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Home › Drama › Period
Actors & Directors
  • Derek Senft
  • Michael Riley
  • Jill Frappier
  • Kate Trotter
  • Julian Richings
  • Kit Hood
Release date: 2004-11-30
Run time: 51 min.
Price: £10.17

Review Strauss: The King of Three-Quarter Time [1996] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Devine Entertainment:


Review Warner Home Video / Barry Lyndon [1975] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Ryan O'Neal
  • Stanley Kubrick
  • Hardy Krüger
  • Steven Berkoff
  • Marisa Berenson
  • Patrick Magee
Release date: 1999-06-29
Run time: 184 min.
Creator: Jan Harlan
Price: £10.25

Review Barry Lyndon [1975] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Warner Home Video:

Perhaps Stanley Kubrick's most underrated film, Barry Lyndon-adapted from the picaresque novel by William Makepeace Thackeray-inhabits the 18th century in the way A Clockwork Orange and 2001: A Space Odyssey inhabit the future: perfect sets, costumes and cinematography capture characters whose rises and falls are at once deeply tragic and absurdly comical. Narrated in avuncular form by Michael Hordern, the film follows the fortunes of Redmond Barry (Ryan O'Neal), a handsome Irish youth forced to flee his hometown after a duel with a cowardly English officer (Leonard Rossiter). Stripped of his small fortune by a deferential highwayman, Barry joins the British army and fights in the Seven Years War, attempting a desertion that leads him into the Prussian army. A position as a spy on an exquisitely painted con man (Patrick Magee) leads to a life of gambling around the courts of Europe, and just before the intermission our hero achieves all he could want by marrying a wealthy, titled beautiful widow (Marisa Berenson). However, Part Two reveals that Barry can no more be a clockwork orange than the protagonist of Kubrick's previous film, and his spendthrift ways, foolhardy pursuit of social advancement and unwise treatment of his new family lead to several disasters, climaxing in another horrific, yet farcical duel. Shot almost entirely in the "magic hour", that point of the day when the light is mistily perfect, with innovative use of candlelight for interiors, Barry Lyndon looks ravishing, but the perfection of its images is matched by the inner turmoil of its seemingly frozen characters. Kubrick is often accused of being unemotional, but his restraint is all the more affecting when, for example, Barry is struck by the deaths of those close to him, his wife writhes into madness or his stepson (Leon Vitali) vomits before he can stand his ground in a duel. On the DVD: The extras are skimpy, a trailer and a list of awards, a French alternate soundtrack and subtitles in seven languages. However, the film-"digitally restored and remastered"-is served superbly by the medium. Letterboxed to 1. [+]
59:1 (which fits the 14:9 option of a widescreen TV), with a 5. 1 Dolby Digital soundtrack, the print looks and sounds wonderful, which not only allows a fresh appreciation of the wit and beauty of the film but shows just how good the apparent underplaying (unusual in Kubrick films) of the cast is. -Kim Newman.

Review Kino / Institute Benjamenta [1995] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Stephen Quay
  • Gottfried John
  • Alice Krige
  • Daniel Smith
  • Mark Rylance
  • Timothy Quay
  • Joseph Alessi
Release date: 2000-08-01
Run time: 104 min.
Creator: Robert Walser

Review Institute Benjamenta [1995] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Kino:


Review Columbia TriStar / Hideous Kinky [1999] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Carrie Mullan
  • Saïd Taghmaoui
  • Gillies MacKinnon
  • Kate Winslet
  • Pierre Clémenti
  • Bella Riza
Release date: 1999-10-26
Run time: 98 min.
Creator: Esther Freud
Price: £140.24

Review Hideous Kinky [1999] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Columbia TriStar:

