Going Off Big Time is a British gangster thriller laced with post-Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels humour, yet free of that film's flash visual gimmickry and populated with convincingly real characters. Opening with a scene of violence and mayhem in a pub, the film unfolds in flashback as Mark Clayton (Neil Fitzmaurice, who also wrote the economical screenplay), recounts to his lawyer how bad luck and worse judgement turned this ordinary young man first into a hardened con, then into a small-time gangster. The prison sequences feature a masterly performance by Bernard Hill as the older con who shows Mark the ropes; the second half charts Clayton's rise to power taking over nightclub doors, running protection scams and, comically, dealing drugs from an ice-cream van. The style is plain vanilla with the rundown Liverpool settings giving a stark northern atmosphere somewhere between Get Carter (1971) and The Fully Monty (1997). It's small scale, unambitious stuff, and though Fitzmaurice packs plenty of plot into 83 minutes, more of Mark's romance with Natasha (Gabbi Barr) and his attempt to go straight would have lent the ending greater impact. The strong performances by a cast of almost entirely unknown actors are the best thing about the film. On the DVD: The anamorphically enhanced 2. 35:1 image is sharp and detailed, though rather grainy in night-time scenes. The Dolby Digital 5. 1 soundtrack doesn't get a lot to do but presents sounds with natural clarity. [+]

Dark secrets, family torments and two murders swirl around the stoic, hardened figure of Dolores Claiborne (Kathy Bates), a housekeeper accused of murdering her employer of 22 years. Then there was that timely accident that took Dolores's husband (David Strathairn) during the solar eclipse of 1975. Yet with all the sombre suffering that follows Dolores like a miasma of pain, none of it compares with the heartache of a relationship she has with her grown daughter (Jennifer Jason Leigh). Although this flick is rife with horror, it is not of the supernatural kind, but rather of the torment only real people can impose on one another. The script is full of colourful language, and director Taylor Hackford successfully weaves several plot threads and psychological dilemmas throughout this engrossing tale without diminishing any of them. He not only culls intense performances from his cast, but he also brings to life the landscape around them. When Dolores Claiborne's best-kept secret is finally given up, it occurs under the surreal backdrop of a solar eclipse that is a truly sensational bit of cinematography. -Rochelle O'Gorman Dark secrets, family torments and two murders swirl around the stoic, hardened figure of Dolores Claiborne (Kathy Bates in one of her most magnetic screen performances), a housekeeper accused of murdering her employer of 22 years. Then there was that timely accident that took Dolores's husband (David Strathairn) during the solar eclipse of 1975. Yet with all the sombre suffering that follows Dolores like a miasma of pain, none of it compares with the heartache of a relationship she has with her grown daughter (Jennifer Jason Leigh). [+]

Alfred Hitchcock considered this 1943 thriller to be his personal favourite among his own films, and although it's not as popular as some of Hitchcock's later work, it's certainly worthy of the master's admiration. Scripted by playwright Thornton Wilder and inspired by the actual case of a 1920s serial killer known as "The Merry Widow Murderer," Shadow of a Doubt sets a tone of menace and fear by introducing a psychotic killer into the small-town comforts of Santa Rosa, California. That's where young Charlie (Teresa Wright) lives with her parents and two younger siblings, and where murder is little more than a topic of morbid conversation for their mystery-buff neighbour (Hume Cronyn). Charlie was named after her favourite uncle, who has just arrived for an extended visit, and at first Uncle Charlie (Joseph Cotten) gets along famously with his admiring niece. But the film's chilling prologue has already revealed Uncle Charlie's true identity as the notorious Merry Widow Murderer, and the suspense grows almost unbearable when young Charlie's trust gives way to gradual dread and suspicion. Through narrow escapes and a climactic scene aboard a speeding train, this witty thriller strips away the fa ade of small-town tranquillity to reveal evil where it's least expected. And, of course, it's all done in pure Hitchcockian style. -Jeff Shannon.

