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Review Cinema Club / Just My Luck [1957]
Actors & Directors
  • John Paddy Carstairs
  • Margaret Rutherford
  • Delphi Lawrence
  • Leslie Phillips
  • Jill Dixon
  • Norman Wisdom
Release date: 2001-11-12
Run time: 82 min.
Creator: Peter Cusick
RRP: £9.99
Price: £19.27

Review Just My Luck [1957] / Cinema Club:

Just My Luck was an important step in the career of Norman Wisdom for several reasons. It's principally notable for the introduction of actor Edward Chapman, whom many would come to know as series regular Mr Grimsdale. Here he's the stuffy foil to Norman's romantic plans regarding his jewel-making job, where he'll do anything to possess some of the wealth about him. The chance comes in the form of an accumulator bet at Goodwood races thanks to a slimy Leslie Phillips. Another star cameo of note was a second appearance by Margaret Rutherford (after Trouble in Store) as an eccentric animal owner. But the real advance with the Wisdom formula was that-after a reasonably serious plot line-Norman finally gets the girl. On the DVD: This is a straight transfer from video. So although the mono sound and 4:3 ratio don't improve on anything previously available, at least it won't deteriorate further. -Paul Tonks.

Review Arrow Films / Millionairess / Trial And Error With Peter Sellers [1960]
Actors & Directors
  • Peter Sellers
  • Alastair Sim
  • Sophia Loren
  • Anthony Asquith
  • Vittorio De Sica
  • Dennis Price
Release date: 2006-05-29
Run time: 165 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £3.33

Review Millionairess / Trial And Error With Peter Sellers [1960] / Arrow Films:


Review Sony Pictures / I Dream of Jeannie: The Complete Second Season [2006] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Claudio Guzman
  • Barbara Eden
  • Larry Hagman
  • Hayden Rorke
  • Hal Cooper
  • Larry Hagman
  • Barton MacLane
  • Bill Daily
  • Richard Goode
Release date: 2006-07-11
Run time: 680 min.
Price: £20.72

Review I Dream of Jeannie: The Complete Second Season [2006] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Sony Pictures:


Review Warner Home Video / My Fair Lady [1965] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Gladys Cooper
  • Wilfrid Hyde-White
  • Suzie Galler
  • Audrey Hepburn
  • George Cukor
  • Rex Harrison
  • Stanley Holloway
Release date: 2004-02-03
Run time: 173 min.
Creator: Alan Jay Lerner
Price: £6.25

Review My Fair Lady [1965] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Warner Home Video:

Hollywood's legendary "woman's director," George Cukor (The Women, The Philadelphia Story), transformed Audrey Hepburn into street-urchin-turned-proper-lady Eliza Doolittle in this film version of the Lerner and Loewe musical. Based on George Bernard Shaw's play Pygmalion, My Fair Lady stars Rex Harrison as linguist Henry Higgins (Harrison also played the role, opposite Julie Andrews, on stage), who draws Eliza into a social experiment that works almost too well. The letterbox edition of this film on video certainly pays tribute to the pageantry of Cukor's set, but it also underscores a certain visual stiffness that can slow viewer enthusiasm just a tad. But it's really star wattage that keeps this film exciting, that and such great songs as "On the Street Where You Live" and "I Could Have Danced All Night. " Actor Jeremy Brett, who gained a huge following later in life portraying Sherlock Holmes, is quite electric as Eliza's determined suitor. -Tom Keogh Hollywood's legendary "woman's director," George Cukor (The Women, The Philadelphia Story), transformed Audrey Hepburn into street-urchin-turned-proper-lady Eliza Doolittle in this film version of the Lerner and Loewe musical. Based on George Bernard Shaw's play Pygmalion, My Fair Lady stars Rex Harrison as linguist Henry Higgins (Harrison also played the role, opposite Julie Andrews, on stage), who draws Eliza into a social experiment that works almost too well. Star wattage keeps this film exciting, that and such great songs as "On the Street Where You Live" and "I Could Have Danced All Night. " Actor Jeremy Brett, who gained a huge following later in life portraying Sherlock Holmes, is quite electric as Eliza's determined suitor. -Tom Keogh.

