DVD Find the Perfect Gift    Send a Gift Certificate
Search 
Home › Comedy
Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / The King Of Comedy [1982]
Actors & Directors
  • Shelley Hack
  • Jerry Lewis
  • Sandra Bernhard
  • Diahnne Abbott
  • Martin Scorsese
  • Robert De Niro
Release date: 2004-04-19
Run time: 104 min.
Creator: Paul D. Zimmerman
RRP: £15.99
Price: £3.00

Review The King Of Comedy [1982] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:

The King of Comedy, which flopped at the box office, is actually a gem waiting to be rediscovered. Like A Face in the Crowd (a not-so-distant cousin to this film), Network, and The Truman Show, its target is show business-specifically the burning desire to become famous or be near the famous, no matter what. Robert De Niro plays the emotionally unstable, horrendously untalented Rupert Pupkin, a wannabe Vegas-style comedian. His fantasies are egged-on by Marsha, a talk-show groupie (brilliantly played by Sandra Bernhard) who hatches a devious, sure-to-backfire plan. Jerry Lewis is terrific in the straight role as the Johnny Carson-like talk-show host Jerry Langford. De Niro's performance as the obsessive Pupkin is among his finest (which is saying a lot) and he never tries to make the character likable in any way. Because there's no hero and no-one to root for, and because at times the film insists we get a little too close and personal with Pupkin, some will be put off. Yet it's one of Scorsese's most original and fascinating films, giving viewers much to consider on the subject of celebrity. Its inevitable climax is clever and quietly horrific. -Christopher J Jarmick.

Review Warner Home Video / Charlie Chaplin - Modern Times [1936]
Actors & Directors
  • Charles Chaplin
  • Tiny Sandford
  • Paulette Goddard
  • Henry Bergman
  • Chester Conklin
  • Charles Chaplin
Release date: 2006-06-01
Run time: 83 min.
RRP: £13.99
Price: £15.76

Review Charlie Chaplin - Modern Times [1936] / Warner Home Video:

Modern Times marks the last proper appearance of Charles Chaplin's iconic Little Tramp, and finds our hero struggling to make ends meet in the Depression of the 1930s. Along the way he takes up with a juvenile delinquent (actually 24-year-old Paulette Goddard) and plays a prison incident with "nose powder" for drug-induced laughs-both plot elements seeming quite innocent here, though both would provoke controversy today. Modern Times' most famous sequences portray the dehumanisation of factory labour to fine comic effect, balancing satire with slapstick to perfection in several superbly executed set-pieces. While the film has sound-effects and musical score, speech is only presented through mechanical means, via a gramophone, or through wall-sized TVs far more futuristic than in those in HG Wells' Things to Come (also 1936)-it's an interesting footnote that the comic and the SF visionary were friends. Chaplin famously not being a fan of sound cinema acknowledges the need to move with the times, yet hilariously spoofs the exploitation of man and machine while doing so. Amid some great laughs, the political message comes though clearly: the boss is making a fortune while doing jigsaw puzzles in his luxury office, the workers are toiling ever harder on the production line for their pittance. On the DVD: Modern Times is offered in the original 4:3 black and white with good mono sound evidencing just a little distortion and a very clean, clear picture with minimal grain to give away its age. Also included are French and Italian dubbed versions and a pointless and ineffective English Dolby Digital 5. 1 version of the soundtrack. The disc features multiple subtitle options, including English for hard of hearing. [+]
Disc Two begins with a six-minute introduction by David Robinson. Next comes a very worthwhile 26-minute documentary by Philippe Truffault, Chaplin Today, centred around a perceptive subtitled discussion between French filmmakers Luc & Jean-Pierre Dardenne. There are three trailers, beautifully reproduced posters, an eight-part photo gallery and one entertaining deleted scene, as well as Chaplin's "nonsense song" from the film in isolated form and in a "Karaoke" version. The Documents section begins with a silent 42-minute 1931 documentary/propaganda film, In the Machine Age made by the US Dept of Labor. Along similar but more entertaining lines is Symphony in F a 1940 colour film combining music, manufacturing footage and animation celebrating the Ford motor company, while also included is a sequence from the Liberace Show (1956) with the star performing the vocal version of "Smile", the theme from Modern Times. Demonstrating the truly universal appeal of Chaplin is a 1967 short For the First Time, documenting what happens when the people of the remote Baracoa mountains in Cuba see their first ever movie, Modern Times. This is a remarkable collection which does a great film justice. -Gary S Dalkin.

