"Actor: Al"

• Al Murray's Happy Hour - Series 2 - Complete | DVD | (16/03/2009) from £4.75   |  Saving you £20.24 (426.11%)   |  RRP £24.99

  Al Murray's Happy Hour: Series 2 (4 Disc)

• The Munsters: Series 1 And 2 | DVD | (19/09/2016) from £45.55   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  It has its own stormy weather and fire-breathing housepet named Spot, but the mansion at 1313 Mockingbird Heights is otherwise like any other American sitcom home. This is the address of the Munsters, the family that for two seasons, 1964-66, found a permanent place in pop culture--if not "monster" success. Developed by Leave It to Beaver team Joe Connelly and Bob Mosher, the series was a standard sitcom (complete with the same awful canned laughter), except that the Ward Cleaver character was a reanimated corpse. Dad Herman (Fred Gwynne) was a Frankenstein's monster, mom Lily (Yvonne DeCarlo) and Grandpa (Al Lewis) were vampires, and son Eddie (Butch Patrick) a little wolf-boy. Munster niece Marilyn was inexplicably normal, which prompted much worry from the other members of the family (she was played in early episodes by Beverly Owen, who left to get married, and then by Pat Priest). The plots revolve around typically tortured sitcom situations: Herman must lose weight to fit into his old Army uniform, Herman has insomnia, Herman takes dance lessons from a crooked instructor. (As that list would suggest, 6'5" Fred Gwynne's wonderfully agile slapstick and Borscht Belt comedy made him the center of the show.) What distinguished The Munsters from Father Knows Best was the Universal horror-movie lineage and the ghoulish one-liners (the latter growing a bit tedious after a while). The show was either pure kiddie farce or a radical comment on the absurdly unreal world of sitcoms. Either way, if you grew up with them as an alternate TV family, you can't help but have warm feelings for the Munsters, as clammy as they are. --Robert Horton

• Scent Of A Woman | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Hoo-ah! After seven Oscar nominations for his outstanding work in films such as The Godfather, Serpico and Dog Day Afternoon, it's ironic that Al Pacino finally won the Oscar for his grandstanding lead performance in this 1992 crowd pleaser. As the blind, blunt, and ultimately benevolent retired Lieutenant Colonel Frank Slade, Pacino is both hammy and compelling, simultaneously subtle and grandly over-the-top when defending his new assistant and prep school student Charlie (Chris O'Donnell) at a disciplinary hearing. While the subplot involving Charlie's prep-school crisis plays like a sequel to Dead Poets Society, Pacino's adventurous escapades in New York City provide comic relief, rich character development, and a memorable supporting role for Gabrielle Anwar as the young woman who accepts the colonel's invitation to dance the tango. Scent of a Woman is a remake of the 1972 Italian film Profumo di donna. In addition to Pacino's award, Scent of Woman garnered Oscar nominations for director Martin Brest and for screenwriter Bo Goldman. --Jeff Shannon

• Miller's Crossing | DVD | (13/10/2003) from £8.95   |  Saving you £14.03 (235.40%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Arguably the best film by Joel and Ethan Coen, the 1990 Miller's Crossing stars Gabriel Byrne as Tom, a loyal lieutenant of a crime boss named Leo (Albert Finney) who is in a Prohibition-era turf war with his major rival, Johnny Caspar (Jon Polito). A man of principle, Tom nevertheless is romantically involved with Leo's lover (Marcia Gay Harden), whose screwy brother (John Turturro) escapes a hit ordered by Caspar only to become Tom's problem. Making matters worse, Tom has outstanding gambling debts he can't pay, which keeps him in regular touch with a punishing enforcer. With all the energy the Coens put into their films, and all their focused appreciation of genre conventions and rules, and all their efforts to turn their movies into ironic appreciations of archetypes in American fiction, they never got their formula so right as with Miller's Crossing. With its Hammett-like dialogue and Byzantine plot and moral chaos mitigated by one hero's personal code, the film so transcends its self-scrutiny as a retro-crime thriller that it is a deserved classic in its own right. --Tom Keogh

• Grantchester Series 5 | DVD | (16/03/2020) from £12.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  A Cambridgeshire clergyman finds himself investigating a series of mysterious wrongdoings in his small village of Grantchester.

• Rocky | DVD | (01/02/2000) from £5.46   |  Saving you £12.53 (229.49%)   |  RRP £17.99

  The 1976 Oscar winner for Best Picture, John G Avildsen's Rocky is the story of a down-and-out club fighter who gets his million-to-one shot at a world championship title. In the title role, Sylvester Stallone (who also penned the screenplay) draws a carefully etched portrait of a loser who, in Brando-esque fashion, "coulda been a contender". Rocky then becomes one thanks to a publicity stunt engineered by current champ Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers), while finding love courtesy of timid wallflower Adrienne (Talia Shire) along the way. Burgess Meredith revives the spirit of 1940's genre pictures through his scenery-chewing performance as Rocky's trainer. An enormous entertainment, Rocky is irresistible in its depiction of an underachiever who has the courage to start all over again--a description that could have been applied to Stallone's own life at the time. --Kevin Mulhall

