The Great Escape image of Steve McQueen (as "The Cooler King") astride his motorcycle has entered silver-screen iconography, alongside Brando on his bike from The Wild One. Based on a true story about a group of POWs who mount a daring breakout from a supposedly inescapable Nazi prison camp, this rousing and suspenseful World War II epic features an all-star cast, including James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasence, James Coburn, and David McCallum. -Jim Emerson A stirring example of courage and the indomitable human spirit, for many John Sturges' The Great Escape is both the definitive World War II drama and the nonpareil prison escape movie. Featuring an unequalled ensemble cast in a rivetingly authentic true-life scenario set to Elmer Bernstein's admirable music (who writes contrapuntal march themes these days?), this picture is both a template for subsequent action-adventure movies and one of the last glories of Golden Age Hollywood. Reunited with the director who made him a star in The Magnificent Seven Steve McQueen gives a career-defining performance as the laconic Hilts, the baseball-loving, motorbike-riding "Cooler King". The rest of the all-male Anglo-American cast-Dickie Attenborough, Donald Pleasance, James Garner, Charles Bronson, David McCallum, James Coburn and Gordon Jackson-make the most of their meaty roles (though you have to forgive Coburn his Australian accent). Closely based on Paul Brickhill's book, the various escape attempts, scrounging, forging and ferreting activities are authentically realised thanks also to the presence on set of technical advisor Wally Flood, one of the original tunnel-digging POWs. Sturges orchestrates the climactic mass break out with total conviction, giving us both high action and very poignant human drama. Without trivialising the grim reality, The Great Escape thrillingly celebrates the heroism of men who never gave up the fight. On the DVD: The Great Escape special edition is indeed a special event. [+]

The Flashing Blade is a tale of high adventure set in 1630 as the dashing Chevalier de Recci (Robert Etcheverry) undertakes a dangerous mission across occupied territory to avert war between France and Spain. This 13-episode serial was made for French television in 1967, and in dubbed form regularly shown on the BBC during school holidays from 1969 through the 1970s (usually when 1965's Adventures of Robinson Crusoe was having a rest). This release is aimed at that generation who, from the spine-tingling theme song onward, remember the show with tremendous affection. Like the classic Hollywood movie serials, each 23-minute episode packs in a couple of action sequences; some plot twists, a little comic relief and very variable acting and costumes. For a children's programme the story is remarkably complex, and takes a while to gather pace. The colours have faded, the use of classical music is clumsy, but the dubbing is surprisingly accomplished. The swashbuckling action is at odds with the more serious historical drama, but viewed with nostalgia The Flashing Blade is thoroughly entertaining vintage TV. -Gary S Dalkin.

The 20th "official" 007 outing released in the 40th anniversary year of the series, Die Another Day is big, loud, spectacular, slick, predictable and as partially satisfying as most Bond movies have been for the last 30 years. Pierce Brosnan gives his best Bond performance to date, forced to suffer torture by scorpion venom administered by a North Korean dominatrix during the Madonna-warbled credits song. He traipses from Cuba to London to Iceland while feuding with a smug insomniac millionaire (Toby Stephens), who admits that he's an evil parody of Bond's own personality. There are many nods to the past: Halle Berry recreates Ursula Andress's entrance from Dr No, the gadget-packed car (which can become invisible) is a Goldfinger-style Aston Martin (albeit a brand-new model), the baddie's line in smuggled "conflict gems" and super-weapons derives from Diamonds Are Forever and the jet-pack from Thunderball can be seen in Q's lab. It's the longest of the franchise to date (two-and-a-quarter hours) and the first to augment stunts and physical effects with major CGI, though the best fight is traditional: a polite club fencing match between Brosnan and Stephens that gets out of hand and turns into a destructive hack-and-slash fest with multiple edged weapons. Berry may be the first Bond girl with an Oscar on her shelf, but she's still stuck with a bad hairdo as well as having to endure 007's worst chat-up lines. Amazingly, most of the old things here do still work, though it's a shame that director Lee Tamahori (Once Were Warriors) wasn't given a better script to play with. On the DVD: Die Another Day arrives on disc in a transfer that makes some of the CGI look less dodgy than it did in cinemas. The first disc includes two separate commentaries: an interesting, enthusiastic technical one with Tamahori and producer Michael Wilson, and a blander drone from Brosnan with input from "bad girl" actress Rosamund Pike. On Disc Two the main extra is "Inside Die Another Day", a 75-minute making-of with the usual 007 DVD extra mix of boosterism and solid background how-the-hell-they-did-it info. [+]