Anthony Hopkins is a brilliant actor; Cuba Gooding Jr is a talented guy with a lot of charm. Both have recently won Oscars (Best Actor for The Silence of the Lambs and Best Supporting Actor for Jerry Maguire, respectively); neither can make Instinct compelling. Hopkins plays a brilliant anthropologist studying gorillas who entered into their world, becoming part of their family, and who killed two park rangers in the gorillas' habitat. Gooding plays a brilliant young psychiatrist who is supposed to evaluate Hopkins and determine whether he's fit to stand trial. Hopkins, along with a number of other psychotics, is being held at a prison, which serves to illustrate the movie's themes about control and freedom. It's not so much that the ideas themselves are hokum-nature versus civilisation is always a rich topic-it's that Instinct boils them down to inane sound bites. Psychology is reduced to a game in which the psychiatrist's job is to trick the patient into believing the correct thing or revealing the key that will solve the puzzle. There's not a credible moment in the whole movie, despite the presence of a good cast, including Donald Sutherland and Maura Tierney. -Bret Fetzer, Amazon. com.

Just what the world needs, another riff on that post-Psycho horror cliché: the slasher movie. In this version, which considerably dumbs down the Lois Duncan book, the bad guy chases naughty teenagers with a hook, all the while dressed as a dark version of the Gorton's fisherman. They seem to have killed someone in a car accident while out partying, and a price must be paid. Nothing new is added to the genre by I Know What You Did Last Summer, though it would be unfair not to note that this does have some scary moments. That is about all it has, because as much as this wanted to be another Scream, it hasn't the heart or the script. It does, however, have the requisite cast of small-screen stars (including Party of Five's Jennifer Love Hewitt and Buffy herself, Sarah Michelle Gellar) to have snagged box-office success, spawning a sequel. -Rochelle O'Gorman.

Paul Newman and Julie Andrews star in Torn Curtain, what must unfortunately be called one of Alfred Hitchcock's lesser efforts. Still, sub-par Hitchcock is better than a lot of what's out there, and this one is well worth a look. Newman plays cold-war physicist Michael Armstrong, while Andrews plays his lovely assistant-and-fiancée Sarah Sherman. Armstrong has been working on a missile defence system that will "make nuclear defence obsolete", and naturally both sides are very interested. All Sarah cares about is the fact that Michael has been acting awfully fishy lately. The suspense of Torn Curtain is by nature not as thrilling as that in the average Hitchcock film-much of it involves sitting still and wondering if the bad guys are getting closer. Still, Hitchcock manages to amuse himself: there is some beautifully clever camera work and an excruciating sequence that illustrates the frequent Hitchcock point that death is not a tidy business. -Ali Davis.

Tautly directed and superbly photographed, this crowd-pleasing thriller from 1997 is indebted to Steven Spielberg's Duel but more closely resembles Dead Calm in its strengths and weaknesses. Kurt Russell plays a stressed-out husband whose wife (Kathleen Quinlan) disappears after their car breaks down in the desert. Tracking down her whereabouts leads to an interstate theft and kidnapping ring, and as Russell pursues-and is pursued by-a vicious redneck played to perfection by J T Walsh (in one of his final film roles), the movie succumbs to several tense but utterly conventional action sequences. That doesn't stop the movie from being an above-average nail-biter. It is so effectively directed by co-writer Jonathan Mostow that even the more surreal situations seem plausible and altogether unsettling. Russell's performance is key to the film's success-he's smart enough to be admirable and we can readily identify with his frustration, confusion and torment. Through him, Breakdown takes on the edgy quality of a wide-awake nightmare. -Jeff Shannon The sinister side of the divide between urban and rural America has inspired countless film makers and, although by no means original, Breakdown is a tense and at times dark example of the genre. Travelling to California to start a new life, Jeff and Amy Taylor are the perfect American couple, young, prosperous and devoted to each other. When they find themselves stranded in the desert following the breakdown of their car their dream descends into a vicious nightmare. [+]