Review Universal Pictures UK / Intolerable Cruelty [2003]
Actors & Directors
  • George Clooney
  • Cedric the Entertainer
  • Catherine Zeta-Jones
  • Edward Herrmann
  • Ethan Coen
  • Geoffrey Rush
  • Joel Coen
Release date: 2004-02-23
Run time: 95 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £1.04

Review Intolerable Cruelty [2003] / Universal Pictures UK:

A sleek George Clooney and a seductive Catherine Zeta-Jones square off magnificently in the divorce comedy Intolerable Cruelty. The plot is simple: lawyer supreme Miles Massey (Clooney) skilfully outmanoeuvres gold-digger Marylin Rexroth (Zeta-Jones) when she divorces her wealthy husband-and she sets out to get revenge. But this movie comes from the creative minds of the Coen Brothers (Fargo, O Brother Where Art Thou?), and so Intolerable Cruelty includes a Scottish wedding chapel in Vegas, an asthmatic hit man, fluffy-dog-stroking European nobility, and a legendarily unbreakable pre-nuptial agreement. Still, it's pretty restrained for the Coens; smooth and consistent, it never stumbles as disappointingly as their movies can, but also never quite hits the operatic pitch of their best work. It's still damn funny, though, with top-notch performances from the leads as well as Geoffrey Rush, Cedric the Entertainer and Billy Bob Thornton. -Bret Fetzer.

Review Uca / Romance Collection - It Could Happen To You/My Best Friend's Wedding/Sleepless In Seattle
Actors & Directors
  • Julia Roberts
  • Cameron Diaz
  • Andrew Bergman
  • P.J. Hogan
  • Rupert Everett
  • Nicolas Cage
  • Nora Ephron
  • Bridget Fonda
Release date: 2007-06-04
Run time: 299 min.
RRP: £14.99
Price: £7.86

Review Romance Collection - It Could Happen To You/My Best Friend's Wedding/Sleepless In Seattle / Uca:


Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / Shallow Hal [2002]
Actors & Directors
  • Gwyneth Paltrow|Jack Black|Jason Alexander|Libby Langdon
  • Bobby Farrelly
Release date: 2002-11-18
Run time: 108 min.
RRP: £17.99
Price: £1.98

Review Shallow Hal [2002] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:

After a succession of hugely successfully movies of a lower brow nature, Shallow Hal finds the Farrelly Brothers attempting a slightly more thoughtful film, albeit still tied up in their trademark toilet humour. It's an approach that is not unproblematic but not unsuccessful either, resulting in a film that engages the emotions in a manner that the likes of Dumb and Dumber, Kingpin and There's Something About Mary never suggested possible. Jack Black is the Hal of the title, a man whose less than commendable attitude to women is suddenly altered by the rather credibility-stretching plot device of a chance meeting with a hypnotist. Henceforth Hal is only capable of seeing the beauty within, a development that allows for much humour at the expense of the less fortunate in the name of some sort of social comment. From it all, however, emerges a quite touching love story with Paltrow's character Rosemary and proof that the Farrellys do have something of a sensitive side-no matter how deep it may be buried. The ending may be woefully predictable, but such is the deftness of touch with which the story is told, that it is still the one we are all rooting for. This is a sickly sweet film in the truest terms. On the DVD: Shallow Hal comes with a plethora of extras on disc, including a series of mini-documentaries and TV specials, all of which plug the film but offer very little insight. That does come, however, from the handily subtitled directors' commentary, which demonstrates clearly the clash of cultures occurring in the movie. As well as commenting on the physical appearance of every female cast member who passes before the camera, the brothers also pay touching tribute to a colleague who passed away during the shoot and seem to know the name of every single extra and crew member who worked on the project, surely a rarity in these days of big budgets and faceless studios. [+]
There is also a large selection of deleted scenes, also with added commentary, a perfunctory music video from Shelby Lynne and a documentary on some of the technical aspects of the film. -Phil Udell.

Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Sabrina [1954]
Actors & Directors
  • Audrey Hepburn
  • Humphrey Bogart
  • Billy Wilder
  • William Holden
  • Walter Hampden
  • John Williams
Release date: 2001-09-03
Run time: 109 min.
Creator: Samuel A. Taylor
RRP: £15.99
Price: £2.76

Review Sabrina [1954] / Paramount Home Entertainment:

Audrey Hepburn is the delightful, young, eponymous Sabrina, the daughter of a chauffeur who is hopelessly in love with David Larrabee (William Holden), the playboy younger son in the rich Long Island household her father works for. In order to help her forget her woes, Sabrina is shipped off to cooking school in Paris. While there, she befriends a baron who provides a bit of culture-and the encouragement to snip off her childlike ponytail. Upon her return to New York, Sabrina is transformed into a sophisticated woman, and David is entranced by her. However, his older brother Linus (Humphrey Bogart) has arranged David's marriage to Elizabeth Tyson in order to seal a business merger and thus must steer David away from Sabrina. To do this, Linus takes on the task of wooing her for himself. Full of great dialogue ("A woman happy in love, she burns the soufflé; a woman unhappy in love, she forgets to turn on the oven") and wonderful performances, this film is a romantic masterpiece. Also enjoyable is the 1995 remake, starring Julia Ormond and Harrison Ford. -Jenny Brown For almost 20 years Audrey Hepburn's pixie-like features lit up Hollywood's silver screens with hit after hit and she became not only a screen icon, but also a style icon (with a little help from Givenchy), and still features high in polls of the world's most beautiful women. It's perhaps no surprise, then, that Paramount have chosen to honour her with a box set of some of her best-known films. [+]
However, this is only "some of", with the absence of her dazzling performances in Roman Holiday and My Fair Lady, leaving three out of the four films included here lacking in comparison. Breakfast at Tiffany's is the strongest and certainly the best-loved Hepburn film in this collection, offering beautifully comic performances by both Hepburn and her leading man, George Peppard. Funny Face also makes a welcome entry, if only for the wonderful performance by Fred Astaire; Hepburn, though, was not a strong enough dancer to hold her own against Astaire's brilliance. Sabrina holds its own as the Cinderella story of a chauffeur's daughter who turns into a beautiful society girl, but it was clearly a quick and easy vehicle for Paramount to produce in the wake of Hepburn's success in Roman Holiday. The mysterious entry of the collection is Paris When It Sizzles, probably one of Hepburn's least-known and most quirky films, with two parallel love stories played out on the screen. Although not an obvious hit and hard work in places it offers an interesting screwball performance by Hepburn, even if the sparks did not fly with her screen partner William Holden. On the DVD: The Audrey Hepburn Collection offers a nice clean widescreen transfer for three of its movies, but Sabrina is a full-frame transfer that lacks something in comparison. All but Breakfast at Tiffany's (which has a 5. 1 Dolby Digital soundtrack) are mono sound transfers, which is only a real disappointment in Funny Face because of George and Ira Gershwin's score. The special features are also lacking, with only a trailer offered on two of the films and a mildly interesting documentary on Sabrina. The best is the featurette on Funny Face, which charts the success of Paramount in the 1950s, but offers nothing a film fan would not have known already. All in all this is an attractive box set, but perhaps one for the die-hard Hepburn fan only. -Nikki Disney.

Review Optimum Home Entertainment / Hue And Cry [1947]
Actors & Directors
  • Joan Dowling
  • Frederick Piper
  • Charles Crichton
  • Douglas Barr
  • Alastair Sim
  • Harry Fowler
Release date: 2006-11-13
Run time: 78 min.
Creator: T.E.B. Clarke
RRP: £12.99
Price: £4.47

Review Hue And Cry [1947] / Optimum Home Entertainment:


Review Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm / Kate And Leopold [2002]
Actors & Directors
  • Hugh Jackman
  • Liev Schreiber
  • Natasha Lyonne
  • Meg Ryan
  • James Mangold
  • Breckin Meyer
Release date: 2003-02-03
Run time: 113 min.
Creator: Steven Rogers
RRP: £15.99
Price: £3.26

Review Kate And Leopold [2002] / Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm:

