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Review MGM Entertainment / Road To Hong Kong [1962]
Actors & Directors
  • Joan Collins
  • Norman Panama
  • Dean Martin
  • Bing Crosby
  • Frank Sinatra
  • Bob Hope
Release date: 2004-09-06
Run time: 92 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £3.99

Review Road To Hong Kong [1962] / MGM Entertainment:


Review Universal Pictures UK / Never Give A Sucker An Even Break [1941]
Actors & Directors
  • Edward F. Cline
  • W.C. Fields
Release date: 2008-05-05
Run time: 67 min.
RRP: £9.99
Price: £5.97

Review Never Give A Sucker An Even Break [1941] / Universal Pictures UK:


Review Elstree Hill Entertainment / Buster Keaton - Vol. 1 [1920]
Actors & Directors
  • Buster Keaton
Release date: 2003-08-11
Run time: 75 min.
RRP: £2.99
Price: £2.04

Review Buster Keaton - Vol. 1 [1920] / Elstree Hill Entertainment:


Review Eureka Entertainment / Laurel And Hardy - Bogus Bandits / March Of The Wooden Soldiers [1933]
Actors & Directors
  • Stan Laurel
  • Hal Roach
  • Oliver Hardy
Release date: 2004-10-04
RRP: £15.99
Price: £9.99

Review Laurel And Hardy - Bogus Bandits / March Of The Wooden Soldiers [1933] / Eureka Entertainment:


Review Columbia TriStar / Twentieth Century [1934] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • John Barrymore
  • Ralph Forbes
  • Roscoe Karns
  • Walter Connolly
  • Howard Hawks
  • Carole Lombard
Release date: 2005-02-22
Run time: 91 min.
Price: £5.23

Review Twentieth Century [1934] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Columbia TriStar:


Review ITV DVD / Square Peg, The / Follow A Star [1958]
Actors & Directors
  • Richard Wattis
  • Norman Wisdom
  • June Laverick
  • Robert Asher
  • Hattie Jacques
  • Jerry Desmonde
Release date: 2003-05-12
Run time: 184 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £4.01

Review Square Peg, The / Follow A Star [1958] / ITV DVD:

In The Square Peg Norman Wisdom plays one of a pair of council workmen who, while repairing the road outside an army base, come to illustrate the oxymoronic nature of the phrase "military intelligence". Finding themselves drafted, the workmen are sent to repair the roads ahead of the Allied advance through war-torn Europe by the sergeant they previously embarrassed. Norman finds himself behind the German lines, joins up with French Resistance, gets captured then sets out to rescue British prisoners from a German military HQ by impersonating General Schreiber. Of course Wisdom plays Schreiber too. The Square Peg is the film that introduced Norman Wisdom's famous catch-phrase, "Mr. Grimsdale!". Also here Hattie Jacques gets to sing a remarkable duet with Wisdom, and a pre-Goldfinger Honor Blackman provides the love interest. Following his rising star was just what Norman Wisdom's audience had been doing all through the 1950s and, by 1959, and after six films with director John Paddy Carstairs, it was time for a change. Hence Robert Asher made his directorial debut with Follow a Star. The plot is a comedy version of A Star is Born (1954), with Norman yet again playing a dreaming shop worker, this time aspiring to singing stardom. [+]
Vernon Carew (played by Wisdom regular Jerry Desmonde) is the fading singer who schemes to use Wisdom's talent to sustain his own rapidly failing career, while the girl is overlooked starlette June Laverick. Norman is surrounded by a particularly strong supporting cast, with Hattie Jacques returning from The Square Peg (1958), Richard Wattis, John Le Mesurier, Fenella Fielding, Ron Moody and, uncredited, future Bond villain Charles Grey. -Gary S Dalkin.

Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / M.A.S.H. - Single Disc Edition [1969]
Actors & Directors
  • Robert Duvall
  • Elliott Gould
  • Tom Skerritt
  • Sally Kellerman
  • Donald Sutherland
  • Robert Altman
Release date: 2003-10-13
Run time: 111 min.
RRP: £17.99
Price: £1.10

Review M.A.S.H. - Single Disc Edition [1969] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:

It's set during the Korean War, in a mobile army surgical hospital. But no one seeing MASH in 1970 confused the film for anything but a caustic comment on the Vietnam War; this is one of the counterculture movies that exploded into the mainstream at the end of the 1960s. Director Robert Altman had laboured for years in television and sporadic feature work when this smash-hit comedy made his name (and allowed him to create an astonishing string of offbeat pictures, culminating in the masterpiece Nashville). Altman's style of cruel humour, overlapping dialogue, and densely textured visuals brought the material to life in an all-new kind of war movie (or, more precisely, antiwar movie). Audiences had never seen anything like it: vaudeville routines played against spurting blood, fuelled with open ridicule of authority. The cast is led by Elliott Gould and Donald Sutherland, as the outrageous surgeons Hawkeye Pierce and Trapper John McIntyre, with Robert Duvall as the uptight Major Burns and Sally Kellerman in an Oscar-nominated role as nurse "Hot Lips" Houlihan. The film's huge success spawned the long-running TV series, a considerably softer take on the material; of the film's cast, only Gary Burghoff repeated his role on the small screen, as the slightly clairvoyant Radar O'Reilly. -Robert Horton MASH-a 1970 comedy-drama set among surgeons drafted into the Korean war-was a breakthrough not just for director Robert Altman but for movie-making in general. Although set in the 50s, there are few who did not realise that the film's anti-war messages were directed at the US involvement in Vietnam. Indeed, the Pentagon banned US servicemen from seeing the film. [+]
Starring Donald Sutherland as Hawkeye Pierce and Elliot Gould as Trapper John McIntyre, two hip young surgeons drafted against their will. Their general attitude-while never corroding either their humanity or their professionalism as surgeons-is one of insolence towards military authority and the arbitrary structures and regulations continually droning from the tannoy system. The film, too, thrives on a lack of attention to conventional order, with its cross-dialogue and random, episodic style reflecting the vivacious and unbuttoned feel of the content. However, MASH has dated and much of what seemed like "liberating" high jinks, today smacks of sexist, frathouse boorishness and harassment, especially at the expense of Major "Hotlips" Hoolihan (Sally Kellerman), while the episode in which "Painless" plans a suicide out of a fear of being gay reflects the persistence of homophobia even in 60s counterculture. Despite this MASH feels ahead of its time and certainly sharper and blacker than the too-cute sitcom it spawned. On the DVD: this is an excellent restoration, overseen by Altman himself, in which any obfuscation from the original have been cleaned up, especially the sound quality. As well as a commentary from Altman, there are three separate documentaries, featuring interviews with Altman, the cast and screenwriter Ring Lardner Jr, who had been blacklisted during the anti-Communist witch-hunt which swept through Hollywood in the 1950s. We learn he was initially appalled at how little of his script Altman actually used but was mollified by the Academy Award he received. Altman is candid about the making of the movie ("It wasn't released by Fox, it escaped from Fox"). There's an abundance of similarly rich, anecdotal material here. -David Stubbs.

Review ITV DVD / Carry On - Doctors And Nurses Collection - Digi Stack 2
Actors & Directors
  • Kenneth Williams
  • Sid James
  • Charles Hawtrey
  • Gerald Thomas
  • Joan Sims
  • Jim Dale
Release date: 2005-03-14
Run time: 521 min.
RRP: £34.99
Price: £5.86

Review Carry On - Doctors And Nurses Collection - Digi Stack 2 / ITV DVD:


Review Universal Studios / A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court/The Emporer Waltz (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Bing Crosby
  • Billy Wilder
  • Rhonda Fleming
  • Cedric Hardwicke
  • Tay Garnett
  • William Bendix
  • Murvyn Vye
Release date: 2003-05-06
Run time: 214 min.
Price: £4.40

Review A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court/The Emporer Waltz (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Universal Studios:


Review Whe Europe Limited / His Girl Friday [1940]
Actors & Directors
  • Rosalind Russell
  • Howard Hawks
  • Cary Grant
  • Gene Lockhart
  • Porter Hall
  • Ralph Bellamy
Release date: 2003-12-08
Run time: 92 min.
RRP: £4.99
Price: £1.40

Review His Girl Friday [1940] / Whe Europe Limited:

His Girl Friday is one of the five greatest dialogue comedies ever made. Howard Hawks had his cast play it at breakneck speed, and audiences hyperventilate trying to finish with one laugh so they can do justice to the four that have accumulated in the meantime. Rosalind Russell, not Hawks' first choice to play Hildy Johnson-the ace newsperson whom demonic editor Walter Burns is trying to keep from quitting and getting married-is triumphant in the part, holding her own as "one of the guys" and creating an enduring feminist icon. Cary Grant's Walter Burns is a force of nature, giving a performance of such concentrated frenzy and diamond brilliance that you owe it to yourself to devote at least one viewing of the movie to watching him alone. But then you have to go back (lucky you) and watch it again for the sake of the press-room gang-Roscoe Karns, Porter Hall, Cliff Edwards, Regis Toomey, Frank Jenks, and others-the kind of ensemble work that gets character actors onto Parnassus. -Richard T Jameson, Amazon. com.

