7-across – Trailing badly : RINGTAIL

9-across – Time to forget about time : TOMTIT

10-across – Port running short : DOVE

11-across – Smoother fish : SANDERLING

12-across – Slithers badly with pulpy stuff around : MISSEL

14-across – Maybe claret’s acidic : REDSTART

15-across – An ’orrible place outside port : ORIOLE

17-across – Join with partners at card table : SEAMEW

20-across – Bathe by coastal hazard? : LAVEROCK

22-across – See 12 : THRUSH

23-across – Another broadcast to draw in viewer : HONEYEATER

24-across – Loud hooter : FOWL

25-across – Holy dope with nothing to hide : PIGEON

26-across – Brief love affair making female celebrity : STARLING

1-down – Revolutionary soldiers in repeated word calling attention to emperor : HIROHITO

2-down – There’s nothing good about villain : OGRE

3-down – Modern miss in upsetting experience — so one in distress? : DAMSEL

4-down – One’s present PM’s bringing in end for the Left : ATTENDEE

5-down – Maybe watch someone unimportant : SMALLTIMER

6-down – There’s a place in Middlesex for bowler but not opener : PINNER

8-down – Fun to be had around a new town : LANARK

13-down – Irish politicians always imbibing booze? That’s an inhuman complaint : SWINEFEVER

16-down – John noticed agenda’s fifth item: Unfinished business : LOOSEEND

18-down – We’ll need women in smart TV show : WESTWING

19-down – Girl brought on board to get fish : SKATES

21-down – Lord upset over rising wickedness : ADONIS

22-down – Ball goes into river somewhere by the sea : TORBAY

24-down – Church congregation to go bust : FOLD

1-across – Wants political biopic shown in bar, Oscar contender : BLACKSWAN

6-across – Part of the house acclaimed old movie star : GABLE

9-across – Director and actor taking part in challenge : ALLEN

10-across – Common sense about where Bing and Bob went in 1947 in Hitchcock classic : NOTORIOUS

11-across – Allowed line introducing Spielberg hit : LET

12-across – Absorbing story blends peril with disruption : SPELLBINDER

14-across – Comic strips used without copyright for film texts : SCRIPTS

15-across – Far from average former great actor holding leading part in movie : EXTREME

16-across – Location of many catches, where Jaws was partly filmed : THEDEEP

19-across – Joined in editing page included in cut : SPLICED

22-across – Not a winner this time around? Perhaps on a different occasion : ANOTHERYEAR

23-across – McGraw in boxing movie : ALI

24-across – Partial angle about odd dream for superhero : SPIDERMAN

26-across – Movie star large in reputation : NOLTE

27-across – It was instrumental in making movie that got Holly Hunter an Oscar : PIANO

28-across – Lacking true grit, even retreating across river? Not so : NERVELESS

1-down – Musicians who also made films, unusually able set : BEATLES

2-down – In hall, starting like team of Oscar presenters : ALLSTAR

3-down – Filmed historic event in Washington : KINGSSPEECH

4-down – Debra and others, players on the fringes : WINGERS

5-down – She’s crazy a lot in name part : NATALIE

6-down – Fish in area covered by maker of 3 down : GAR

7-down – Movie agent that’s hugging large comic strip heroine : BLONDIE

8-down – Unfinished Elm Street production in British studio location : ELSTREE

13-down – Crenelation reconstructed for historical epic : INTOLERANCE

16-down – Use part in unconventional way — it’s what many an Oscar winner does : TEARSUP

17-down – Arousing films, for example, using Beethoven’s music, including his fourth : EROTICA

18-down – See 5 : PORTMAN

19-down – More austere in ultimate part, Mirren’s 2006 role : STERNER

20-down – C for Chaplin, say : CHARLIE

21-down – Directors in vehicles, several holding Oscar, finally : DRIVERS

25-down – Feeling of self-importance obvious in The Godfather : EGO

1-across – Before little one emerg­es, an aquatic bird shelters brown back : ANTENATAL

6-across – Nation for sale? : TOGO

8-across – Landlord has to declare in retrieval of payment : TAVERNER

9-across – Strange being inside baby animal, as it is unborn : FOETAL

10-across – Casually named work of Michelangelo in an inverted state : NEVADA

11-across – Bacon not entirely accepts one freaky artist! : LEONARDO

12-across – A Cuban leader retired, revolutionary sort? : CASTRO

15-across – City team doesn’t have to reveal supporter : SKELETON

16-across – Calvary became hot in recollection of a diary : GOLGOTHA

19-across – See 2 : SUPPER

21-across – Stick outside as window frame : CASEMENT

22-across – See 6 down : MUTANT

24-across – Capital of the country, capital of Albania : TIRANA

25-across – 11’s nation holds on while in recession : MONALISA

26-across – Head scalped in days gone by : ONCE

27-across – Where international cricketers play fast, having lost opener: no will here : INTESTACY

