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Review 2 Entertain Video / Waking The Dead : Complete BBC Series 1 [2001]
Actors & Directors
  • Martin Hutchings
  • Sue Johnston
  • Trevor Eve
  • Robert Del Maestro
  • Ben Bolt (II)
  • Jim O'Hanlon
  • Gary Love
Release date: 2005-09-12
Run time: 400 min.
RRP: £24.99
Price: £8.50

Review Waking The Dead : Complete BBC Series 1 [2001] / 2 Entertain Video:


Review Revelation Films Ltd / Holocaust - 30th Anniversary Collector's Set [1978]
Actors & Directors
  • Marvin J Chomsky
  • Tom Bell
  • Joseph Bottoms
  • Meryl Streep
  • James Woods
Release date: 2008-09-22
Run time: 431 min.
RRP: £24.99
Price: £15.98

Review Holocaust - 30th Anniversary Collector's Set [1978] / Revelation Films Ltd:


Review Entertainment in Video / Donnie Brasco [1997]
Actors & Directors
  • Johnny Depp
  • Mike Newell
  • James Russo
  • Al Pacino
  • Bruno Kirby
  • Michael Madsen
Release date: 1999-06-28
Run time: 121 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £1.50

Review Donnie Brasco [1997] / Entertainment in Video:

Based on a memoir by former undercover cop Joe Pistone (whose daring and unprecedented infiltration of the New York Mob scene earned him a place in the federal witness protection program), Donnie Brasco is like a de-romanticised, de-mythologised version of The Godfather. It offers an uncommonly detailed, privileged glimpse inside the world of organised crime from the perspective of the little guys at the bottom of Mafia hierarchy rather than from the kingpins at the top. Donnie Brasco is not only one of the great modern-day gangster movies to put in the company of The Godfather films and GoodFellas, but it is also one of the great undercover police movies-arguably surpassing Serpico and Prince of the City in richness of character, detail and moral complexity. Donnie (Johnny Depp, a splendid actor) is practically adopted by Lefty Ruggiero (Al Pacino), a gregarious, low-level "made" man who grows to love his young protégé like a son. (Pacino really sinks into this guy's skin and polyester slacks and creates his freshest, most fully realised character since his 1970s heyday. ) As Donnie acclimates himself to Lefty's world, he distances himself from his wife (a terrific Anne Heche) and family for their own protection. Almost imperceptibly his sense of identity slips away from him. Questioning his own confused loyalties, unable to trust anybody else because he himself is an imposter, Donnie loses his way in a murky and treacherous no-man's land. The film is directed by Mike Newell, who also headed up Four Weddings and a Funeral and the gritty, true crime melodrama Dance with a Stranger. -Jim Emerson.

Review The Catherine Cookson Collection / Catherine Cookson Complete Collection (24 Disc Box Set) [1956]
Release date: 2006-08-21
RRP: £120.99
Price: £39.97

Review Catherine Cookson Complete Collection (24 Disc Box Set) [1956] / The Catherine Cookson Collection:


Review Paramount Home Entertainment / Great Gatsby, The [1974]
Actors & Directors
  • Karen Black
  • Bruce Dern
  • Scott Wilson
  • Mia Farrow
  • Jack Clayton
  • Robert Redford
Release date: 2003-12-15
Run time: 135 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £4.98

Review Great Gatsby, The [1974] / Paramount Home Entertainment:

Perhaps no movie could capture F Scott Fitzgerald's novel The Great Gatsby in its entirety, but this adaptation, scripted by Francis Ford Coppola, is certainly a handsome try, putting costume design and art direction above the intricacies of character. Robert Redford is an interesting casting choice as Gatsby, the millionaire isolated in his mansion, still dreaming of the woman he lost. And Sam Waterston is perfect as the narrator, Nick, who brings the dream girl Daisy Buchanan back to Gatsby. The problem seems to be that director Jack Clayton fell in love with the flapper dresses and the party scenes and the jazz age tunes, ending up with a Classics Illustrated version of a great book rather than a fresh, organic take on the text. While Redford grows more quietly intriguing in the film, Mia Farrow's pallid performance as Daisy leaves you wondering why Gatsby, or anyone else, should care so much about his grand passion. The effective supporting cast includes Bruce Dern as Daisy's husband, and Scott Wilson and Karen Black as the low-rent couple whose destinies cross the sun-drenched protagonists. (That's future star Patsy Kensit as Daisy's little daughter. ) The film won two Oscars-not surprisingly, for costumes and musical score. -Robert Horton.