Review Rhino Home Video / The Best of Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In [1968] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Dick Whittington
  • Barbara Sharma
  • Sammy Davis Jr.
  • Harvey Jason
  • Jud Strunk
Release date: 2003-06-24
Run time: 360 min.
Price: £17.95

Review The Best of Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In [1968] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Rhino Home Video:


Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / Bright Eyes [1934]
Actors & Directors
  • David Butler
  • Shirley Temple
Release date: 2006-10-02
RRP: £12.99
Price: £3.39

Review Bright Eyes [1934] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:


Review Elstree Hill Entertainment / Buster Keaton - Vol. 2 [1920]
Actors & Directors
  • Buster Keaton
Release date: 2003-11-10
Run time: 80 min.
RRP: £2.99
Price: £2.15

Review Buster Keaton - Vol. 2 [1920] / Elstree Hill Entertainment:


Review Columbia TriStar / The Trouble With Angels [1966] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Mary Wickes
  • Camilla Sparv
  • Binnie Barnes
  • Rosalind Russell
  • Ida Lupino
  • Marge Redmond
Release date: 2003-11-11
Run time: 111 min.
Price: £4.91

Review The Trouble With Angels [1966] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Columbia TriStar:


Review C'est La Vie / Une Parisienne [1957]
Actors & Directors
  • Madeleine LeBeau
  • Noël Roquevert
  • Charles Boyer
  • Michel Boisrond
  • Henri Vidal
  • Brigitte Bardot
Release date: 2003-09-29
Run time: 86 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £6.11

Review Une Parisienne [1957] / C'est La Vie:


Review Uca / Platinum Blonde [1931]
Actors & Directors
  • Frank Capra
  • Jean Harlow
  • Loretta Young
Release date: 2005-03-07
Run time: 85 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £3.77

Review Platinum Blonde [1931] / Uca:


Review Paramount / Fancy Pants [1950] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Lea Penman
  • Lucille Ball
  • Jack Kirkwood
  • Bob Hope
  • George Marshall
  • Bruce Cabot
Release date: 2004-06-29
Run time: 92 min.
Price: £3.20

Review Fancy Pants [1950] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Paramount:


Review Warner Home Video / Entertaining Mr Sloane [1969]
Actors & Directors
  • Beryl Reid
  • Harry Andrews
  • Alan Webb
  • Peter McEnery
  • Douglas Hickox
Release date: 1994-08-01
Run time: 90 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £32.95

Review Entertaining Mr Sloane [1969] / Warner Home Video:


Review ITV DVD / The Importance Of Being Earnest [1952]
Actors & Directors
  • Anthony Asquith
  • Michael Denison
  • Edith Evans
  • Richard Wattis
  • Walter Hudd
  • Michael Redgrave
Release date: 2001-04-30
Run time: 114 min.
Price: £10.99

Review The Importance Of Being Earnest [1952] / ITV DVD:

If you're looking for the definitive example of dry wit, look no further than this 1952 version of The Importance of Being Earnest. Of course, it helps to have Oscar Wilde's beloved play as source material, but this exquisite adaptation has a charmed life of its own, with a perfectly matched director and a once-in-a-lifetime cast. Mix these ingredients with Wilde's inimitable repartee, and you've got a comedic soufflé that's cooked to perfection. Opening with a proscenium nod to its theatrical origins, the film turns Wilde's comedy of clever deception and mixed identities into a cinematic treat, and while the 10-member cast is uniformly superb, special credit must be given to Dame Edith Evans, reprising her stage role as the imperiously stuffy Lady Bracknell. To hear her Wilde-ly hilarious inflections and elongated syllables is to witness British comedy in its purest form. -Jeff Shannon, Amazon. com.

Review Republic Pictures / The Bells of St. Mary's [1945] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Ingrid Bergman
  • Ruth Donnelly
  • Leo McCarey
  • Bing Crosby
  • William Gargan
  • Henry Travers
Release date: 2003-09-23
Run time: 126 min.
Price: £5.09

Review The Bells of St. Mary's [1945] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Republic Pictures:


Models & Brands:
Road To Hong Kong [1962], Never Give A Sucker An Even Break [1941], Buster Keaton - Vol. 1 [1920], Laurel And Hardy - Bogus Bandits / March Of The Wooden Soldiers [1933], Twentieth Century [1934] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Square Peg, The / Follow A Star [1958], M.A.S.H. - Single Disc Edition [1969], Carry On - Doctors And Nurses Collection - Digi Stack 2, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court/The Emporer Waltz (REGION 1) (NTSC), His Girl Friday [1940], The Best of Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In [1968] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Bright Eyes [1934], Buster Keaton - Vol. 2 [1920], The Trouble With Angels [1966] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Une Parisienne [1957], Platinum Blonde [1931], Fancy Pants [1950] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Entertaining Mr Sloane [1969], The Importance Of Being Earnest [1952], The Bells of St. Mary's [1945] (REGION 1) (NTSC)

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