On its theatrical release, James Mangold's romantic comedy Kate & Leopold was rightly panned for holes in the logic of its time-travel plot. Stewart (Liev Schreiber) finds a portal to 1876 and goes to observe his ancestor Leopold, Duke of Albany (Hugh Jackman) who then follows him back to 2001. Since Leopold is responsible for inventing a key component in lifts, this instantly causes problems. The gallant Leopold charms, and is charmed by Stewart's ex, Kate (Meg Ryan), a hard-boiled cynical marketing expert who finds in Victorian idealism a corrective to her view of the world. And this is part of the problem with the film-we cannot entirely believe in Meg Ryan as a cynic, or that her problems can be resolved by going off to 1876 to be with her aristocratic sweetie, and much of the film has an oddly sour hostility to its heroine. Hugh Jackman is a delight in the fish-out-of-water scenes and Breckin Meyer is also very funny as Kate's actor brother, who assumes Leopold is a colleague sunk deep into the creation of a part. On the DVD Kate and Leopold has crisp Dolby 5:1 sound, which allows the very different acoustics of the two historical periods to be neatly contrasted, and is presented in anamorphic 1. 85:1 widescreen. We get both the theatrical and Director's cut, both offered with commentary, though the Director's cut audio track is more polemical. The Director's cut restores some expository material and makes more sense. [+]
-Roz Kaveney.

Review Universal Pictures UK / Stella Street - Series 1 - Complete
Actors & Directors
  • John Sessions
  • Phil Cornwell
Release date: 2007-06-18
Run time: 100 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £7.88

Review Stella Street - Series 1 - Complete / Universal Pictures UK:


Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Viva La Bam - Series 2 And 3
Actors & Directors
  • Chris Raab
  • Ryan Dunn
  • Bam Margera
  • Brandon Dicamillo
Release date: 2006-04-03
Run time: 318 min.
RRP: £29.99
Price: £5.65

Review Viva La Bam - Series 2 And 3 / Paramount Home Entertainment:


Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / Super Troopers [2002]
Actors & Directors
  • Joey Kern
  • Geoffrey Arend
  • Jay Chandrasekhar
  • André Vippolis
  • Jay Chandrasekhar
  • Kevin Heffernan
Release date: 2003-04-21
Run time: 96 min.
Creator: Amy Minda Cohen
RRP: £17.99
Price: £3.39

Review Super Troopers [2002] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:

Super Troopers is a dumb-and-dumber cop comedy starring the members of comedy quintet Broken Lizard, which will no doubt be unfamiliar to the majority of audiences this side of the Atlantic. Although don't let that put you off what is a no-brainer, but often very funny cop caper. The bungling patrolmen are of course hopelessly inept at solving real police work and instead spend more time battling with their nasty rivals in another police force. But when budget cuts loom, the boys have to become real cops for once to prove their worth, not just to their frustrated and long suffering boss but to each other. The gags come thick and fast and the sheer enthusiasm and timing of the cast ensure that, although very old fashioned in its comedic sensibilities, it remains a consistently entertaining and stupid in equal measure. Watch out also for a small cameo by formers 70's super heroine Lynda Wonder Woman Carter as the mayor. On the DVD: Super Troopers is packed with extras that belie its limited run and modest success at the box office. There are two commentaries by cast and director, 17 outtakes with optional commentary that are as good as anything that made the final cut and a trailer. The Dolby 5. 1 mix is sharp and often loud, and the picture quality on the whole very good. [+]
-Jon Weir.

Review Fabulous Films Ltd. / High Hopes [1988]
Actors & Directors
  • Philip Jackson
  • Ruth Sheen
  • Heather Tobias
  • Mike Leigh
  • Edna Doré
  • Philip Davis
Release date: 2007-09-03
Run time: 108 min.
Creator: Victor Glynn
RRP: £4.99
Price: £4.66

Review High Hopes [1988] / Fabulous Films Ltd.:


Review Paramount Home Entertainment / All You've Got [2006]
Actors & Directors
  • Neema Barnette
  • Ciara
  • Adrienne Bailon
  • Efren Ramirez
Release date: 2006-09-18
Run time: 92 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £2.98

Review All You've Got [2006] / Paramount Home Entertainment:


Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / M*A*S*H - Season Five (Collector's Edition) [1976]
Actors & Directors
  • Alan Alda
  • Loretta Swit
  • Larry Linville
  • Harry Morgan
  • Mike Farrell
Release date: 2005-01-17
Run time: 600 min.
RRP: £29.99
Price: £15.97

Review M*A*S*H - Season Five (Collector's Edition) [1976] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:


Review Momentum Pictures / Creature Comforts Series 1, Part 1 [2003]
Actors & Directors
  • Nick Park
Release date: 2003-11-17
RRP: £17.99
Price: £3.50

Review Creature Comforts Series 1, Part 1 [2003] / Momentum Pictures:

There's nothing not to like about Aardman Animations' new Creature Comforts series, belatedly inspired by their Oscar-winning short film and the subsequent spin-off TV ads that turned out to be far more memorable than the product itself ("It's got to be easily turn-off-and-onable"). But if you stop and think about it for a moment, Creature Comforts is an extraordinarily un-PC concept. First of all, identify some members of the public who are willing to drone on about trivia that's really of no interest to anyone but themselves. (Ideally they will be working class and perhaps a bit dim, although it helps if they're over-articulate in the way that dull people often are when someone suddenly feigns an interest in them. ) If they have a strong regional accent or are elderly, so much the better. Then sync up their interviews with a bunch of claymation cartoon animals, linking any extraneous noises to improbable snippets of on-screen action. Finally, sit back and watch as the very people you're patronising laugh their heads off at your efforts, thus proving that they were every bit as dim as you thought. Cynicism aside, though, the ability of the British public to laugh at themselves is a national trait worth celebrating, and it's brilliantly exploited here by the company that brought you Wallace and Gromit. On this first volume you get six episodes, of which perhaps the funniest is "Working Animals", where we learn that egglaying is "very repetitive" and meet the greyhound who can never quite get his latest bit of portentous self-analysis out before the trap opens. On the DVD: The Creature Comforts Series 1, Part 1 DVD contains just the first six 10-minute episodes of the series. [+]
To add value, the disc also includes what is quite literally a making-of documentary, plus the original Creature Comforts short and sundry other items of interest. -Roger Thomas.

Review Paramount Home Entertainment (UK) / Harold & Maude - Paramount Originals (includes Limited Edition reproduction film poster) [1971]
Actors & Directors
  • Hal Ashby
  • Bud Cort
  • Cyril Cusack
  • Vivian Pickles
  • Ruth Gordon
  • Ellen Geer
Release date: 2007-07-23
Run time: 88 min.
RRP: £9.99
Price: £6.56

Review Harold & Maude - Paramount Originals (includes Limited Edition reproduction film poster) [1971] / Paramount Home Entertainment (UK):


Review Victoria Wood / An Audience With Victoria Wood Special Edition
Release date: 2006-06-19
Run time: 50 min.
RRP: £9.99
Price: £6.93

Review An Audience With Victoria Wood Special Edition / Victoria Wood:


Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / The Commitments (Special Edition) [1991]
Actors & Directors
  • Robert Arkins
  • Michael Aherne
  • Alan Parker
  • Maria Doyle
  • Angeline Hall
  • Andrew Strong
Release date: 2005-03-14
Run time: 113 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £3.88

Review The Commitments (Special Edition) [1991] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:


Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / Ally McBeal - Season 5 (M-Lock Packaging)
Actors & Directors
  • Peter MacNicol
  • Greg Germann
  • Calista Flockhart
Release date: 2005-05-09
Run time: 875 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £11.98

Review Ally McBeal - Season 5 (M-Lock Packaging) / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:


Review Second Sight Films Ltd. / Bedazzled [1967]
Actors & Directors
  • Eleanor Bron
  • Peter Cook
  • Alba
  • Stanley Donen
  • Raquel Welch
  • Dudley Moore
Release date: 2005-07-25
Run time: 99 min.
Creator: Richard Marden
RRP: £20.99
Price: £2.99

Review Bedazzled [1967] / Second Sight Films Ltd.:


Browse Comedy:

Models & Brands:
The King Of Comedy [1982], Charlie Chaplin - Modern Times [1936], Intolerable Cruelty [2003], Romance Collection - It Could Happen To You/My Best Friend's Wedding/Sleepless In Seattle, Shallow Hal [2002], Sabrina [1954], Hue And Cry [1947], Kate And Leopold [2002], Stella Street - Series 1 - Complete, Viva La Bam - Series 2 And 3, Super Troopers [2002], High Hopes [1988], All You've Got [2006], M*A*S*H - Season Five (Collector's Edition) [1976], Creature Comforts Series 1, Part 1 [2003], Harold & Maude - Paramount Originals (includes Limited Edition reproduction film poster) [1971], An Audience With Victoria Wood Special Edition, The Commitments (Special Edition) [1991], Ally McBeal - Season 5 (M-Lock Packaging), Bedazzled [1967]

Top headlines:
Search 
DVD Rental: try it for free