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Review Cinema Club / Rita, Sue And Bob Too [1987]
Actors & Directors
  • Kulvinder Ghir
  • Siobhan Finneran
  • George Costigan
  • Michelle Holmes
  • Alan Clarke
  • Lesley Sharp
Release date: 1999-09-06
Run time: 89 min.
Creator: Andrea Dunbar
Price: £5.99

Review Rita, Sue And Bob Too [1987] / Cinema Club:

British films about sex are fairly rare, and mostly embarrassing: from the painfully anxious (Brief Encounter) to the hopelessly naff (the Carry On films). What a treat then is Rita, Sue and Bob Too, Alan Clarke's filming of a stage play by young Andrea Dunbar. It's an unsentimental, gleefully lewd comedy about shagging. Tagged for its cinema release in 1987 as "Thatcher's Britain with its knickers down", it even provoked a minor moral hullabaloo in the newspapers. Rita (Siobhan Finneran) and Sue (Michelle Holmes) are two giggly Bradford lasses stuck on a ramshackle housing estate. They keep themselves in fags by occasional baby-sitting for nouveau riche couple Bob (George Costigan) and Michelle (Lesley Sharp). Bob fancies himself rotten, but Michelle has ruled that sex is off the menu. So one night, driving Rita and Sue home, Bob detours to the Yorkshire moors and offers the girls a little something extra in his front seat. Rita and Sue decide to grab it while they can. Alan Clarke's cult following is founded on his bleak, brilliant films about violent young men (Scum, The Firm, Made in Britain). [+]
But Rita, Sue is a tribute to Clarkey's ribald sense of humour. It even sports a cameo from novelty pop-act Black Lace, performing their non-hit "Gang-Bang". Teenage debutantes Holmes and Finneran are terrific-just watch them dancing lustily around Bob's red leather sofa to Bananarama. In support, Clarke wisely cast skilled northern comedians like Patti Nicholls and Willie Ross, as Sue's foul-mouthed mum and dad. Amid the laughs, Clarke as usual doesn't stint from showing us the harsh, unlovely side of life. He shot the film on location at Bradford's Buttershaw estate, where Andrea Dunbar grew up and where, tragically, she died of a brain haemorrhage only a few years after the film's release. -Richard Kelly.

Review Monterey Video / The Gift of Love [1978] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Don Chaffey
  • Bethel Leslie
  • Timothy Bottoms
  • Donald Moffat
  • Marie Osmond
  • June Lockhart
Release date: 2003-11-18
Run time: 98 min.
Creator: O. Henry
Price: £8.66

Review The Gift of Love [1978] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Monterey Video:


Review Peccadillo Pictures / The Iron Ladies [2001]
Actors & Directors
  • Youngyooth Thongkonthun
  • Jesdaporn Pholdee; Sahaphap Tor; Ekachai Buranapanit; Giorgio Maiocchi; Chaicharn Nimpulsawasdi; Kokkorn Benjathikoon; Shiriohana Hongsopon; Phomsit Sitthijamroenkhun; Sutthipong Sitthijamroenkhun; Anucha Chatkaew
Release date: 2004-01-12
Run time: 104 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £3.40

Review The Iron Ladies [2001] / Peccadillo Pictures:


Review Channel 4 Video / Teachers: Series 1 [2001]
Actors & Directors
  • Iain B. MacDonald
  • Andrew Lincoln
  • Barnaby Southcombe
  • Brian Kelly
  • Jeremy Lovering
Release date: 2003-08-11
Run time: 382 min.
Creator: Richard Stoneman
RRP: £24.99
Price: £8.48

Review Teachers: Series 1 [2001] / Channel 4 Video:

Depending on where you get your recommendations, you'll see Teachers described as a comedy, a drama, an irresponsible depiction of the teaching profession and a (fairly) sympathetic reminder of how teachers are expected to be morally unimpeachable despite being ordinary human beings like the rest of us. In fact, it's all of the above, which perhaps does more for the show's realism than all its supposedly controversial elements put together. The series stars Andrew (This Life) Lincoln as the feckless Simon, who, like several of his colleagues, is no more mature or advanced in terms of his ability to manage his own life than his pupils. The staff at the fictitious Bristol school are given to in-fighting, petty factionalism, bad behaviour, inappropriate nookie and dishonesty, both on and off-duty. That said, they also have to wrestle with professional and moral dilemmas and deal with their dysfunctional relationships: sometimes they succeed, often they don't. It makes for a superb, bittersweet concoction. If you want yet more social comment, it's worth noting that the series was filmed in a disused, empty LEA school. On the DVD: Teachers, Series 1 bucks the take-it-or-leave-it convention of many television series releases by actually providing some interview material as part of this two-disc set. Simple extras such as this cost little enough to include and do at least add some value to the package. -Roger Thomas.