Hideous Kinky journeys back to the early 1970s to Marrakesh, that hippy mecca for everyone from Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix to Gillies MacKinnon, the director of this movie. Here you'll find one nice but confused middle-class young woman escaping the daily grind of a drab London with her two young daughters in tow. Whereas Esther Freud's book was told from the younger girl's perspective, the film-script places Julia centre-stage as she searches for what she describes wistfully as "the annihilation of the ego". Though fresh from her Titanic experience, Kate Winslet is no drippy hippy, bringing a refreshing feistiness to her role and looking fetching swathed in diaphanous layers. As her two daughters, Bella Riza (Bea, the wide-eyed younger one) and Carrie Mullan (Lucy, the sensible one) are brilliant discoveries-unselfconscious, charmingly quirky and enjoying a camaraderie that belies their difference in characters. Completing the family unit is Julia's lover, the endearingly unreliable Bilal (a fiery performance from Saïd Taghmaoui). When the money runs out, their adventures begin and the resilience and practicality of the girls is contrasted throughout with the dreaminess of their mother, her sense of duty vying with her quest for self-discovery. Visually, it's a veritable feast as we're pitched from the colour and cacophony of the market-place to the dusty harshness of the mountains. And that elusive title-which is never explained in the film-is in fact a phrase coined by the girls as a term of approbation. On the DVD: Hideous Kinky is presented in widescreen 16:9 with a Dolby Digital soundtrack. [+]
Additional features are disappointing minimal. As well as the usual theatrical trailer, there are brief interviews with the main players (though no marks for imagination as they're all asked the same questions) and approximately eight minutes of behind-the-scenes footage. There are no subtitles. -Harriet Smith.

Review Warner Home Video / The Mission [1986] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Roland Joffé
  • Aidan Quinn
  • Ray McAnally
  • Cherie Lunghi
  • Jeremy Irons
  • Robert De Niro
Release date: 2003-05-13
Run time: 126 min.
Creator: Felipe López Caballero
Price: £13.34

Review The Mission [1986] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Warner Home Video:

Roland Joffé (The Killing Fields) directs this fuzzy effort at a David Lean-like epic without David Lean's sense of emotional proportion. Lean's most important screenwriting collaborator, Robert Bolt, in fact wrote The Mission, which concerns a Jesuit missionary (Jeremy Irons) who establishes a church in the hostile jungles of Brazil and then finds his work threatened by greed and political forces among his superiors. Robert De Niro is briefly effective as a callous soldier who kills his own brother and then turns to Irons's character to oversee his penance and conversion to the clergy. The narrative and dramatic forces at work in this movie should be more stirring and powerful than they are-the problem being that Joffé is too removed from them to allow us in. -Tom Keogh The Mission is director Roland Joffé's fuzzy effort at an epic in David Lean style without David Lean's sense of emotional proportion. In fact, Lean's most important screenwriting collaborator, Robert Bolt, wrote The Mission, which concerns a Jesuit missionary (Jeremy Irons) who establishes a church in the hostile jungles of Brazil and then finds his work threatened by greed and political forces among his superiors. Robert De Niro is briefly effective as a callous soldier who kills his own brother and then turns to Irons's character to oversee his penance and conversion to the clergy. The narrative and dramatic forces at work in this movie should be more stirring and powerful than they are, the problem being that Joffé is too removed from them to allow us in. By way of compensation, Ennio Morricone contributes one of his most evocative and admired music scores. -Tom Keogh.

Review BFS Entertainment Entertainment / The Great Air Race [1990] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • John Benton
  • Marcus Cole
  • David Arnett
  • Tristan Arniel
  • Duke Bannister
  • Kirk Alexander
Release date: 2000-08-08
Run time: 192 min.
Creator: Michael Brindley
Price: £67.95

Review The Great Air Race [1990] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / BFS Entertainment Entertainment:


Review Image Entertainment / Wuthering Heights [1985] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Jacques Rivette
  • Sandra Montaigu
  • Fabienne Babe
  • Lucas Belvaux
  • Alice de Poncheville
  • Olivier Cruveiller
Release date: 2002-01-02
Run time: 130 min.
Creator: Suzanne Schiffman
Price: £28.15

Review Wuthering Heights [1985] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Image Entertainment:


Actors & Directors
  • Lionel Braham
  • Guy Bellis
  • Harry Allen
  • E.E. Clive
  • Clyde Cook
Release date: 2001-05-15
Run time: 94 min.
Creator: William Skall
Price: £4.30

Review The Little Princess [1939] (NTSC) / GT Media:


Review New Yorker Video / Chunhyang [2000] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Jung-hun Lee
  • Hyo-jeong Lee
  • Hak-young Kim
  • Kwon-taek Im
  • Sung-nyu Kim
  • Seung-woo Cho
Release date: 2001-10-09
Run time: 120 min.
Creator: Myung-gon Kim
Price: £29.71

