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Review Universal Pictures UK / Golden Years Of British Comedy - 40s/50s/60s
Actors & Directors
  • Tommy Trinder
  • Sid James
  • Tommy Cooper
  • Norman Wisdom
  • Eric Morecambe
Release date: 2007-04-09
RRP: £15.99
Price: £7.25

Review Golden Years Of British Comedy - 40s/50s/60s / Universal Pictures UK:


Review 20th CENTURY FOX HOME ENTERTAINMENT / Epic Movie [2007]
Actors & Directors
  • Jennifer Coolidge
  • Mary Castro
  • Kal Penn
  • Adam Campbell
  • Fred Willard
Release date: 2007-06-11
Run time: 82 min.
RRP: £17.99
Price: £4.22

Review Epic Movie [2007] / 20th CENTURY FOX HOME ENTERTAINMENT:

By dint of the inexplicable popularity of their send-up of movie genres in the parody movies Scary Movie and Date Movie, writer/director duo Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer probably got an epic-sized bucket of cash for this hastily stitched pastiche of drive-by entertainment. There's no particular variety of movie they were sent to send up this time, unless big box-office grossers has now become a genre in and of itself. If so, Epic Movie may well qualify as part of that league itself. Very little expense has been spared to make so-called "comic" references to a slew of mostly recent blockbusters-The Chronicles of Narnia, Borat, Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, the X-Men and Harry Potter series, Superman Returns, Nacho Libre, and The Da Vinci Code to name a few-and it's assumed we've seen them all. In a goofy thread of a story about four orphans plucked from some of the above, battle must be done through various bastardized plots from same so that a prophecy can be fulfilled and they can assume their rightful place as rulers of a sacred land. Lots of crotch kicks, fart, urine, and vomit jokes speed by as we pass through Willie Wonka's factory and a magical wardrobe with an unusually interesting assortment of look-alikes and name actors caught up in the gag mix (some of it legitimately funny). Darrell Hammond, Crispin Glover, David Carradine, Kevin McDonald, Carmen Electra, Kal Penn put on game (and sometimes gamy) faces, and it's definitely a hoot to watch comedy improv alums Fred Willard and Jennifer Coolidge as Aslo the Lion and the White Bitch do battle in a Narnian good vs. evil character smackdown. As lame as you already expect a movie like this to be, anything that can throw together an homage to C. S. [+]
Lewis alongside MTV's Punk'd in less than 90 minutes can't be all bad. -Ted Fry.

Review Walt Disney Home Video / D2 The Mighty Ducks [1994]
Actors & Directors
  • Emilio Estevez
  • Carsten Norgaard
  • Sam Weisman
  • Michael Tucker
  • Jan Rubes
  • Kathryn Erbe
Release date: 2002-09-23
Run time: 102 min.
Creator: Steven Brill
RRP: £14.99
Price: £3.33

Review D2 The Mighty Ducks [1994] / Walt Disney Home Video:

This follow-up to the surprise Disney hit about a hockey team of misfits brings Emilio Estevez back to the role of the kids' yuppie coach. This time, Estevez assimilates his Ducks into the higher-stakes Team USA in the Junior Goodwill Games, an opportunity that could bring fame and money. Entirely perfunctory, this sequel is basically an excuse to revisit the eccentricities of some of the younger characters, extend some of their conflicts into adolescence and showcase their allegedly entertaining but ethically dubious abilities on the ice. Estevez is okay but even he had enough after this movie. -Tom Keogh.