Review Walt Disney Video / Meredith Willson's: The Music Man [2003] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Debra Monk
  • Molly Shannon
  • Victor Garber
  • Matthew Broderick
  • Jeff Bleckner
  • Kristin Chenoweth
Release date: 2003-11-11
Run time: 150 min.
Creator: Sally Robinson
Price: £4.03

Review Meredith Willson's: The Music Man [2003] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Walt Disney Video:


Review 4 Front Video / Snatch/Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels [1998]
Actors & Directors
  • Jason Statham
  • Guy Ritchie
  • Dexter Fletcher
  • Jason Flemyng
  • Ade
  • Brad Pitt
Release date: 2002-07-08
Run time: 205 min.
Creator: Michael Dreyer
RRP: £9.99
Price: £23.89

Review Snatch/Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels [1998] / 4 Front Video:


Review Warner Home Video / Hobson's Choice [1954]
Actors & Directors
  • Brenda De Banzie
  • Prunella Scales
  • Daphne Anderson
  • David Lean
  • Charles Laughton
  • John Mills
Release date: 2000-07-03
Run time: 102 min.
Creator: Wynyard Browne
RRP: £10.99
Price: £16.25

Review Hobson's Choice [1954] / Warner Home Video:

Britain's greatest ever film director David Lean wasn't feted for providing belly-laughs. His finest films, from Great Expectations (1946) to Lawrence of Arabia (1962) are resolutely sober, which is more than can be said of Henry Horatio Hobson in his wonderfully comic encounter with the moon in Hobson's Choice. Lean's only other comedy was Blithe Spirit (1945), but here he approaches matters of the heart with a surprising lightness of touch and wins a marvellous performance from Charles Laughton-himself soon to make his one and only film as a director, Night of the Hunter (1955). The setting is late-19th century Salford (the b/w location filming is exceptional), and widower Henry Hobson forbids his three daughters to marry to avoid paying their dowries. Romance will not be thwarted by economics, and much humorous conflict ensues, interspersed with some serious and even disturbing moments-the shaving scene when Laughton gets the DTs is a queasily unbalanced. Brenda De Banzie is splendidly spirited as the eldest daughter, Maggie, while her fiancie is played by the ever excellent John Mills, who would later win an Oscar for his part in Lean's much more serious love story, Ryan's Daughter (1970). -Gary S. Dalkin.

Review Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm / Operation Dumbo Drop [1995]
Actors & Directors
  • Simon Wincer
  • Ray Liotta
  • Denis Leary
  • Danny Glover
  • Doug E. Doug
  • Corin Nemec
Release date: 2001-02-12
Run time: 104 min.
Creator: Jim Kouf
RRP: £14.99
Price: £7.99

Review Operation Dumbo Drop [1995] / Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm:


Review Midget Entertainment / The Kingdom ( Riget ) [1996] [ English subtitles ]
Actors & Directors
  • Ernst-Hugo Järegård
  • Holger Juul Hansen
  • Kirsten Rolffes
  • Søren Pilmark
  • Ghita Nørby
Release date: 2006-03-01
Run time: 278 min.
Creator: Sven Abrahamsen
RRP: £15.99
Price: £23.99

Review The Kingdom ( Riget ) [1996] [ English subtitles ] / Midget Entertainment:

The Kingdom has been described as "ER meets Twin Peaks", and seldom can the standard and the surreal have met in more perfect accord. The hospital that conceals dark secrets is the premise for this riveting "soap"-seen on Danish TV in 1994-in which science and civilisation are eroded by superstition and instinct. Lars von Trier is not a director who aims to please, and the claustrophobic visuals he draws from handheld cameras and natural lighting anticipate the stripped-down film work of his Dogme 95 movement. Yet there's nothing cerebral about the goings-on here, thanks to the rich variety of characters who people the labyrinthine corridors and functional wards. The Minister's visit and the Haiti jaunt are slapstick humour worthy of the best Python sketches, and Trier is never afraid to mix the prosaic with the profound. There are wonderfully observed performances from Ernst Hugo Jaregard as chequered Swedish surgeon Stig Helmer, and Kirsten Rolffes as common-sense psychic Sigrid Drusse. These are only the first five episodes: having seen them, you'll be awaiting the remainder with impatience. This is persuasive, provocative filmmaking. On the DVD: The Kingdom on disc has audio and visual reproduction that is authentically Trier, with English subtitles and 10 access points per episode. Each part is viewable separately or in sequence, though make sure you don't lose some of the director's amusingly offbeat postscripts. [+]
The first disc also features Tranceformer, a frank insight into the mind and movies of Lars von Trier with extracts from his features between 1984 and 95. -Richard Whitehouse.