Review Warner Home Video / You've Got Mail [1999]
Actors & Directors
  • Greg Kinnear
  • Meg Ryan
  • Jean Stapleton
  • Parker Posey
  • Nora Ephron
  • Tom Hanks
Release date: 1999-08-23
Run time: 114 min.
RRP: £13.99
Price: £2.85

Review You've Got Mail [1999] / Warner Home Video:

By now, Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan have amassed such a fund of goodwill with moviegoers that any new onscreen pairing brings nearly reflexive smiles. In You've Got Mail, the quintessential boy and girl next door repeat the tentative romantic crescendo that made Sleepless in Seattle, writer-director Nora Ephron's previous excursion with the duo, a massive hit. The prospective couple do actually meet face to face early on but Mail otherwise repeats the earlier feature's gentle, extended tease of saving its romantic resolution until the final, gauzy shot. The underlying narrative is an even more old-fashioned romantic pas de deux that is casually hooked to a newfangled device. The script, cowritten by the director and her sister, Delia Ephron, updates and relocates the Ernst Lubitsch classic, The Shop Around the Corner, to contemporary Manhattan, where Joe Fox (Hanks) is a cheerfully rapacious merchant whose chain of book superstores is gobbling up smaller, more specialized shops such as the children's bookstore owned by Kathleen Kelly (Ryan). Their lives run in close parallel in the same idealized neighbourhood yet they first meet anonymously, online, where they gradually nurture a warm, even intimate correspondence. As they begin to wonder whether this e-mail flirtation might lead them to be soul mates, however, they meet and clash over their colliding business fortunes. It's no small testament to the two stars that we wind up liking and caring about them despite the inevitable (and highly manipulative) arc of the plot. Although their chemistry transcended the consciously improbable romantic premise of Sleepless, enabling director Ephron to attain a kind of amorous soufflé, this time around there's a slow leak that considerably deflates the affair. Less credulous viewers will challenge Joe's logic in prolonging the concealment of his online identity from Kathleen, and may shake their heads at Ephron's reinvention of Manhattan as a spotless, sun-dappled wonderland where everybody lives in million-dollar apartments and colour co-ordinates their wardrobes for cocktail parties. [+]
-Sam Sutherland.

Review Warner Home Video / The Thorn Birds: Series 1
Actors & Directors
  • Jean Simmons
  • Richard Chamberlain
  • Rachel Ward
  • Ken Howard
Release date: 2004-11-01
Run time: 464 min.
RRP: £20.99
Price: £8.98

Review The Thorn Birds: Series 1 / Warner Home Video:

The second most-watched mini-series (after Roots) of all time, The Thorn Birds was originally broadcast in 1983 and captivated viewers with its story of a lifelong conflict between the spirit and the flesh. Adapted from the bestselling novel by Colleen McCullough, the production stars Richard Chamberlain as a Catholic priest named Ralph de Bricassart, whose life in Australia between 1920 and 1962 is one long torment as he pines for his lover, Meggie Carson (Rachel Ward), while seeking advancement in his clergyman career. The passion and the guilt make for compelling drama, but a stellar cast of supporting players adds muscle to the proceedings: Barbara Stanwyck (who won an Emmy for her work as Meggie's tough grandmother), Jean Simmons, Richard Kiley, Christopher Plummer, Bryan Brown, and Mare Winningham. Chamberlain, who was something of the king of the miniseries form at the time, is very good in the lead, as is the often-underrated Ward. Their affair is indeed irresistible to watch, which proves to be true, too, of the story's thick weave of church politics, forbidden desire, social change over decades, and family secrets. -Tom Keogh.