Review Siren DVD / TV Comedy Classics [1959]
Release date: 2003-04-21
Run time: 319 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £3.08

Review TV Comedy Classics [1959] / Siren DVD:


Review MGM Entertainment / Hucksters, The / San Francisco [1947]
Actors & Directors
  • Jack Conway
  • Spencer Tracy
  • Jeanette MacDonald
  • W.S. Van Dyke
  • Deborah Kerr
  • Jack Holt
  • Clark Gable
Release date: 1994-07-04
Run time: 222 min.
Creator: Robert E. Hopkins
RRP: £12.99
Price: £37.95

Review Hucksters, The / San Francisco [1947] / MGM Entertainment:

As Victor Norman, Clark Gable plays a returning World War II veteran looking for a job with an advertising agency. He succeeds, landing a good position with a nice salary, but soon finds out that ethics and integrity are in short supply in the rarefied world of corporate advertising. With a big soap account on the brink of leaving the ad agency, things get a bit desperate as the agency struggles to hang onto the company's business. They round up a war widow for an endorsement, and their client is temporarily happy, but soon Gable finds the man to be a harsh and demanding taskmaster. This acerbic comedy may seem a little thin by today's standards but some of the commentary on the gullibility of the American-buying public is still pretty fresh half a century later. Sydney Greenstreet excels as the tyrannical, somewhat disgusting head of the soap firm and Deborah Kerr makes her American screen debut as Gable's war-widow love interest in The Hucksters. -Jerry Renshaw.

Review Alpha Video / The Whispering Shadow, Vol. 2 (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Colbert Clark
  • Malcolm McGregor
  • Bela Lugosi
  • Henry B. Walthall
  • George J. Lewis
  • Viva Tattersall
  • Albert Herman
Release date: 2004-01-27
Run time: 111 min.
Creator: Wyndham Gittens
Price: £2.58

Review The Whispering Shadow, Vol. 2 (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Alpha Video:


Review 20th Century Fox / John Wayne: American Hero, Hollywood Legend [1961] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Michael Curtiz
  • Rock Hudson
  • Henry Hathaway
  • Stewart Granger
  • Andrew V. McLaglen
  • John Wayne
  • Stuart Whitman
  • John Wayne
  • Ina Balin
Release date: 2003-05-20
Run time: 347 min.
Creator: James Edward Grant
Price: £16.02

Review John Wayne: American Hero, Hollywood Legend [1961] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / 20th Century Fox:


Review www.a2zcds.com / Gulliver's Travels [1939]
Actors & Directors
  • Sam Parker; Jack Mercer; Pinto Colvig
Release date: 2005-06-01
Run time: 73 min.
RRP: £14.99
Price: £6.25

Review Gulliver's Travels [1939] / www.a2zcds.com:


Review Image Entertainment / The Elusive Avengers [1966]
Actors & Directors
  • Savely Kramarov
  • Boris Sichkin
  • Inna Churikova
  • Lev Sverdlin
  • Edmond Keosayan
  • Gleb Strizhenov
Release date: 2005-07-12
Run time: 78 min.
Price: £12.60

Review The Elusive Avengers [1966] / Image Entertainment:


Review Cinema Club / Press For Time [1966]
Actors & Directors
  • Allan Cuthbertson
  • Norman Wisdom
  • Derek Bond
  • Angela Browne
  • Tracey Crisp
  • Robert Asher
Release date: 2000-08-14
Run time: 98 min.
Creator: Eddie Leslie
RRP: £5.99
Price: £7.99

Review Press For Time [1966] / Cinema Club:

In Press for Time Norman Wisdom offered his version of the crusading reporter movie, though by 1966 time was running out for Norman's style of big-screen comedy. Wisdom had played duel roles in The Square Peg (1958) and On the Beat (1962), but perhaps a sign of his growing frustration with the formulaic nature of his pictures was that he stretched himself to play not just his usual underdog hero, but also his own mother and his grandfather, the Prime Minister. Wisdom also co-wrote the movie, and as a reporter in a small seaside town causes chaos for the council, organises a beauty parade and manages to reprise his drag act (he dressed as a female nurse in A Stitch in Time) as a suffragette. This was really the penultimate Norman Wisdom comedy, since apart from What's Good for the Goose (1969), he has only made two more features, William Friedkin's The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and the belated thriller Double X (1992). Though now nearing the end of his years as a movie star, Wisdom shows himself to still be as polished as ever at his own brand of good-natured slapstick. Fans can be sure that with Norman around there's Trouble in Store (1953). -Gary S. Dalkin.