Reinterpreting HG Wells' The Time Machine, one of the most well-loved science fiction classics both as a book and in its 1960 film incarnation, was always going to risk critical condemnation. Yet despite all the problems experienced in making the film (reshoots, September 11 comparison fears, Guy Pearce breaking a rib), this new Time Machine is still great fun. Critics and naysayers may point at the obvious timeline gaffes, the lazy groundlaying for a sequel, or even the radical departure from Wells' scenario, but the film is still gorgeous to look at and imbued with a sense of carefree adventure. Pearce plays Professor Hartdegen with just the right touch of distraction turning into passionate resolve. The secondary cast all manage to make something of their brief on-screen appearances, too, notably Mark Addy as faithful friend Philby, Samantha Mumba as Morlock babe Mara and Jeremy Irons making more of his shadowy baddie than might be thought likely. The film's chief accomplishment is that it in no way supersedes the George Pal version. If anything, it enriches the spirit of fun it has happily inherited. On the DVD: The Time Machine 2002 incarnation has picture (2. 35:1) and sound (Dolby 5. 1) that are as pristine as you'd expect from so recent a digital FX extravaganza. [+]

Warning from Paramount Home Entertainment (UK): The stunts in this movie were performed by professionals, so neither you nor your dumb buddies should attempt anything from this movie. Some critics see the success of Jackass: The Movie as the last nail in the coffin of civilisation-and they're probably right. This compilation of pain-inflicting stunts and embarrassing pranks has no artistic merit whatsoever (which doesn't keep it from being freakishly entertaining). Among other things, Johnny Knoxville and his posse get beaten up by a female kick-boxing champion; shoot bottle rockets out of their rectums; run amok in Japan wearing giant panda bear costumes; swim with whale sharks while holding pounds of brine shrimp in their swimsuits; and get done up in realistic old age makeup so that they can race each other in motorized wheelchairs, among other goofs. It's a weird mixture of machismo and masochism, adolescent recklessness and frat-boy homoeroticism, and some day someone will write a doctoral thesis about how Jackass relates to our safety-obsessed society; in the meantime, just enjoy. -Bret Fetzer.

Directed by Ralph Thomas, Above Us the Waves (1955) tells of a Royal Navy mission to sink the "invincible" German battleship Tirpitz, off the Norwegian coast. John Mills is calm and confident as the mission commander, with strong support from John Gregson and Donald Sinden-all treated by the German personnel as fellow gentlemen when captured. Despite stirring music from Arthur Benjamin, the action sequences are visually no more than adequate, and the film is only a partial success. -Richard Whitehouse.

Computer generated special effects have seldom been so giddy as in Shaolin Soccer, a gleeful fusion of kung fu and a classic Bad News Bears sports story. A former soccer star-whose "golden leg" was broken by a hired mob-assembles a team of former students of Shaolin martial arts, whose assorted skills (indicated by their nicknames, like Mighty Steel Leg and Iron Head) lend themselves to the swift interplay of the world's most popular game. Along the way, the team's leader (Hong Kong comic superstar Stephen Chow) meets a sticky bun baker (Vicki Zhao) whose kung fu is the equal of any of his teammates. Shaolin Soccer is supremely silly-in the final match, their opponents are called Team Evil-but that's part of the fun. American movies rarely achieve this perfect balance of the absurd and the sincere. A delight. -Bret Fetzer.