Review Utv Home Entertainment / Jodhaa Akbar
Actors & Directors
  • Ashutosh Gowariker
  • Aishwarya Rai
  • Hrithik Roshan
Release date: 2008-08-25
Run time: 210 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £11.46

Review Jodhaa Akbar / Utv Home Entertainment:


Review Tla Releasing / Loving Annabelle
Release date: 2008-01-14
Run time: 76 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £10.00

Review Loving Annabelle / Tla Releasing:


Review Warner Home Video / The Sopranos: Complete HBO Seasons 1-6 Box Set [1999]
Actors & Directors
  • Steve Van Zandt
  • Edie Falco
  • James Gandolfini
  • Tony Sirico
  • Lorraine Bracco
Release date: 2007-11-19
Run time: 4675 min.
Creator: David Chase
RRP: £159.99
Price: £96.48

Review The Sopranos: Complete HBO Seasons 1-6 Box Set [1999] / Warner Home Video:

A flat-out treasure trove of television, The Sopranos Complete HBO Seasons 1-6 box set brings together every episode of a genuinely extraordinary series. Those that call it quite possibly the best show America has produced in the last decade aren't far wide of the mark (although fans of The Wire could have an argument there). To think The Sopranos all started from a simple sell: that a New Jersey mob boss falls into depression, and seeks out counselling to help him cope. And while early episodes followed Tony Soprano's balancing act as he sought to keep this from his mobster friends, The Sopranos took this foundation and built upon it a collection of layered, intriguing characters from both Tony's `work' and `home' families. That's only part of the reason for The Sopranos' extraordinary success, though. Because the writers then seeded many delightfully intricate plotlines, that seemed to seamlessly weave between one another. The end result was that every character was important, and-crucially-there was a real sense of unease, as fans began to realise that The Sopranos could have a quiet run of episodes, and then suddenly take out a character you've spent hours engaged with. It's a fascinating cocktail. Ruthless yet emotional, violent yet intimate, brash yet insecure, the characters of The Sopranos are as three dimensional as television drama gets. It's a tragedy it's finished, but the six series in this box offer a stunning legacy, and a masterclass to anyone else in the planet looking to make a character-driven drama. [+]
-Simon Brew.

Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / Prison Break - Season 1 - Complete [2005]
Actors & Directors
  • Wentworth Miller
  • Dominic Purcell
  • Stacy Keach
  • Wade Williams
  • Robin Tunney
Release date: 2006-09-18
Run time: 960 min.
RRP: £59.99
Price: £28.50

Review Prison Break - Season 1 - Complete [2005] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:

Season one of Prison Break is great television. Here's the set-up. Lincoln Burrows (Dominic Purcell) is framed and wrongfully convicted for assassinating the Vice President's brother. Lincoln's brother Michael Scofield (Wentworth Miller), who just happens to have designed Illinois' Fox River Penitentiary where Lincoln is on death row, hatches an elaborate escape plan. Michael's plan involves getting himself incarcerated in Fox River and smuggling the prison's blueprints by having them hidden in tattoos that cover his entire torso. Once inside, Michael must form alliances with a rogue's gallery of felons with their own sometimes unsavory motives. Meanwhile, on the outside, Lincoln's lawyer and one-time girlfriend Veronica Donovan (Robin Tunney), pursued by Secret Service agents, attempts to unravel the conspiracy that sent her man to the slammer. Prison Break is anchored by tight, suspenseful writing clearly relished by the largely little-known cast. Standouts include Robert Knepper as the murderer/pedophile T-Bag, who somehow makes such a despicable character likeable. Stacey Keach of Mike Hammer fame plays the warden-with-a-heart-of-gold, who clashes with Captain Brad Bellick (Wade Williams) over whether to rehabilitate the inmates or makes their lives more miserable. [+]
Peter Stormare, famous for his skills with a wood chipper in Fargo, turns in a deliciously menacing performance as mob boss John Abruzzi, while Amaury Nolasco's winsome Fernando Sucre shares a cell and secrets with Miller's Scofield. Watching the show one gets a sense that this is the opening salvo of Wentworth Miller's career, which will doubtless include roles as assassins, detectives, super heroes, and perhaps the champion of staring contests. Midway through the season it's explained that Scofield is a genius with an heightened sensitivity to other peoples' suffering, which sums up what makes the show so great-the mind-bendingly intricate plot is a framework for moments when people make others suffer and cope with the burden of their own suffering. The six-disc set includes 22 addictive episodes, audio commentary on selected episodes, three featurettes, and alternate and deleted scenes. As with most TV shows on DVD, the "previously on Prison Break" intros can get tiresome, but that's what the fast forward button is for. -Ryan Boudinot.