Michael Crichton's bestselling novel was both a high-tech thriller and source of controversy with its hot-button plot about a man's charge of sexual harassment against a female colleague and former lover. The movie, directed by Barry Levinson, turned these issues into a prurient thriller dressed up in glossy production values, virtual reality computer graphics and steamy sex between Michael Douglas and Demi Moore. Having cornered the market on roles for men whose brains are located south of their waistline, Douglas is well cast as the computer-industry guy who loses a plush promotion to the opportunistic Moore, and he's perfected the expression of paranoid panic. If you don't think about it too much, this is one of those films that can draw you into its manipulative web and really grab your attention. Disclosure is more entertaining than thought provoking (because the filmmakers basically danced around the story's potential controversy), but there's enough star power and visual glitz to make this an enjoyable ride. -Jeff Shannon.

Based on a novel by Susan Isaacs, Shining Through is uncomfortably close to Alfred Hitchcock's Notorious. This World War II drama concerns a love affair between a spy (Michael Douglas) and a secretary (Melanie Griffith) that goes south when duty turns him cold and pushes her into dangerous, behind-the-lines intelligence work. Liam Neeson plays the gentleman Nazi unwittingly providing Griffith with cover as domestic help. The best parts of the film are the twists and turns in the romance (Douglas is very good at playing a character who can turn off all feeling at will) at the beginning; the German scenes are less compelling despite such high stakes for the heroine. The climax-taking us back to Notorious whether it wants to or not-is quite gripping, largely due to Douglas's performance. -Tom Keogh.

There are several occasions when this rousing Australian thriller from 1987 should have ended with a well-placed shot from a speargun or a stronger knot of rope, but you don't think about these small details when you're being scared out of your wits. In a role that catapulted her to international stardom, Nicole Kidman plays a young wife who has joined her husband (Sam Neill) on a yachting trip to recover from the tragic death of their son. Far out to sea, they encounter a sinking ship with one survivor (Billy Zane, 10 years before Titanic) but inviting him aboard turns out to be a very bad mistake. While Neill attempts to salvage the sinking boat, Kidman is fighting for her life against the psychotic Zane-a villain so creepy that you eagerly look forward to his demise. By the time that moment arrives director Phillip Noyce has resorted to a typical slasher-movie climax (proving that no boat should be without a flare gun) but until then Dead Calm is a nail-biting thriller that's guaranteed to keep you in a state of nail-biting suspense. -Jeff Shannon.

Workplace dramas seem to have become a French speciality, and Jacques Audiard's Read My Lips ("Sur mes levres") proves a worthy follow-up to such notable predecessors in the genre as Human Resources and Time Out ("L'Emploi du temps"). The film also nods towards Neil LaBute's In the Company of Men and Hitchcock's Rear Window, but it's none the worse for that. Carla, our anti-heroine (Emmanuelle Devos), is an ugly duckling working as a secretary for a construction company in suburban Paris. Dowdy and all-but deaf, she's exploited and put upon by her male coworkers. When her boss lets her hire an assistant she bizarrely chooses Paul (Vincent Cassel), a scruffy and none-too-bright ex-con. But an odd symbiosis grows up between this pair of losers; the combination of his petty-criminal skills and her lip-reading abilities has certain potentials. As A Self-Made Hero, his previous movie, showed, Audiard doesn't go in for lovable characters. Carla is no long-suffering saint and Paul is frankly sleazy, but this just makes their interaction all the more intriguing. Devos, glowering malevolently beneath her dark brows, and Cassel with his greasy hair and ratty moustache, turn in relishably truculent and un-starry performances, and Audiard deftly manages the transition from office comedy to gangland heist thriller with no grinding of gears. By the end the plot starts to strain belief, but it scarcely matters. [+]