Review Shout! Factory / That Girl: Season Three (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Ted Bessell
  • Bonnie Scott
  • James Sheldon
  • Homer Powell
  • Jay Sandrich
  • Bernie Kopell
  • Alan Rafkin
  • Marlo Thomas
  • Lew Parker
  • Jeffrey Hayden
Release date: 2007-08-07
Run time: 660 min.
Price: £19.03

Review That Girl: Season Three (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Shout! Factory:


Review Contender Entertainment Group / The Avengers - The M. Appeal Collection - Mission 2 [1961]
Actors & Directors
  • Patrick Macnee
  • Diana Rigg
Release date: 1998-08-10
Run time: 150 min.
Creator: Sydney Newman
Price: £12.99

Review The Avengers - The M. Appeal Collection - Mission 2 [1961] / Contender Entertainment Group:


Review Warner Home Video / Private's Progress [1956]
Actors & Directors
  • Richard Attenborough
  • Terry-Thomas
  • Ronald Adam
  • Dennis Price
  • John Boulting
  • Henry B. Longhurst
Release date: 2004-02-16
Run time: 96 min.
Creator: Frank Harvey
RRP: £13.99
Price: £41.99

Review Private's Progress [1956] / Warner Home Video:

With a remarkable cast headlined by Ian Carmichael, Richard Attenborough, Dennis Price and Terry Thomas, WWII army comedy Private's Progress was one of the major British hits of 1956. Carmichael is Stanley Windrush, a naïve young soldier who during training falls in with the streetwise Private Cox (Attenborough). Windrush's uncle is the even more ambitiously corrupt Colonel Tracepurcel (Price), who plans to divert the war effort to liberate art treasures already looted by the Germans. The first half of the film is quite pedestrian, though the pace picks up considerably once the heist gets underway, and the cheery tone masks a really rather dark and cynical heart. Carmichael's innocent abroad quickly wears thin, but Attenborough and Price steal the film, as well as the paintings, with typically excellent turns. With a nod in the direction of Ealing's The Ladykillers (1955) the film also anticipates the attitudes of both The League of Gentlemen (1959) and Joseph Heller's novel Catch 22 (1961), though lacks the latter's greater sophistication. The cast also contains such British stalwarts as William Hartnell, Peter Jones, Ian Bannen, John Le Mesurier, Christopher Lee and David Lodge, and was sufficiently popular to reunite all the major players for the superior sequel, I'm Alright Jack (1959). On the DVD: Private's Progress is presented in black and white at 4:3 Academy ratio, though the film appears to have been shot full frame and then unmasked for home viewing so there is more top and bottom to the images than at the cinema. The print used shows constant minor damage and is quite grainy, though no more than expected for a low-budget film of the time. The mono sound is average and unremarkable, and there are no special features. [+]
-Gary S Dalkin.

Review ITV DVD / That Riviera Touch [1966]
Actors & Directors
  • Suzanne Lloyd
  • Cliff Owen
  • Armand Mestral
  • Ernie Wise
  • Eric Morecambe
  • Paul Stassino
Release date: 2002-05-20
Run time: 93 min.
Creator: Sidney Green
RRP: £5.99
Price: £2.50

Review That Riviera Touch [1966] / ITV DVD:


Review Warner Home Video / My Favorite Wife [1940] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Ann Shoemaker
  • Gail Patrick
  • Garson Kanin
  • Randolph Scott
  • Irene Dunne
  • Cary Grant
Release date: 2004-06-01
Run time: 88 min.
Creator: John McClain
Price: £9.08

Review My Favorite Wife [1940] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Warner Home Video:


Review A&E Home Video / The Avengers '65: Set 2 [1961] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Diana Rigg
  • Patrick Macnee
Release date: 1999-08-31
Run time: 400 min.
Creator: Sydney Newman
Price: £12.84

Review The Avengers '65: Set 2 [1961] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / A&E Home Video:


Review Alpha Video / This Is the Army [1943] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Irving Berlin
  • Herbert Anderson
  • Warner Anderson
  • Murray Alper
  • Irving Bacon
Release date: 2004-08-31
Run time: 114 min.
Creator: Max Steiner
Price: £12.43

Review This Is the Army [1943] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Alpha Video:


Review Alpha Video / Juke Joint/Reet, Petite, and Gone [1947]
Actors & Directors
  • Louis Jordan
  • Spencer Williams
  • Mantan Moreland
Release date: 2006-06-27
Run time: 128 min.
Price: £2.99

Review Juke Joint/Reet, Petite, and Gone [1947] / Alpha Video:


Review ITV DVD / Carry On Camping [1968]
Actors & Directors
  • Terry Scott
  • Charles Hawtrey
  • Sid James
  • Kenneth Williams
  • Joan Sims
  • Gerald Thomas
Release date: 1997-06-16
Run time: 84 min.
Creator: Talbot Rothwell
RRP: £5.99
Price: £10.49

Review Carry On Camping [1968] / ITV DVD:

There are three periods to Carry On. Early on, they were typical British light comedy capers, hardly risqué. By the 1970s, the loveable double-entendres had been replaced by an almost nasty sleaziness, culminating in 1977's Carry On Emanuelle. 1969's Carry On Camping, thankfully, belongs to the Golden Years. Pretty much everybody is present and correct, if not politically. Sid James is a likely-ish, if slightly elderly lad, persuading Joan Sims to join him at what he secretly expects to be a nudist colony. Terry Scott is a put-upon suburbian, coerced into outdoor vacations by his ghastly, horsey-laughed wife, while Charles Hawtrey is the campest of campers who befriends them. Kenneth Williams, who alone makes this worth watching, is gloriously ridiculous as head of a girl's school, Chayste Place, with Hattie Jacques as Matron and Barbara Windsor as one of the 30 year old fifth formers in their charge. Technically it's terrible stuff, with Barbara Windsor's flying bra, laboured puns galore, peeping tomfoolery, punchlines visible two miles off, "comedy" incidental music and a reactionary denouement in which they chase off a bunch of hippies. Yet if you don't chuckle at least half a dozen times during this, however many times you've seen it, there's probably something wrong with you. [+]
-David Stubbs Made in 1969, Carry On Camping belongs to the Golden Years before the loveable double-entendres had been replaced by an almost nasty sleaziness. Pretty much everybody is present and correct, if not politically. Sid James is a likely-ish, if slightly elderly lad, persuading Joan Sims to join him at what he secretly expects to be a nudist colony. Terry Scott is a put-upon suburban, coerced into outdoor vacations by his ghastly, horsey-laughed wife, while Charles Hawtrey is the campest of campers who befriends them. Kenneth Williams, who alone makes this worth watching, is gloriously ridiculous as head of a girl's school, Chayste Place, with Hattie Jacques as Matron and Barbara Windsor as one of the 30-year-old fifth formers in their charge. Technically it's terrible stuff, with Barbara Windsor's flying bra, laboured puns galore, peeping tomfoolery, punchlines visible two miles off, "comedy" incidental music and a reactionary denouement in which they chase off a bunch of hippies. Yet if you don't chuckle at least half a dozen times during this, however many times you've seen it, there's probably something wrong with you. -David Stubbs.

Models & Brands:
Just My Luck [1957], Millionairess / Trial And Error With Peter Sellers [1960], I Dream of Jeannie: The Complete Second Season [2006] (REGION 1) (NTSC), My Fair Lady [1965] (REGION 1) (NTSC), TV Comedy Classics [1959], Hucksters, The / San Francisco [1947], The Whispering Shadow, Vol. 2 (REGION 1) (NTSC), John Wayne: American Hero, Hollywood Legend [1961] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Gulliver's Travels [1939], The Elusive Avengers [1966], Press For Time [1966], That Girl: Season Three (REGION 1) (NTSC), The Avengers - The M. Appeal Collection - Mission 2 [1961], Private's Progress [1956], That Riviera Touch [1966], My Favorite Wife [1940] (REGION 1) (NTSC), The Avengers '65: Set 2 [1961] (REGION 1) (NTSC), This Is the Army [1943] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Juke Joint/Reet, Petite, and Gone [1947], Carry On Camping [1968]

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