Review Optimum Home Entertainment / La Haine (Special Edition) [1995]
Actors & Directors
  • Mathieu Kassovitz
  • Hubert Kounde
  • Said Taghmaoui
  • Vincent Cassel
Release date: 2004-09-27
Run time: 98 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £4.98

Review La Haine (Special Edition) [1995] / Optimum Home Entertainment:

La Haine is an angry, anti-authoritarian French film that concerns three young guys (a Jew, an Arab, a black) who decide to take on the police after a friend is brutally beaten. There isn't much going on in this black and white drama beyond its violence (which can be pretty hard to watch, such as an interrogation scene that incorporates torture) and gritty observations of wayward youths hanging out on the fringes of Paris. Certainly, there isn't much in the way of insight, and director Mathieu Kassovitz seems to have absorbed more of the excesses of America's independent film scene, especially Spike Lee at his most indulgent, than its blessings. But if it's edge and rawness you want, this has it-with subtitles. -Tom Keogh.

Review ITV DVD / Fried Green Tomatoes At The Whistle Stop Cafe (Special Edition) [1991]
Actors & Directors
  • Jessica Tandy
  • Kathy Bates
  • Jon Avnet
  • Marie-Louise Parker
  • Mary Stuart Masterson
  • Cicely Tyson
Release date: 2007-09-17
Run time: 125 min.
RRP: £9.99
Price: £9.62

Review Fried Green Tomatoes At The Whistle Stop Cafe (Special Edition) [1991] / ITV DVD:


Review Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm / There Will Be Blood [Blu-ray] [2007]
Actors & Directors
  • Paul Dano
  • Ciaran Hinds
  • Paul Thomas Anderson
  • Kevin J. O'Connor
  • Daniel Day-Lewis
  • Dillon Freasier
Release date: 2008-07-07
Run time: 152 min.
RRP: £23.99
Price: £15.70

Review There Will Be Blood [Blu-ray] [2007] / Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm:

If there's a screen performance in 2008 that comes anywhere near to matching Daniel Day-Lewis' Oscar-winning turn in There Will Be Blood, then we've come nowhere near to seeing it. A tour-de-force of acting and a career high for Day-Lewis, it's the highlight of an extraordinary, really quite daring piece of cinema. That said, we've come to expect nothing less from writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson, the man who previously brought us Boogie Nights, Magnolia and Punch Drunk Love. However, he's really topped himself in terms of ambition with There Will Be Blood, an adaptation of Upton Sinclair's book, Oil! It follows Daniel Plainview (Day-Lewis) who, when we first meet him in the film's silent opening is attempting to mine silver, before he discovers oil and slowly builds up an empire off the back of it. There Will Be Blood then follows his rise to power, given the vast riches that his oil brings him, concurrently exploring his relationship with his son. It proves to be a long, complex, stunning piece of work. There's little room in There Will Be Blood for much more than the sheer power of Day-Lewis' performance, but credit Paul Dano (last seen saying an awful lot less in Little Miss Sunshine) for attempting to go toe-to-toe with the leading man. He's a foil of sorts for Plainview, playing a man as troubled and torn as Day-Lewis' character, and it's a career high to date for the young actor. The film, too, is a match for anything Paul Thomas Anderson has done to date, and that's some achievement. With no easy resolution, and a degree of complexity in its characters that we all-too-rarely see from modern American films, There Will Be Blood is a challenging, at times breathtaking piece of cinema. [+]
It won't be to all tastes, and it adamantly refuses to give easy answers, but it's as daring as anything you'll see on screen all year. And Day-Lewis' performance ranks next to any of the all-time greats that you'd care to mention. -Simon Brew.