During the Civil War, Union "Redlegs" attack Southerner Josey Wales's dirt farm and wipe out his family. Seeking vengeance, Wales throws in with a company of Reb guerrillas. Tagged as a renegade after the surrender, he flees west into the vastness of the Indian Territories, where, quite unintentionally, he finds himself cast as the straight-shooting paterfamilias of an ever-growing, spectacularly motley community of misfits and castaways. Which is to say, Josey's personal quest for survival and something like peace of mind evolves into a funky, multicultural allegory of the healing of America. The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976), Clint Eastwood's 31st film as an actor, 20th as international star and 5th as director, was the first to win him widespread respect. Critics had grumbled when the producer-star replaced Philip Kaufman (The Right Stuff) in the director's chair a week into shooting. They ended up cheering when Eastwood delivered both his most sympathetic performance to date and-with the heroic collaboration of cinematographer Bruce Surtees-an impressive Panavision epic that stresses the scruffiness, rather than the scenic splendors, of frontier life. Though it's been honoured with a place in the National Film Registry, Josey Wales is good, not great, Eastwood. The big-gun fetishism can get tiresome, and too many characters exist only to serve as six-gun (and at one point Gatling gun) fodder. But mostly the film is agreeably eccentric, and almost furtively sweet in spirit-a key transitional title in the Eastwood filmography, and one of his most entertaining. [+]

John Wayne hams it up as a one-eyed, broken-down marshal in this 1969 adaptation of Charles Portis's bestselling novel. Kim Darby plays the formal-speaking adolescent who goes to Wayne for help tracking down her father's killer, and singer Glen Campbell straps on his guns to join the quest. Directed by old lion Henry Hathaway (Rawhide), True Grit is largely a showcase for Wayne (who finally won an Oscar), but it is also a decent Western with a particularly stirring final act. -Tom Keogh.

This is a John Wayne Western double-bill featuring The Comancheros (1961) and The Undefeated (1969). Nobody made a fuss about The Comancheros when it came out, yet it has proved to be among the most enduringly entertaining of John Wayne's later Westerns. The Duke, just beginning to crease and thicken toward Rooster Cogburn proportions, plays a veteran Texas Ranger named Jake Cutter who joins forces with a New Orleans dandy (Stuart Whitman) to subdue rampaging Indians and the evil white men behind their uprising. The Comancheros was the last credit for Michael Curtiz (Casablanca), who, ravaged by cancer, ceded much of the direction to Wayne (uncredited) and action specialist Cliff Lyons. With support from Wayne stalwarts James Edward Grant (co-screenplay) and William Clothier (camera), the first of many rousing Elmer Bernstein scores for a Wayne picture and a big, flavourful cast including Lee Marvin (the once and future Liberty Valance), Nehemiah Persoff, Bruce Cabot, and Guinn "Big Boy" Williams (in his last movie), they made a broad, cheerfully bloodthirsty adventure movie for red-meat-eating audiences of all ages. In The Undefeated Wayne and Rock Hudson each play a Civil War commander who, after the ceasefire, lead a community of folks into Mexico to make a fresh start. Hudson is a Southern gentleman; Wayne commanded the Yankee cavalry at Shiloh, where Hudson's brother died. Nevertheless, Rock, with his extended family, and Duke, with his troop of cowboys and 3,000 horses to sell to Emperor Maximilian, soon join forces to outgun banditos and beam paternally over the budding romance between their respective daughter and son. Lingering North-South animosities are celebrated in an obligatory communal fistfight, and the showdown with both Maximilian's lancers and the rebel Juaristas is disconcertingly perfunctory. -Richard T Jameson.

Disney's first animated feature in CinemaScope is now available in widescreen presentations on video, and it is definitely good to get the whole picture. One of the studio's most original and charming movies, the 1955 film tells the story of a rakish, street-smart dog named Tramp, who helps an aristocratic pooch named Lady out of some trouble and then commences a romance with her. Sweet, funny scenes abound, and the combination of innocence and sophistication would have done well in a live-action picture. Peggy Lee co-wrote the songs and provides the voice of the Siamese cats in one of the film's best-known musical sequences. This newly restored version spruces up both sonics and visuals, and a letterbox version is available. - Tom Keogh, Amazon. com.