Review RCV / Rent-A-Kid
Actors & Directors
  • Matt McCoy
  • Sherry Miller
  • Christopher Lloyd
  • Fred Gerber
  • Amos Crawley
  • Leslie Nielsen
Release date: 2005-02-23
Run time: 95 min.
Creator: Paul Bernbaum
RRP: £11.87
Price: £10.84

Review Rent-A-Kid / RCV:


Review Starz Home Entertainment / Withnail And I [1986]
Actors & Directors
  • Richard E. Grant
  • Paul McGann
  • Richard Griffiths
  • Michael Elphick
  • Bruce Robinson
  • Ralph Brown
Release date: 2001-11-12
Run time: 103 min.
Creator: Paul M. Heller
RRP: £10.99
Price: £1.94

Review Withnail And I [1986] / Starz Home Entertainment:

Set in 1969, the year in which the hippy dreams of so many young Englishmen went sour, 1986's Bruce Robinson's Withnail and I is an enduring British cult. Fellow enthusiasts cry immortal phrases from the endlessly brilliant script to one another like mating calls; "Scrubbers!", "We want the finest wines known to humanity and we want them now!" Withnail is played by the emaciated but defiantly effete Richard E Grant, "I" (i. e. , Marwood) by Paul McGann. Out-of-work actors living in desperate penury in a rancid London flat, their lives are a continual struggle to keep warm, alive and in Marwood's case sane, until the pubs open. A sojourn in the country cottage of Withnail's gay Uncle Monty only redoubles their privations-they have to kill a live chicken to eat. The arrival of Monty spells further misery for Marwood as he must fend off his attentions. This borderline homophobic interlude apart, Withnail and I is a delight, enhanced by an aimless but appallingly eventful plot. Popular among students, it strikes a chord with anyone who has undergone a period of debauchery and impoverished squalor prior to finding their way onto life's straight and narrow. -David Stubbs.

Review A&E Home Video / The Avengers '68: Set 4 [1961] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Diana Rigg
  • Patrick Macnee
Release date: 2002-04-30
Run time: 364 min.
Creator: Sydney Newman
Price: £8.89

Review The Avengers '68: Set 4 [1961] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / A&E Home Video:


Review Buena Vista Home Entertainment / The Importance of Being Earnest [2002]
Actors & Directors
  • Oliver Parker
  • Colin Firth
  • Reese Witherspoon
  • Rupert Everett
  • Judi Dench
  • Frances O'Connor
Release date: 2003-07-21
Run time: 97 min.
Creator: Oscar Wilde
RRP: £12.99
Price: £5.22

Review The Importance of Being Earnest [2002] / Buena Vista Home Entertainment:


Review Universal Studios / Alice's Adventures in Wonderland [1973] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • William Sterling
  • Davy Kaye
  • Michael Crawford
  • Hywel Bennett
  • Michael Jayston
  • Fiona Fullerton
Release date: 2004-12-28
Run time: 95 min.
Price: £3.53

Review Alice's Adventures in Wonderland [1973] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Universal Studios:


Review Funimation Prod / Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Season 2 - Part 2 (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Rob Paulsen
  • Jennifer Darling
  • James Avery
  • Barry Gordon
  • Cam Clarke
Release date: 2008-10-21
Run time: 308 min.
Creator: Larry Parr
Price: £7.13

Review Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Season 2 - Part 2 (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Funimation Prod:


Review Paramount / Forrest Gump [1994] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Gary Sinise
  • Sally Field
  • Robert Zemeckis
  • Mykelti Williamson
  • Robin Wright Penn
  • Tom Hanks
Release date: 2001-08-28
Run time: 142 min.
Creator: Steve Tisch
Price: £6.35

Review Forrest Gump [1994] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Paramount:

If you read the label on a box of chocolates you'll know exactly what you're gonna get. Life isn't like that in Forrest Gump, however, which is one of the reasons why this movie divided appreciative audiences from hard-hearted critics like few others before it. Audiences responded to the Frank Capra-style sentimentality of this warm-hearted tale of a good ol' American boy making his way in the world without ever losing his pure and simple innocence. Critics, however, were made uneasy by the apparently reactionary subtext to the parallel lives of Forrest and his girlfriend Jenny. Her fate, contrasted with his, suggests a triumph for plain ol' American values over dangerous freethinking hippies and liberals. Whether the movie is just unadulterated sentiment or right-wing propaganda, one thing at least was acknowledged by all: that Forrest Gump displays all the craftsmanship of one of Hollywood's most inventive directors and features a central performance from an actor renowned for his total commitment to every role. Thanks to Robert Zemeckis and Tom Hanks, even the most cynical critic will find it hard not to shed at least one tear by the end of this undeniably engrossing movie. The soundtrack is great, too. On the DVD: another good two-disc set gives fans of Gump and budding filmmakers alike plenty to enjoy. The anamorphic picture and Dolby Surround on Disc 1 do full justice to Zemeckis' vision, which is accompanied by two commentaries: one from the director, producer Steve Starkey and production designer Rick Carter, and another one from producer Wendy Finerman. [+]
Disc 2 has the usual making of documentary (30 mins), plus some neat featurettes on the production and sound design and the many special effects shots (including how they made Gary Sinise lose his legs). In addition there are some screen tests of Robin Wright and a very young Haley Joel (The Sixth Sense) Osment, plus trailers and a photo gallery. All in all this is a worthwhile package. -Mark Walker.

Review Umbrella Entertainment / Bed and Board [1971]
Actors & Directors
  • François Truffaut
  • Barbara Laage
  • Claude Jade
  • Jean-Pierre Léaud
  • Hiroko Berghauer
  • Danièle Girard
Release date: 2003-10-09
Run time: 94 min.
Creator: Claude de Givray
RRP: £11.87
Price: £3.54

Review Bed and Board [1971] / Umbrella Entertainment:


Review Kino / Conspirators of Pleasure [1996]
Actors & Directors
  • Jirí Lábus
  • Barbora Hrzánová
  • Anna Wetlinská
  • Jan Svankmajer
  • Petr Meissel
  • Gabriela Wilhelmová
Release date: 2000-04-10
Run time: 85 min.
Creator: Pierre Assouline
Price: £12.06

Review Conspirators of Pleasure [1996] / Kino:


Review TLA Releasing / Curiosity of Chance [2007]
Actors & Directors
  • Brett Chukerman
  • Tad Hilgenbrinck
  • Chris Mulkey
  • Aldevina da Silva
  • Pieter Van Nieuwenhuyze
Release date: 2008-07-15
Run time: 99 min.
Creator: Willie Aron
Price: £8.11

Review Curiosity of Chance [2007] / TLA Releasing:


Review Passport / The Bela Lugosi Box: 15 Frightful Films [1940]
Actors & Directors
  • Edward D. Wood Jr.
  • Christy Cabanne
  • Jean Yarbrough
  • Madge Bellamy
  • Edward D. Wood Jr.
  • Molly Lamont
  • George Zucco
  • Edwin L. Marin
  • Bela Lugosi
  • Ray Taylor
Release date: 2006-09-05
Run time: 1034 min.
Price: £8.62

Review The Bela Lugosi Box: 15 Frightful Films [1940] / Passport:


Models & Brands:
Rita, Sue And Bob Too [1987], The Gift of Love [1978] (REGION 1) (NTSC), The Iron Ladies [2001], Teachers: Series 1 [2001], Meredith Willson's: The Music Man [2003] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Snatch/Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels [1998], Hobson's Choice [1954], Operation Dumbo Drop [1995], The Kingdom ( Riget ) [1996] [ English subtitles ], Rent-A-Kid, Withnail And I [1986], The Avengers '68: Set 4 [1961] (REGION 1) (NTSC), The Importance of Being Earnest [2002], Alice's Adventures in Wonderland [1973] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Season 2 - Part 2 (REGION 1) (NTSC), Forrest Gump [1994] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Bed and Board [1971], Conspirators of Pleasure [1996], Curiosity of Chance [2007], The Bela Lugosi Box: 15 Frightful Films [1940]

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