Review MGM Entertainment / Woody Allen Collection Vol. 3 - The Purple Rose Of Cairo/Hannah And Her Sisters/Radio Days/September/Another Woman
Actors & Directors
  • Dianne Wiest
  • Woody Allen
  • Jack Warden
  • Tony Roberts
  • Denholm Elliott
  • Woody Allen
Release date: 2007-01-22
Run time: 420 min.
RRP: £34.99
Price: £12.97

Review Woody Allen Collection Vol. 3 - The Purple Rose Of Cairo/Hannah And Her Sisters/Radio Days/September/Another Woman / MGM Entertainment:


Review Warner Home Video / Pay It Forward [2001]
Actors & Directors
  • James Caviezel
  • Mimi Leder
  • Haley Joel Osment
  • Jay Mohr
  • Kevin Spacey
  • Helen Hunt
Release date: 2001-07-30
Run time: 119 min.
RRP: £13.99
Price: £2.68

Review Pay It Forward [2001] / Warner Home Video:

Director Mimi Leder's third movie, Pay it Forward, finds her moving into softer, more intimate territory after making her name with a pair of high-budget action spectaculars, The Peacemaker and Deep Impact. This is a would-be heart-warming fable about the power of human kindness, but it's handled with such heavy sententiousness as to suggest that she might do better sticking to the big-bang stuff. Haley Joel Osment (The Sixth Sense, A. I. ), son of a struggling lone parent (Helen Hunt) in Las Vegas, is influenced by inspirational teacher Kevin Spacey to come up with a scheme for social betterment: do acts of benevolence to three people, each of whom then does something good for three more, and so on. Inevitably, the lad's first ventures come to grief, but then the idea starts catching on and spreading, and a reporter in Los Angeles gets wind of it. This Readers Digest-ish scenario, treated with great solemnity by Leder and screenwriter Leslie Dixon, leaves the cast struggling to make something individual out of their pre-cooked roles. As you'd expect given such a line-up of acting talent, several scenes come off better than they deserve, and Spacey in particular does wonders with what is, in effect, two Hollywood clichés rolled into one: not just "offbeat inspirational teacher" but "shy, reclusive burns victim" as well. Interesting, too, to see a Vegas-set movie that shows a low-rent side of the city well away from the glitz and glamour of the Strip. But in the end, all else is drowned out by the clatter of predetermined plot-points being hammered home. [+]
On the DVD: Extras include a commentary from Leder, and a 13-minute "making-of" documentary that includes cast and director interviews. None of it, though, tells us much we couldn't have gathered from the movie. The clean widescreen (1. 85:1) print and the Dolby 5. 1 sound deliver on quality, and come fully into their own in the all-out bravura finale-shameless tear-jerking on a grand scale. -Philip Kemp.