Review Chunhyang [2000] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / New Yorker Video:


Review Anchor Bay / They Shoot Horses, Don't They? [1969] (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Michael Sarrazin
  • Sydney Pollack
  • Red Buttons
  • Jane Fonda
  • Susannah York
  • Gig Young
Release date: 1999-10-12
Run time: 120 min.
Creator: Theodore B. Sills
Price: £44.83

Review They Shoot Horses, Don't They? [1969] (NTSC) / Anchor Bay:

They Shoot Horses Don't They? is set in the dark years of the l930s, when dance marathons became popular as a way for desperate people to compete for prize money. Sometimes the events would drag on for weeks as contestants pushed themselves far beyond the point of physical, mental and emotional exhaustion, the dancers shambling around the floor in a half-dead stupor. People would then pay to sit in the bleachers, watch the event and cheer on their favourites. Taken from hard-boiled pulp writer Horace McCoy's novel of the same name, Jane Fonda plays a bitter young woman paired up with Michael Sarrazin for the ordeal. Gig Young portrays the unctuous MC of the event, bringing equal parts compassion and sleaze to his role. Many of the film's images are unforgettable, such as "the derby", a heel-and-toe race around the dance floor with bouncy, light-hearted music to accompany the miserable spectacle. It's a powerful, tragic period piece that reminds us of the privations of the Great Depression. In the largest sense, the film has existential overtones that go far beyond the story of enervated dancers staying on their feet for a month or more. This film brought home a string of Academy Award nominations for the cast and director Sydney Pollack and a win for Young. -Jerry Renshaw, Amazon. [+]
com On the DVD: The disc offers film trivia and notes on the main cast and director, along with a short slide show and original publicity notes in an attempt to furnish valuable information about the film. However the layout is visually unimpressive and the information is merely standard film trivia offering little insight into the film itself-the quotes from Jane Fonda are surely aimed at hardcore fans of the actress only. It all feels like a selection put together in a bit of a rush. -Nikki Disney.

Review Acorn Media / The Hanging Gale [1995]
Actors & Directors
  • Michael Kitchen
  • Stephen McGann
  • Mark McGann
  • Paul McGann
  • Diarmuid Lawrence
  • Joe McGann
Release date: 2005-05-09
Run time: 201 min.
RRP: £16.99
Price: £7.75

Review The Hanging Gale [1995] / Acorn Media:


Review Monterey Video / Solomon Northup's Odyssey:
Actors & Directors
  • Joe Seneca
  • Gordon Parks
  • Mason Adams
  • Avery Brooks
  • Michael Tolan
  • Petronia Paley
Release date: 2005-01-08
Run time: 117 min.
Creator: John Carter
Price: £8.50

Review Solomon Northup's Odyssey: "Twelve Years a Slave" [1984] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Monterey Video:


Review Simitar / Women of Valor [1986] (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Buzz Kulik
  • Susan Sarandon
  • Valerie Mahaffey
  • Suzanne Lederer
  • Alberta Watson
  • Kristy McNichol
Release date: 1998-03-10
Run time: 100 min.
Creator: Philip L. Parslow
Price: £132.95

Review Women of Valor [1986] (NTSC) / Simitar:


Review Fox Lorber / Hammers over the Anvil [1991] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Alexander Outhred
  • Ann Turner
  • Frankie J. Holden
  • Jake Frost
  • Charlotte Rampling
  • Russell Crowe
Release date: 2000-12-05
Run time: 97 min.
Creator: Peter Hepworth
Price: £12.65

Review Hammers over the Anvil [1991] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Fox Lorber:


Review Fox Lorber / The Last Metro [1981]
Actors & Directors
  • Andréa Ferréol
  • Gérard Depardieu
  • Jean Poiret
  • François Truffaut
  • Catherine Deneuve
  • Paulette Dubost
Release date: 1999-05-18
Run time: 131 min.
Creator: Suzanne Schiffman
Price: £52.54

Review The Last Metro [1981] / Fox Lorber:

François Truffaut again tackles the elusive nature of creativity and creation in this thoughtful, sumptuous, 1980 film. Nominated for the Best Foreign Language film Oscar, and a winner of various Césars, The Last Metro is set in occupied France during World War II. Marion Steiner (Catherine Deneuve) manages the Theatre Montmarte in the stead of her Jewish husband, director Lucas Steiner (Heinz Bennent). He has purportedly fled France but is really hiding in the basement of the theatre. The one hope to save the Montmarte is a new play starring the dashing Bernard Granger (Gérard Depardieu). The attraction between Marion and Bernard is palpable, and as usual Truffaut creates tension and drama from even the most casual of occurrences. The theme of the director locked away while his lover and his creation are appropriated by others makes for interesting Truffaut study, but first and foremost this is a well-spun romance. -Keith Simanton, Amazon. com.

