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Review Revelation Films Ltd / LA Ink - The Complete Series One [2007]
Actors & Directors
  • Eve
  • Steve-O
  • Kat Von D
  • Jesse Metcalfe
  • Ja Rule
Release date: 2008-07-07
Run time: 545 min.
RRP: £34.99
Price: £9.99

Review LA Ink - The Complete Series One [2007] / Revelation Films Ltd:


Review MGM Entertainment / Moonstruck [1987]
Actors & Directors
  • Cher
  • Nicolas Cage
  • Norman Jewison
  • Olympia Dukakis
  • Vincent Gardenia
  • Danny Aiello
Release date: 2000-04-24
Run time: 162 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £3.69

Review Moonstruck [1987] / MGM Entertainment:

Remember the outfit Cher wore to the Oscars when she won an Academy Award for her performance in this 1987 film? Ay-yi-yi. The actress' more retiring character in this infectious comedy leaps several psychological hurdles just giving her hair a permanent. But then the original screenplay of Moonstruck, by John Patrick Shanley (Joe Versus the Volcano), is a wonderful, gently satirical tale of an Italian-American family dealing with repression and dissatisfaction against a backdrop of cultural expectations. Cher is focused and funny as a widow who feels she should marry an older fellow (Danny Aiello), but then falls for his black-sheep brother (Nicolas Cage). Olympia Dukakis and Vincent Gardenia are perfect as her parents, and John Mahoney (of TV's Frasier) has a memorable, small role as a middle-aged man on the make who gets a lecture from Dukakis's character. Shanley's dialogue is comically stylised in a way that makes one appreciate how much words can inform an actor's performance. Taking its cues from him and director Norman Jewison (And Justice for All), the cast immerse themselves in a pool of hilariously operatic emotion. -Tom Keogh.

Review Warner Home Video / Ryan's Daughter - Special Edition [1970]
Actors & Directors
  • Sarah Miles
  • Barry Foster
  • Christopher Jones
  • Robert Mitchum
  • Trevor Howard
  • David Lean
Release date: 2006-02-13
Run time: 186 min.
RRP: £16.99
Price: £4.95

Review Ryan's Daughter - Special Edition [1970] / Warner Home Video:


Review Warner Home Video / Clockwork Orange [1972]
Actors & Directors
  • John Clive
  • Michael Bates
  • Malcolm McDowell
  • Stanley Kubrick
  • Patrick Magee
  • Warren Clarke
Release date: 2005-07-01
Run time: 131 min.
RRP: £13.99
Price: £3.79

Review Clockwork Orange [1972] / Warner Home Video:

The controversy that surrounded Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of Anthony Burgess's dystopian novel A Clockwork Orange while the film was out of circulation suggested that it was like Romper Stomper: a glamorisation of the violent, virile lifestyle of its teenage protagonist, with a hypocritical gloss of condemnation to mask delight in rape and ultra-violence. Actually, it is as fable-like and abstract as The Pilgrim's Progress, with characters deliberately played as goonish sitcom creations. The anarchic rampage of Alex (Malcolm McDowell), a bowler-hatted juvenile delinquent of the future, is all over at the end of the first act. Apprehended by equally brutal authorities, he changes from defiant thug to cringing bootlicker, volunteering for a behaviourist experiment that removes his capacity to do evil. It's all stylised: from Burgess' invented pidgin Russian (snarled unforgettably by McDowell) to 2001-style slow tracks through sculpturally perfect sets (as with many Kubrick movies, the story could be told through decor alone) and exaggerated, grotesque performances on a par with those of Dr Strangelove (especially from Patrick Magee and Aubrey Morris). Made in 1971, based on a novel from 1962, A Clockwork Orange resonates across the years. Its future is now quaint, with Magee pecking out "subversive literature" on a giant IBM typewriter and "lovely, lovely Ludwig Van" on mini-cassette tapes. However, the world of "Municipal Flat Block 18A, Linear North" is very much with us: a housing estate where classical murals are obscenely vandalised, passers-by are rare and yobs loll about with nothing better to do than hurt people. On the DVD: The extras are skimpy, with just an impressionist trailer in the style of the film used to brainwash Alex and a list of awards for which Clockwork Orange was nominated and awarded. The box promises soundtracks in English, French and Italian and subtitles in ten languages, but the disc just has two English soundtracks (mono and Dolby Surround 5. [+]
1) and two sets of English subtitles. The terrific-looking "digitally restored and remastered" print is letterboxed at 1. 66:1 and on a widescreen TV plays best at 14:9. The film looks as good as it ever has, with rich stable colours (especially and appropriately the orangey-red of the credits and the blood) and a clarity that highlights previously unnoticed details such as Alex's gouged eyeball cufflinks and enables you to read the newspaper articles which flash by. The 5. 1 soundtrack option is amazingly rich, benefiting the nuances of performance as much as the classical/electronic music score and the subtly unsettling sound effects. -Kim Newman.