Review Warner Home Video / The OC: The Complete Season 1 [2004]
Actors & Directors
  • Rachel Bilson
  • Benjamin McKenzie
  • Doug Liman
  • Chris Carmack
  • Adam Brody
  • Mischa Barton
Release date: 2004-10-18
Run time: 999 min.
RRP: £61.99
Price: £10.98

Review The OC: The Complete Season 1 [2004] / Warner Home Video:

Surf, sand, sex and scandal. The rich and glamorous city of Newport Beach, California is the setting for The O. C. , one of today's most hip and edgy television series making its way to DVD in a collectible seven-disc set featuring all 27 episodes from Season One. If you missed the first season, here is the chance to introduce yourselves to the hottest new show of the 2003-04 television season. The O. C. is a story of father/son and husband/wife relationships and the coming of age of three young people. [+]
When Ryan Atwood (Benjamin McKenzie), a tough, guarded fiercely intelligent teenager, plunges headlong into the wealthy, privileged community of Newport Beach, he soon discovers that the ruling families of Orange County are every bit as territorial as the tough crowd with which he ran on the streets of Chino. For Sandy Cohen (Peter Gallagher), the patient, pro-bono public defender who takes Ryan in; his wife, Kirsten (Kelly Rowan), the linchpin of O. C. society; their awkward adolescent son, Seth (Adam Brody) - Ryan's presence will forever change their lives. Meanwhile, Marissa Cooper (Mischa Barton), the heartbreakingly beautiful girl next door who is dating her classmate Luke Ward (Chris Carmack), seems to glide through life effortlessly-that is, until the indiscretions of her wealthy father, Jimmy (Tate Donovan) threaten to break her world apart, along with that of her mother, Julie (Melinda Clarke). DVD Special Features include Deleted Scenes with introductions by creator Josh Schwartz; Casting The O. C. featurette with creator Josh Schwartz and casting director Patrick Rush; The Music of The O. C. featurette with music supervisor Alexandra Pastavas; Inside The Real O. C. featurette with producer McG; Audio Commentary for The Pilot with creator Josh Schwartz and producer Stephanie Savage; The O. C. Music Guide for 6 episodes; Season 2 Sneak Peak with creator Josh Schwartz and the cast and the trailer for the ocinsider. com.

Review Second Sight Films Ltd. / La Gloire De Mon Pere [1990]
Actors & Directors
  • Didier Pain
  • Phillippe Caubere
  • Nathalie Roussel
  • Yves Robert
  • Therese Liotard
Release date: 2004-04-19
Run time: 106 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £5.35

Review La Gloire De Mon Pere [1990] / Second Sight Films Ltd.:


Review Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm / The English Patient (Special Edition) [1996]
Actors & Directors
  • Kristin Scott Thomas
  • Julian Wadham
  • Willem Dafoe
  • Ralph Fiennes
  • Juliette Binoche
  • Anthony Minghella
Release date: 2005-02-21
Run time: 155 min.
RRP: £22.99
Price: £4.28

Review The English Patient (Special Edition) [1996] / Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm:


Review 2 Entertain Video / Private Schulz [1981]
Actors & Directors
  • Michael Elphick
  • Ian Richardson
  • Billie Whitelaw
Release date: 2008-07-21
Run time: 300 min.
RRP: £14.99
Price: £9.97

Review Private Schulz [1981] / 2 Entertain Video:


Browse Drama:

Models & Brands:
Waking The Dead : Complete BBC Series 1 [2001], Holocaust - 30th Anniversary Collector's Set [1978], Donnie Brasco [1997], Catherine Cookson Complete Collection (24 Disc Box Set) [1956], Great Gatsby, The [1974], You've Got Mail [1999], The Thorn Birds: Series 1, Jodhaa Akbar, Loving Annabelle, The Sopranos: Complete HBO Seasons 1-6 Box Set [1999], Prison Break - Season 1 - Complete [2005], La Haine (Special Edition) [1995], Fried Green Tomatoes At The Whistle Stop Cafe (Special Edition) [1991], There Will Be Blood [Blu-ray] [2007], Woody Allen Collection Vol. 3 - The Purple Rose Of Cairo/Hannah And Her Sisters/Radio Days/September/Another Woman, Pay It Forward [2001], The OC: The Complete Season 1 [2004], La Gloire De Mon Pere [1990], The English Patient (Special Edition) [1996], Private Schulz [1981]

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