1-down – Saw the era of Saatchi & Saatchi? : ADAGE

2-down – 11’s wasted less with that part of a shoe : THELAST

3-down – See 6 : NINJA

4-down – See 6 : TURTLES

5-down – Romeo and Juliet gobbling newt — what remains? : LEFTOVERS

6-down – 11 was one of those extraordinary men, just genuine talent at art : TEENAGE

7-down – August goes with rain, Scotland ultimately stormy : GRANDIOSE

13-down – 11’s delivery theirs in short movement : ADORATION

14-down – See 13 : OFTHEMAGI

17-down – Potential danger with pineapple, pin being pulled and fruit going off? : GRENADE

18-down – Go towards and lead astray : ATTEMPT

20-down – Bone specialist finally placed in dish : PATELLA

22-down – Sign in sum dashed? : MINUS

23-down – Mean to get some protection as tyrant : NASTY

9-across – See 22 : ANDHEARTY

10-across – Inspirer of poetry by lecturer at Oxford : ERATO

11-across – Firm on fire is causing bellyache : COLITIS

12-across – Brutus, it was said, made good return in case : NOBLEST

13-across – A team’s centre of revolution : AXIS

14-across – Wee woolly with springy harness : BABYJUMPER

16-across – Runner to behold setter in body cavity : COELOME

17-across – Wizard with standard return outside : GANDALF

19-across – Alfresco eateries are a bore, regressing into adolescence : TEAGARDENS

22-across – Fit as a fiddle though heat had nearly killed me : HALE

24-across – Plant and lay out from varied 22 9 : HEATHER

25-across – Religion about half priced? It’s my fault : CULPRIT

26-across – Like men we won : ASHES

27-across – Home Christian keeping pet as a sign : INDICATOR

1-down – No holds barred in casual approach to fielding? : CATCHASCATCHCAN

2-down – Scenes for 26: : ADELAIDE

3-down – … : PERTH

4-down – … : BRISBANE

5-down – … : SYDNEY

6-down – … : MELBOURNE

7-down – Call to puke regrettably after state of 3 : WAKEUP

8-down – Fish turned to bull in Spain when Keith, correspondent of the Queen, gets appropriate degree : DOCTOROFLETTERS

15-down – Religious life is belief in royalty without the royal : MONACHISM

17-down – Lack of detectives probing horse is disastrous to race : GENOCIDE

18-down – Promptness, city style, arresting redhead : ALACRITY

20-down – Bisyllabic hooligan meets trisyllabic American : APACHE

21-down – Scientist additional to 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6? : DARWIN

23-down – Girl coming under the foregoing? : ALICE

7-across – Northerner’s age — or diet — has no bounds : GEORDIE

8-across – Say Evelyn said Hank : WARLOCK

9-across – Having no master from the start, pro swallows back drink at far edge of green : FREE

10-across – Small sketch of Tom and Spike? : THUMBNAIL

12-across – See 15 : BRAIN

13-across – Lean right and put out bust : BANKRUPT

15-across – Charlie, 1960s-style girl: underwear accepted : BIRD

16-across – Miss going east of eastern tip of Shandong : GLASS

17-across – See 9 : BORN

18-across – Gave credit for publicity about writer : ASCRIBED

20-across – Familiar state, yet un­familiar : MATEY

21-across – Dog hides tail after phosphorous feed : PROVENDER

22-across – Say Bill is rejected : CAGE

24-across – Flanks of inferior antelope : IRELAND

25-across – Performing is welcomed by the Bee Gees, family-wise : GIBBONS

1-down – Strange date ditched : WEIR

2-down – A friend he lost : FREEHAND

3-down – No time to drink up : PISTON

4-down – Doctor Richard Leakey’s fossil hunters famously did in 1984 : SAWBONES

5-down – Broadcast about sports body star : ALTAIR

6-down – As carboxylic acid is lacy, top to bottom : ACYL

11-down – Out of bed, possibly dreadlocked, so dressed down : UPBRAIDED

12-down – Chablis ousts tea on Sunday! : BLISS

14-down – Catherine the Sixth : PARRY

16-down – Side Wall has old Hollywood heartthrob teamed with Close : GABLEEND

17-down – But beach bum is a water softener : BATHCUBE

19-down – Act like a pig, covering flipping lot with eggs : ROOTLE

20-down – Big fish — both sides consumed by chief : MARLIN

21-down – Gin tipped over? : PART

23-down – Kelly, one of many passed on? : GENE