Review Warner Home Video / Gypsy [1962]
Actors & Directors
  • Karl Malden
  • Mervyn Le Roy
  • Rosalind Russell
  • Natalie Wood
Release date: 2006-04-03
Run time: 137 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £3.47

Review Gypsy [1962] / Warner Home Video:


Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / The Unit - Series 1 - Complete [2006]
Actors & Directors
  • Max Martini
  • David Mamet
  • Regina Taylor
  • Oz Scott
  • Steve Gomer
  • Helen Shaver
  • Robert Patrick
  • Scott Foley
  • Dennis Haysbert
  • Davis Guggenheim
Release date: 2007-04-30
Run time: 549 min.
RRP: £34.99
Price: £18.99

Review The Unit - Series 1 - Complete [2006] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:

Full of action, intrigue, and espionage, The Unit offers a dramatic, fictionalised look inside the military while also giving viewers a peek inside the private lives of the elite squad. Conceived by the critically acclaimed David Mamet (Glengarry Glen Ross, House of Games), The Unit is an elite, covert Special Forces team that operates outside the military chain of command. The first season's 13 episodes offer insight into the characters without revealing too much about the men who make up the operation. Are they extremely patriotic, or are they adrenalin junkies who have to be in danger to feel validated? The answer probably falls somewhere in between, and the viewer gets the feeling that as much as the men love their wives and children, it's their jobs that give them their true reason for living. Led by veteran Jonas Blane (Dennis Haysbert, 24), the Unit deals with terrorism, rescue missions, and assassinations quickly, discreetly, and efficiently. If all goes well, someone else gets the credit. If things go awry, it's their necks on the line. In the first season of The Unit, the action is fast, the plot is succinct, and the acting is well done (when dealing with the deadly missions). It's the secondary storyline involving the wives that's less successful. The newest member of the Unit, Bob Brown (Scott Foley, Felicity), apparently didn't fill his wife Kim (Audrey Marie Anderson) in on what their new life would be like. [+]
From the beginning, she resists the hoo rah attitude that the other wives exhibit. But rather than coming across as an independent free thinker, she is presented as a whining drip of a woman who has no clue about the definition of a secret. Of course, when faced with the military's version of The Stepford Wives, who could blame her? As Jonas' supportive wife Molly, Regina Taylor (I'll Fly Away, Courage Under Fire) is less sympathetic than usual. In the early episodes, she comes across as an almost stalkerish busybody who is always there when Kim is trying to cope with a life she never wanted. Throw in an affair between commanding officer Colonel Tom Ryan (Robert Patrick, Terminator 2: Judgment Day) and one of the wives and you've got the makings of a military soap opera. The show is at its best when it concentrates on the men and their missions. We may not understand why they do what they do, but we're grateful that someone is doing the dangerous job for us. -Jae-Ha Kim.