Review Empire Pictures / Almost Peaceful [2004] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Zabou Breitman
  • Michel Deville
  • Vincent Elbaz
  • Simon Abkarian
  • Denis Podalydès
  • Lubna Azabal
Release date: 2005-03-29
Run time: 94 min.
Creator: Robert Bober
Price: £11.16

Review Almost Peaceful [2004] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Empire Pictures:


Review Polygram USA Video / Jude [1996] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Christopher Eccleston
  • Kate Winslet
  • June Whitfield
  • Rachel Griffiths
  • Michael Winterbottom
  • Liam Cunningham
Release date: 2002-05-14
Run time: 123 min.
Creator: Sheila Fraser Milne
Price: £37.79

Review Jude [1996] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Polygram USA Video:

This curiously dry adaptation of Thomas Hardy's last novel, Jude is a good example of Michael Winterbottom's inability to make a particularly good film until Welcome to Sarajevo. Christopher Eccleston plays Jude Fawley, a self-educated stonemason who holds the dream of attending university but identifies with the working class. Kate Winslet is enlisted to play his cousin Sue Bridehead, a young woman with suffragette leanings and a position as a teacher's assistant. When the two enter into an illicit union, they are condemned to the margins of society, ultimately resulting in a horrifying tragedy. Winterbottom takes an oddly lean approach to Hardy's deterministic story, which leaves a viewer feeling short on emotion just when one needs it for the from-bad-to-worse third act. Welcome to Sarajevo proved that Winterbottom needs a whole other level of personal involvement to make a film that inspires him. Jude isn't one of those lucky films. -Tom Keogh, Amazon. com.

Review Geneon / Hiroshima [1995] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Bernard Behrens
  • Allen Altman
  • Wesley Addy
  • Lynne Adams
  • James Bradford
  • Roger Spottiswoode
  • Koreyoshi Kurahara
Release date: 1999-11-23
Run time: 190 min.
Creator: Toshirô Ishido

Review Hiroshima [1995] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Geneon:


Actors & Directors
  • Mia Kirshner
  • Aleksandr Buravsky
  • Brian Dennehy
  • Keith Carradine
  • Judd Hirsch
  • Mercedes Ruehl
Release date: 2001-10-30
Run time: 111 min.
Creator: Alex Kustanovich
Price: £8.65

Review Out of the Cold [1999] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / First Look Pictures:


Review Warner Home Video / Jezebel [1938] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Actors & Directors
  • Henry Fonda
  • Bette Davis
  • Margaret Lindsay
  • George Brent
  • William Wyler
  • Donald Crisp
Release date: 2000-03-28
Run time: 103 min.
Creator: Clements Ripley
Price: £7.99

Review Jezebel [1938] (REGION 1) (NTSC) / Warner Home Video:


Models & Brands:
Strauss: The King of Three-Quarter Time [1996] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Barry Lyndon [1975] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Institute Benjamenta [1995] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Hideous Kinky [1999] (REGION 1) (NTSC), The Mission [1986] (REGION 1) (NTSC), The Great Air Race [1990] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Wuthering Heights [1985] (REGION 1) (NTSC), The Little Princess [1939] (NTSC), Chunhyang [2000] (REGION 1) (NTSC), They Shoot Horses, Don't They? [1969] (NTSC), The Hanging Gale [1995], Solomon Northup's Odyssey: "Twelve Years a Slave" [1984] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Women of Valor [1986] (NTSC), Hammers over the Anvil [1991] (REGION 1) (NTSC), The Last Metro [1981], Almost Peaceful [2004] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Jude [1996] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Hiroshima [1995] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Out of the Cold [1999] (REGION 1) (NTSC), Jezebel [1938] (REGION 1) (NTSC)

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