Review Universal Pictures UK / Pillow Talk [1959]
Actors & Directors
  • Doris Day
  • Tony Randall
  • Rock Hudson
  • Thelma Ritter
  • Michael Gordon
  • Nick Adams
Release date: 2006-10-02
Run time: 102 min.
RRP: £9.99
Price: £2.70

Review Pillow Talk [1959] / Universal Pictures UK:

Jan Morrow (Doris Day) and Brad Allen (Rock Hudson) have never met, but they're sworn enemies because of one small appliance in their lives: the telephone. The two share a party line, and Jan is outraged over the amount of time Bill spends wooing women over the phone. A convenient triangle emerges when a client (Tony Randall) of Jan's-she's an interior decorator-falls in love with her and happens to be Brad's old college chum. When Brad makes the connection, he decides to try to court Jan himself, to make her more sympathetic to his phone woes. Of course, she'd never go for such a heel, so he passes himself off as Rex Stetson, a Texas rancher visiting New York. The ensuing tale, albeit predictable, is lots of fun, with some quick-witted dialogue and some clever use of split-screens for the phone calls. Thelma Ritter is hilarious as Jan's always-hung-over maid, Alma; and the pairing of Rock and Doris works beautifully, as always. -Jenny Brown.

Review Joan Rivers / An Audience With Joan Rivers [2008]
Release date: 2008-08-25
Run time: 47 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £7.98

Review An Audience With Joan Rivers [2008] / Joan Rivers:

Outrageous, shocking, controversial and undoubtedly funny, the "acid queen of stand-up" Joan Rivers hosts An Audience with. The Daytime Emmy Award winner has her celebrity audience crying with laughter from start to finish as well as causing a number of jaws to hit the ground with her countless daring and racy comments. Rivers' ability to make people laugh in spite of themselves is clearly on display and is what makes her a much acclaimed, loved and celebrated stand up comedian.

Review Network / Morecambe And Wise: The Thames Years - Series 1 [1978]
Actors & Directors
  • Ernie Wise
  • Eric Morecambe
Release date: 2008-03-24
Run time: 150 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £8.72

Review Morecambe And Wise: The Thames Years - Series 1 [1978] / Network:


Review Arrow Films / Like Water For Chocolate [1992]
Actors & Directors
  • Marco Leonardi
  • Mario Ivan Martinez
  • Regina Torne
  • Alfonso Arau
  • Lumi Cavazos
Release date: 2005-09-19
Run time: 109 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £5.09

Review Like Water For Chocolate [1992] / Arrow Films:

Expect to be very hungry (and perhaps amorous) after watching this contemporary classic in the small genre of food movies that includes Babette's Feast and Big Night. Director Alfonso Arau (A Walk in the Clouds), adapting a novel by his former wife, Laura Esquivel, tells the story of a young woman (Lumi Cavazos) who learns to suppress her passions under the eye of a stern mother, but channels them into her cooking. The result is a steady stream of cuisine so delicious as to be an almost erotic experience for those lucky enough to have a bite. The film's quotient of magic realism feels a little stock, but the story line is good and Arau's affinity for the sensuality of food (and of nature) is sublime. You might want to rush off to a good Mexican restaurant afterward, but that's a good thing. -Tom Keogh, Amazon. com.

Review Warner Home Video / Curb Your Enthusiasm: Complete HBO Season 4
Actors & Directors
  • Ben Stiller
  • Larry Charles
  • Robert B. Weide
  • Mel Brooks
  • Barry Gordon
  • Larry David
  • Jeff Garlin
  • Cheryl Hines
Release date: 2005-09-26
Run time: 330 min.
RRP: £25.99
Price: £9.98

Review Curb Your Enthusiasm: Complete HBO Season 4 / Warner Home Video:

He never learns. In the fourth season of his award-winning HBO comedy series, the quasi-fictional character of Larry David continues to say-and do-whatever he wants whenever he wants. In the first episode alone ("Mel's Offer"), in which Mel Brooks offers him the role of Max Bialystock in The Producers, David offends a doctor, a lesbian couple, a wheelchair user, and Ben Stiller (by not shaking his hand after he sneezes). Then, in the second ("Ben's Birthday Party"), he offends a blind man-by telling him his girlfriend's not as hot as she claims-and pokes Stiller in the eye with a skewer while attempting to show agent Jeff Greene (Jeff Garlin) his new golf move. Larry continues to offend Stiller until he drops out of The Producers and, in the fifth episode ("The 5 Wood"), David Schwimmer steps in. The following episode ("The Car Pool Lane"), in which David attends a Dodgers game-with a prostitute, so he can use the carpool lane-made history when it set an innocent man free. Unused footage from the show, entered into evidence by the defense attorney, confirmed his client's alibi that he couldn't have committed a murder because he was at the game (alas, the Braves still trounced the Dodgers). Other guests include Ted Danson ("The Weatherman"), Russell Means ("Wandering Bear"), and Gina Gershon ("The Survivor") as a Hasidic hottie. In addition, the hour-long season finale ("Opening Night") boasts a bevy of stars, including David's old colleague Jerry Seinfeld, Nathan Lane (Broadway's original Bialystock), and fellow Tony Award winner Anne Bancroft. As they've done since the early days, Cheryl Hines (Cheryl David), Susie Essman (Susie Greene), and Richard Lewis and Wanda Sykes (as themselves) do what they can to keep one-man demolition derby David in check. [+]
-Kathleen C. Fennessy, Amazon. com.

Review Network / On The Buses - Series 3
Actors & Directors
  • Stephen Lewis
  • Michael Robbins
  • Doris Hare
  • Stuart Allen
  • Anna Karen
  • Reg Varney
Release date: 2006-05-15
Run time: 325 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £7.93

Review On The Buses - Series 3 / Network:


Review 2 Entertain Video / Big Train : Complete BBC Series 1 & 2 [1998]
Actors & Directors
  • Barry Davies
  • Catherine Tate
  • Phil Cornwell
  • Julia Davis
  • Amelia Bullmore
Release date: 2004-10-25
Run time: 348 min.
RRP: £24.99
Price: £8.96

Review Big Train : Complete BBC Series 1 & 2 [1998] / 2 Entertain Video:

Originally shown in 1998, Big Train was the eagerly awaited follow-up to Father Ted from writers Graham Linehan and Arthur Matthews. Resisting the pressure to make another sitcom, Big Train is, instead, a sketch show in the best Monty Python tradition, updated with influences from arch-surrealist Chris Morris as well as the contemporary The Fast Show. The sketches can be joyously odd-Pythonesque firefighting showjumpers, the evil hypnotist, and the outrageous onanistic office workers, for example-but the show never neglects to keep the punchlines coming thick and fast (though the animated staring contest does rather drag after a while). The cast comprises some of the best new names in comedy, including Kevin Eldon, Simon Pegg, Mark Heap, Julia Davis and Amelia Bullmore (who went on to become Alan Partridge's Ukrainian girlfriend). Series 2 didn't pull into the platform until 2002, by which time Graham Linehan was absent writing Black Books. But Arthur Matthews maintains the quality of the first series on the whole-the man with oversized hands, the creepy cult questionnaire, the zookeeper's recruitment agency-adding some spot-on French art house cinema spoofs and other movie-style take offs somewhat in the manner of Spaced, which Pegg and Heap had gone on to make. That duo return here for more silliness along with new cast members Rebecca Front (The Day Today, Knowing Me, Knowing You) and Tracey-Ann Oberman (better known now as Chrissie Watts in Eastenders). On the DVD: Big Train belatedly arrives on DVD in a two-disc set which includes a plethora of deleted scenes for both Series 1 and 2. There are cast biogs plus three of the sketches as performed on a German TV sketch show. Commentary on the first series is by both writers, though happily Pegg, Heap and Eldon gatecrash halfway through. [+]
Matthews and Eldon join director and producer for the somewhat more straight-faced commentary on the second disc. Menu options thankfully include the treasurable "Play all" facility. -Mark Walker.