Review Cinema Club / The Shooting Party (Collectors Edition) [1985]
Actors & Directors
  • Dorothy Tutin
  • John Gielgud
  • Robert Hardy
  • Edward Fox
  • James Mason
  • Alan Bridges
Release date: 2006-10-09
Run time: 93 min.
RRP: £17.99
Price: £3.69

Review The Shooting Party (Collectors Edition) [1985] / Cinema Club:


Review ITV DVD / This Happy Breed [1944]
Actors & Directors
  • Robert Newton
  • John Mills
  • David Lean
  • Stanley Holloway
  • Kay Walsh
  • Celia Johnson
Release date: 2008-09-15
Run time: 106 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £7.98

Review This Happy Breed [1944] / ITV DVD:


Review Pathe Distribution / All About My Mother [1999]
Actors & Directors
  • Rosa Maria Sarda
  • Marisa Paredes
  • Pedro Almodovar
  • Candela Pena
  • Penelope Cruz
  • Cecilia Roth
Release date: 2000-02-28
Run time: 97 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £3.97

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 Network / We'll Meet Again : The Complete Series (4 Disc Box Set)
Actors & Directors
  • Ronald Hines
  • Christopher Hodson
  • Tony Wharmby
  • Michael J. Shannon
  • Susannah York
Release date: 2006-04-24
Run time: 675 min.
RRP: £29.99
Price: £13.53

Review We'll Meet Again : The Complete Series (4 Disc Box Set) / Network:


Review MGM Entertainment / The French Lieutenant's Woman [1981]
Actors & Directors
  • Jeremy Irons
  • Emily Morgan
  • Karel Reisz
  • Meryl Streep
  • Hilton McRae
  • Charlotte Mitchell
Release date: 2002-02-04
Run time: 119 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £3.20

Review The French Lieutenant's Woman [1981] / MGM Entertainment:

Writer Harold Pinter (Betrayal) and director Karel Reisz (Isadora) take an experimental spin with John Fowles's magnificent novel set in Victorian England, and come up with something puzzling. Jeremy Irons and Meryl Streep play the forbidden lovers in Fowles's story, but in a parallel story line they also play contemporary actors performing those characters in a movie production and having an affair of their own during off-hours. Got that? Considering that Fowles himself presents alternative endings in his novel, something equally eccentric is called for here. But little is accomplished by this intertwining of a fictional past and present, and the opportunity to do justice to a great story is lost. On the plus side, Irons and Streep are instantly striking as a natural couple on screen, and their presence makes watching The French Lieutenant's Woman easy enough despite the larger problems. -Tom Keogh With The French Lieutenant's Woman writer Harold Pinter and director Karel Reisz take an experimental spin on John Fowles' magnificent novel set in Victorian England, and come up with something puzzling. Jeremy Irons and Meryl Streep play the forbidden lovers in Fowles' story, but in a parallel story line they also play contemporary actors performing those characters in a movie production and having an affair of their own during off-hours. Got that? Considering that Fowles himself presents alternative endings in his novel, something equally eccentric is called for here. But little is accomplished by this intertwining of a fictional past and present, and the opportunity to do justice to a great story is lost. On the plus side, Irons and Streep are instantly striking as a natural couple on screen, and their presence makes watching this film easy enough despite the larger problems. [+]
-Tom Keogh, Amazon. com.

Review CSI: Crime Scene Investigation / CSI: Crime Scene Investigation - Las Vegas - Season 1 Part 1 [2001]
Release date: 2002-07-01
Run time: 513 min.
RRP: £39.99
Price: £7.95

Review CSI: Crime Scene Investigation - Las Vegas - Season 1 Part 1 [2001] / CSI: Crime Scene Investigation:

The latest in a long line of successful US police dramas, the forensic cop show Crime Scene Investigation varies the formula by focusing on a team of civilian scientists who work the night shift in Las Vegas, poring over crime scenes for fingerprints, blood spatters, DNA-laced mucus and (especially) maggots. Star William Petersen plays a variation of his role from Manhunter, the cool puzzle-solving genius who can rattle off mystifying speeches with aplomb, while his contrasting partner is Marg Helgenberger, cast as a single mother/ex-stripper who is as concerned with the emotional as well as the physical mess left by crime. While most US cop shows (witness NYPD Blue) tend towards soap, neglecting the cases in favour of personal crises, CSI gives its regulars enough life to make them human but is essentially puzzle-based, with individual episodes following two or three cases à la Homicide: Life on the Street. The occasional special focuses on a major job with the team investigating the slaughter of a whole family ("Blood Drops") or a death in first class on a plane over Vegas ("Unfriendly Skies"). A few continuing threads are laid down, with a recurrent villain who gets away, but will inevitably return, but on the whole these shows play pretty well as one-offs. Very high-tech in style, with lots of zooms into microscopic examinations of hair follicles or stomach contents and distinctive visualisations of the different stories told by witnesses and evidence, this is one of the best shows currently airing. On the DVD: CSI's first DVD box set contains the show's first 12 episodes: the pilot followed by "Cool Change", "Crate & Burial", "Pledging Mr Johnson"; "Friends and Lovers", "Who Are You?", "Blood Drops"; "Anonymous", "Unfriendly Skies", "Sex Lies and Larvae"; "The I-15 Murders" and "Fahrenheit 932". In addition to inventive menus, the three-disc set offers character profiles, a trailer, some B-roll on-set footage, a subtitle option, and snippet-like interviews with the cast and creatives. -Kim Newman.

Review Fremantle Home Entertainment / Homicide - Series 6 - Complete
Actors & Directors
  • Andre Braugher
  • Richard Belzer
  • Barry Levinson
  • Yaphet Kotto
Release date: 2008-09-01
Run time: 990 min.
RRP: £39.99
Price: £17.50

Review Homicide - Series 6 - Complete / Fremantle Home Entertainment:


Review Universal Pictures UK / Little House On The Prairie - Series 2 [1975]
Actors & Directors
  • Michael Landon
  • Karen Grassle
  • Victor French
  • Melissa Sue Anderson
  • Melissa Gilbert
Release date: 2006-03-27
RRP: £29.99
Price: £12.36

Review Little House On The Prairie - Series 2 [1975] / Universal Pictures UK:


Review Warner Home Video / Alexander Revisited - The Final Cut (2 Disc Special Edition) [2004]
Actors & Directors
  • Jared Leto
  • Oliver Stone
  • Val Kilmer
  • Colin Farrell
  • Rosario Dawson
  • Angelina Jolie
Release date: 2007-08-06
Run time: 206 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £4.23

Review Alexander Revisited - The Final Cut (2 Disc Special Edition) [2004] / Warner Home Video:


Review Warner Home Video / What Ever Happened To Baby Jane (2 Disc Special Edition) [1962]
Actors & Directors
  • Robert Aldrich
  • Bette Davis
  • Joan Crawford
  • Victor Buono
Release date: 2006-07-17
Run time: 128 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £5.49

Review What Ever Happened To Baby Jane (2 Disc Special Edition) [1962] / Warner Home Video:


Review Artificial Eye / Chansons D'Amour [2007]
Actors & Directors
  • Alice Butaud
  • Louis Garrel
  • Gregoire Leprince-Ringuet
  • Brigitte Rouan
  • Christophe Honore
  • Clotilde Hesme
Release date: 2008-04-14
Run time: 92 min.
RRP: £19.99
Price: £5.92

Review Chansons D'Amour [2007] / Artificial Eye:


Review Sony Pictures Home Entertainment / 21 [Blu-ray] [2008]
Actors & Directors
  • Robert Luketic
  • Laurence Fishburne
  • Jim Sturgess
  • Kate Bosworth
  • Kevin Spacey
Release date: 2008-09-08
Run time: 123 min.
RRP: £24.99
Price: £13.25

Review 21 [Blu-ray] [2008] / Sony Pictures Home Entertainment:

An unconvincing exercise in moral complexity, 21 is based on Ben Mezrich's book Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story of Six M. I. T. Students Who Took Vegas for Millions. Jim Sturgess (Across the Universe) plays brilliant blue collar scholar Ben Campbell, whose doubts that he'll win a scholarship to Harvard Medical School compel him to join a secret, M. I. T. gang of math whiz kids. Under the silky but chilling command of a math professor (Kevin Spacey), Jim and the others master card counting -the statistical analysis of cards dealt in blackjack games. The team lives a humdrum existence during the week, but on weekends in Sin City the students are rolling in cash, frequenting exclusive clubs and feeling on top of the world. [+]
Ben even gets the girl: a comely fellow card counter played by Kate Bosworth. Despite all the success, Ben feels ethically compromised and indeed director Robert Luketic (Legally Blonde, Across the Universe), in the old tradition of American movies, plays it both ways where fun vices are concerned. On the one hand, it feels so good -on the other, ahem, we know it's wrong. That studied ambivalence proves wearing after a while, making the most interesting character in the film a casino watchdog played by Laurence Fishburne. A master at reading the emotions of gamblers beating the house with a scam, he's admirable for being good at his job, but repellent for wrecking the faces of counters in casino dungeons. He's all about moral complexity in the tradition of anti-heroes, and a truly provocative element in an otherwise superficial movie. -Tom Keogh.

Review Momentum Pictures / CSI: Crime Scene Investigation - Las Vegas - Season 5 Part 1
Actors & Directors
  • William L. Petersen
  • Marg Helgenberger
  • Gary Dourdan
  • George Eads
  • Robert David Hall
Release date: 2006-04-24
Run time: 504 min.
RRP: £39.99
Price: £7.80

Review CSI: Crime Scene Investigation - Las Vegas - Season 5 Part 1 / Momentum Pictures:


Review Warner Home Video / Ocean's Twelve [HD DVD]
Actors & Directors
  • Brad Pitt
  • George Clooney
  • Catherine Zeta Jones
  • Matt Damon
  • Steven Soderbergh
  • Andy Garcia
Release date: 2007-11-05
Run time: 120 min.
RRP: £25.99
Price: £6.98

Review Ocean's Twelve [HD DVD] / Warner Home Video:

Like its predecessor Ocean's Eleven, Ocean's Twelve has a preposterous plot given juice and vitality by the combination of movie star glamour and the exuberant filmmaking skill of director Steven Soderbergh (Out of Sight, The Limey). The heist hijinks of the first film come to roost for a team of eleven thieves (including the glossy mugs of Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Bernie Mac, and Don Cheadle), who find themselves pursued not only by the guy they robbed (silky Andy Garcia), but also by a top-notch detective (plush Catherine Zeta-Jones) and a jealous master thief (well-oiled Vincent Cassel) who wants to prove that team leader Danny Ocean (dapper George Clooney) isn't the best in the field. As if all that star power weren't enough-and the eternally coltish Julia Roberts also returns as Ocean's wife-one movie star cameo raises the movie's combined wattage to absurd proportions. But all these handsome faces are matched by Soderbergh's visual flash, cunning editing, and excellent use of Amsterdam, Paris, and Rome, among other highly decorative locations. The whole affair should collapse under the weight of its own silliness, but somehow it doesn't-the movie's raffish spirit and offhand wit soar along, providing lightweight but undeniably enjoyable entertainment. -Bret Fetzer.

Browse Drama:

Models & Brands:
LA Ink - The Complete Series One [2007], Moonstruck [1987], Ryan's Daughter - Special Edition [1970], Clockwork Orange [1972], Gypsy [1962], The Unit - Series 1 - Complete [2006], The Shooting Party (Collectors Edition) [1985], This Happy Breed [1944], All About My Mother [1999], We'll Meet Again : The Complete Series (4 Disc Box Set), The French Lieutenant's Woman [1981], CSI: Crime Scene Investigation - Las Vegas - Season 1 Part 1 [2001], Homicide - Series 6 - Complete, Little House On The Prairie - Series 2 [1975], Alexander Revisited - The Final Cut (2 Disc Special Edition) [2004], What Ever Happened To Baby Jane (2 Disc Special Edition) [1962], Chansons D'Amour [2007], 21 [Blu-ray] [2008], CSI: Crime Scene Investigation - Las Vegas - Season 5 Part 1, Ocean's Twelve [HD DVD]

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