One Hour Photo marks Robin Williams' third film running as the bad guy, following on from Insomnia and the straight-to-video (in the UK) Death to Smoochy. It's also his most chilling role to date. Playing "photo guy" Sy Parrish, obsessed by the seemingly perfect family who are his most regular customers, he paints a desperate image of a lonely, fanatical man whose only comfort lies in imagining himself a part of the lives of the wealthy, happy Yorkins family (headed by Connie Nielsen). Devastated by being fired from his job at the processing lab, and making a shocking discovery on his exit, he descends into psychosis. Director and screenwriter Mark Romanek, previously best known for his Nine Inch Nails and Madonna music videos, has made a stylish, distinctive entry into the world of mainstream movies; the film combines an ever-intensifying sense of menace with some unconventional shocks that never descend into clichés. Refreshingly, the film is presented from Parrish's point of view rather than the Yorkins', and it's a real (if disquieting) treat to see Williams ditch his usual bumbling buffoon character and get another meaty role to sink his teeth into. Eschewing the formulas and devices of the standard thriller with bleak effectiveness, One Hour Photo is a far more intelligent proposition than most of its peers-though it may be a disappointment to those expecting visceral thrills. On the DVD: One Hour Photo's beautifully austere photography and skilful use of colour translates excellently to the DVD's anamorphic widescreen format. The stylish menu screens have a photo-processing theme with stills and film footage; the extras comprise an informative and often amusing commentary from Romanek and Williams, a 25-minute Sundance Channel "Anatomy of a Scene" feature, a 12-minute Cinemax featurette, and an in-depth and entertaining half-hour interview with director and star from New York's acclaimed Charlie Rose show. The film is presented in Dolby Digital 5. [+]

Don't Look Now was filmed in 1973 and based around a Daphne Du Maurier novel. Directed by Nicolas Roeg, it has lost none of its chill: like Kubrick's The Shining, its dazzling use of juxtaposition, colour, sound and editing make it a seductive experience in cinematic terror, whose aftershock lingers in daydreams and nightmares, filling you with uncertainty and dread even after its horrific climax. Donald Sutherland plays John Baxter, an architect, Julie Christie his wife: a well-to-do couple whose young daughter drowns while out playing. Cut to Venice, out of season, where the couple encounter a pair of sisters, one of whom claims psychic powers and to have communicated with their dead daughter. The subsequent plot is as labyrinthine as the back streets of the city itself, down which Baxter spots a diminutive and elusive red-coated figure akin to his daughter, before being drawn into an almost unbearable finale. Don't Look Now is a Gothic masterpiece, with its melange of gore, mystery, ecstasy, the supernatural and above all grief, while the city of Venice itself-which thanks to Roeg and his team seems to breathe like a dark, sinister living organism throughout the movie-deserves a credit in its own right. Not just a magnificent drama but an advanced feat of cinema. -David Stubbs.

In Kiss of the Dragon, Chinese undercover agent Jet Li chops his way through Paris after he's framed in some sketchily defined drug sting operation. The fight sequences are tough and quite brutal, and the over-the-top finale is arguably worth the price of admission, wherein an implacable Li takes on the entire Paris Police Bureau, working his way up toward police chief Tchéky Karyo's office through cops, a pair of peroxide-blond twin henchmen, and a whole class of kung fu cadets. Coscreenwriter Luc Besson (La Femme Nikita) should know by now what makes for a nifty genre piece, but the woeful dialogue is a shame, and there aren't nearly enough action sequences to get your blood boiling. Poor Bridget Fonda gives it the old-school try in a thankless role as an ex-junkie prostitute from the Midwest whose young daughter is being held captive by duplicitous police chief/drug lord/pimp Karyo (who fairly inhales the scenery). Director Chris Nolan might have pushed further the strangers-in-a-strange-land camaraderie between Li and Fonda, but the script still would've sunk him. -Steve Wiecking On the DVD: Kiss of the Dragon is a film that relies on its superbly choreographed fight scenes, so luckily the anamorphically enhanced 2. 35:1 widescreen presentation is spotless. The Dolby Digital 5. 1 audio track positively shakes the room in the action sequences and atmospheric music by Craig Armstrong perfectly underscores the highs and lulls in the drama. Extras are plentiful: the audio commentary from Director Chris Nahon with Jet Li and Bridget Fonda is informative. [+]