Review Pathe Distribution / All About My Mother [1999]
Actors & Directors
  • Candela Peña
  • Marisa Paredes
  • Antonia San Juan
  • Cecilia Roth
  • Penélope Cruz
  • Pedro Almodóvar
Release date: 2000-02-28
Run time: 97 min.
Creator: Michel Ruben
RRP: £19.99
Price: £3.49

Review All About My Mother [1999] / Pathe Distribution:

After her son is killed in an accident, Manuela (Cecilia Roth) leaves Madrid for her old haunts in Barcelona. She reconnects with an old friend, a pre-op transsexual prostitute named La Agrado (Antonia San Juan), who introduces her to Rosa (Penélope Cruz), a young nun who turns out to be pregnant. Meanwhile, Manuela becomes a personal assistant for Huma Rojo (Marisa Paredes), an actress currently playing Blanche DuBois in a production of A Streetcar Named Desire. All About My Mothertraces the delicate web of friendship and loss that binds these women together. The movie is dedicated to the actresses of the world, so it's not surprising that all the performances are superb. Roth in particular anchors All About My Mother with compassion and generosity. But fans of writer-director Pedro Almodóvar needn't fret-as always, Almodóvar's work undermines conventional notions of sexual identity and embraces all human possibilities with bright colours and melodramatic plotting. However,All About My Mother approaches its twists and turns with a broader emotional scope than most of Almodóvar's work; even the more extravagant aspects of the story are presented quietly, to allow the sadness of life to be as present as the irrepressible vitality of the characters. Almodóvar embraces pettiness, jealousy and grief as much as kindness, courage and outrageousness, and the movie is the richer for it. -Bret Fetzer.

Review Channel 4 DVD / Acorn Antiques - The Musical
Actors & Directors
  • Julie Walters
  • Duncan Preston
  • Celia Imrie
  • Trevor Nunn
Release date: 2006-03-13
Run time: 121 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £6.77

Review Acorn Antiques - The Musical / Channel 4 DVD:


Review Balls of Steel / Balls Of Steel - Complete Season 1
Release date: 2007-02-05
Run time: 245 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £8.67

Review Balls Of Steel - Complete Season 1 / Balls of Steel:


Review Sony Pictures Home Ent. UK / Bewitched - Season 4
Actors & Directors
  • Dick York
  • Agnes Moorehead
  • David White
  • Elizabeth Montgomery
Release date: 2007-01-22
Run time: 803 min.
RRP: £34.99
Price: £14.31

Review Bewitched - Season 4 / Sony Pictures Home Ent. UK:


Review Pathe Distribution / Breakfast On Pluto [2005]
Actors & Directors
  • Bryan Ferry
  • Stephen Rea
  • Liam Neeson
  • Brendan Gleeson
  • Neil Jordan
  • Cillian Murphy
Release date: 2006-05-15
Run time: 124 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £2.99

Review Breakfast On Pluto [2005] / Pathe Distribution:


Review Vision Video Ltd. / Ken Dodd - Another Audience With Ken Dodd [2002]
Actors & Directors
  • Ken Dodd
Release date: 2002-11-18
Run time: 96 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £11.07

Review Ken Dodd - Another Audience With Ken Dodd [2002] / Vision Video Ltd.:


Review Universal Pictures Video / Magicians [2007]
Actors & Directors
  • David Mitchell
  • Robert Webb
Release date: 2007-09-17
Run time: 87 min.
RRP: £17.99
Price: £3.67

Review Magicians [2007] / Universal Pictures Video:

After taking a fairly decent run up in superb voyeur-friendly sitcom Peep Show, David Mitchell and Robert Webb make the jump onto the big screen in Magicians, a Brit-com with just enough tricks up its sleeve to carry it out of fandom and into the mainstream. That said, fans of Peep Show will be pleased to see the duo's familiar character traits (uptight nerd and faux-cool layabout) very much in evidence. The story sees the pair recast as fading magicians Harry and Karl (Mitchell and Webb respectively), whose successful double act is brought to a somewhat sticky end when Harry catches Karl cheating with his wife, before accidentally guillotining her in front of a packed audience. The aftermath sees Harry reduced to performing tricks in supermarkets, while Karl has the more humiliating task of establishing himself as a Derren Brown-style performer. But the chance to reclaim former glory presents itself in the form of a magic contest and, aided by the lovably hapless assistant Linda (Jessica Hynes) and fruity TV agent Otto (Darren Boyd), Harry and Karl dust off the guillotine for a head to head battle. Despite its modest ambitions, Magicians maintains a respectable pace and gag rate throughout. A great supporting cast help raise the bar, but the film's appeal is largely down to its two leads, whose isn't-broke-won't-fix-it route to comic acting is effective and well judged. Magicians might not pack the belly laughs of a Hot Fuzz, but you're never too far away from a chuckle or two. -Luke Mawson.

Review Momentum Pictures Home Ent / Waiting [2005]
Actors & Directors
  • Ron Jeremy
  • Ryan Reynolds
  • Patrick Hasson
  • Will Keenan
  • Hannah Dalton
  • Lloyd Kaufman
Release date: 2006-09-25
Run time: 94 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £2.47

Review Waiting [2005] / Momentum Pictures Home Ent:


Review Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm / Pocahontas 2 -Journey To A New World [1998]
Actors & Directors
  • Finola Hughes
  • Irene Bedard
  • Linda Hunt
  • Donal Gibson
  • Jim Cummings
  • Bradley Raymond
  • Tom Ellery
Release date: 2001-02-05
Run time: 70 min.
Creator: Flip Kobler
RRP: £17.99
Price: £4.50

Review Pocahontas 2 -Journey To A New World [1998] / Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm:

Disney's direct-to-video sequel to their 1995 hit places the Native American princess Pocahontas in harm's way in London, where she is almost tossed into jail and has some other mishaps. She's not alone, however: a cute racoon named Meeko does a nice job as the obligatory funny animal. The songs are about as memorable as those in the first film, but the art and animation maintain far higher standards than most animated sequels dumped onto tape. If you don't drive yourself nuts thinking about the appalling historical revisionism at work here, this is passable family entertainment. -Tom Keogh Disney's direct-to-video sequel to their 1995 hit places Pocahontas in harm's way in London, where she is almost tossed into jail and has some other mishaps. She's not alone, however: a cute racoon named Meeko does a nice job as the obligatory funny animal. The songs are about as memorable as those in the first film, but the art and animation in Pocahontas 2 maintain far higher standards than most animated sequels dumped onto tape. If you don't drive yourself to distraction thinking about the appalling historical revisionism at work here, this is passable family entertainment. -Tom Keogh, Amazon. com.

Review Warner Home Video / Joey - The Complete First Season [2004]
Actors & Directors
  • Jennifer Coolidge
  • Andrea Anders
  • Drea De Matteo
  • Paulo Costanzo
  • Kevin Bright
  • Matt Le Blanc
Release date: 2005-07-25
Run time: 720 min.
RRP: £50.99
Price: £7.67

Review Joey - The Complete First Season [2004] / Warner Home Video:


Browse Comedy:

Models & Brands:
Golden Years Of British Comedy - 40s/50s/60s, Epic Movie [2007], D2 The Mighty Ducks [1994], Pillow Talk [1959], An Audience With Joan Rivers [2008], Morecambe And Wise: The Thames Years - Series 1 [1978], Like Water For Chocolate [1992], Curb Your Enthusiasm: Complete HBO Season 4, On The Buses - Series 3, Big Train : Complete BBC Series 1 & 2 [1998], All About My Mother [1999], Acorn Antiques - The Musical, Balls Of Steel - Complete Season 1, Bewitched - Season 4, Breakfast On Pluto [2005], Ken Dodd - Another Audience With Ken Dodd [2002], Magicians [2007], Waiting [2005], Pocahontas 2 -Journey To A New World [1998], Joey - The Complete First Season [2004]

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