• Scarface (Special Edition) | DVD | (29/03/2004) from £4.99   |  Saving you £15.00 (300.60%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Brian De Palma's update of the classic 1932 crime drama by Howard Hawks, Scarface is a sprawling epic of bloodshed and excess that sparked controversy over its outrageous violence when released in 1983. It's a wretched, fascinating car wreck of a movie, starring Al Pacino as a Cuban refugee who rises to the top of Miami's cocaine-driven underworld, only to fall hard into his own deadly trap of addiction and inevitable assassination. Scripted by Oliver Stone and running nearly three hours, it's the kind of film that can simultaneously disgust and amaze you (critic Pauline Kael wrote "this may be the only action picture that turns into an allegory of impotence"), with vivid supporting roles for Steven Bauer, Michelle Pfeiffer, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, and Robert Loggia. --Jeff Shannon

• Cruising | Blu Ray | (19/08/2019) from £17.25   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Academy Award-winner William Friedkin (The Exorcist, The French Connection) directs Al Pacino as an undercover cop pitched into New York's seedy underbelly in Cruising available for the first time on Blu-ray in a brand new director-approved transfer. The Big Apple is caught in the grip of a sadistic serial killer who is preying on the patrons of the city's underground gay bars. Captain Edelson (Paul Sorvino) tasks young rookie Steve Burns (Pacino) with infiltrating the S&M subculture to try and lure the killer out of the shadows but as he immerses himself deeper and deeper into the lurid underworld, Steve risks losing his own identity in the process. Based on reporter Gerald Walker's novel of the same name, Cruising was the subject of great controversy at the time of its release and remains a challenging and remarkable movie to this day, with Pacino's haunted lead performance as its magnetic centrepiece. Limited Edition Contents: Brand new restoration from a 4K scan of the original camera negative, supervised and approved by writer-director William Friedkin High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation Newly remastered 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio supervised by William Friedkin Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing Brand new audio commentary by authors Mark Kermode, Alan Jones and Gary Needham Archival audio commentary by William Friedkin The History of Cruising archival featurette looking at the film's origins and production Exorcising Cruising archival featurette looking at the controversy surrounding the film and its enduring legacy Original Theatrical Trailer

• Donnie Brasco | DVD | (01/10/1999) from £5.94   |  Saving you £6.05 (101.85%)   |  RRP £11.99

  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

• Al Murray: Collection | DVD | (24/11/2014) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £29.99

  3 of the Pub Landlord's best ever stand-up shows brought together in this boxset collection. Includes: One Man One Guvnor The Only Way is Epic and Barrel of Fun Live.

• Grantchester Series 4 | DVD | (04/03/2019) from £10.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Adapted from the Grantchester Mysteries novels, this series will feature James Norton's final episodes as character Sidney Chambers, the charismatic, jazz-loving clergyman, and one half of the unlikely crime-fighting duo based in 1950s Grantchester.

• Al Murray The Pub Landlord: Beautiful British Tour Live at the 02 | DVD | (16/11/2009) from £4.42   |  Saving you £15.57 (352.26%)   |  RRP £19.99

  The multi-award winning Al Murray – The Pub Landlord brings a brand new live show to DVD, direct from his sell-out 2009 national tour performed in front of more than 250,000 people. 'The way he integrates the crowd into the show is awe-inspiring' The TimesRecorded at The Guv’s biggest lock-in to date at London’s O2 Arena, the nation's favourite pub landlord will once again raise a glass at home with you - the beautiful British public - whilst he merrily muses over a heady brew of topics including: the global financial crisis, London 2012, and his one man crusade to fix Broken Britain. As one of the UK’s premier stand-up comedians, and a prime-time star of ITV1, Al Murray – The Pub Landlord is ‘one national treasure to cherish’ Daily Telegraph'Actually deserves the tag genius' The Sun

• NCIS: Hawai'i: Season Two | DVD | (16/10/2023) from £15.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Scarface | Blu Ray | (01/06/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £24.99

  Brian De Palma's update of the classic 1932 crime drama by Howard Hawks, Scarface is a sprawling epic of bloodshed and excess that sparked controversy over its outrageous violence when released in 1983. It's a wretched, fascinating car wreck of a movie, starring Al Pacino as a Cuban refugee who rises to the top of Miami's cocaine-driven underworld, only to fall hard into his own deadly trap of addiction and inevitable assassination. Scripted by Oliver Stone and running nearly three hours, it's the kind of film that can simultaneously disgust and amaze you (critic Pauline Kael wrote "this may be the only action picture that turns into an allegory of impotence"), with vivid supporting roles for Steven Bauer, Michelle Pfeiffer, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, and Robert Loggia. --Jeff Shannon

• Tolkien Blu Ray | Blu Ray | (09/09/2019) from £8.48   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Tolkien explores the formative years of the orphaned author as he finds friendship, love and artistic inspiration among a group of fellow outcasts at school. This takes him into the outbreak of WW1, which threatens to tear their fellowship apart. All of these experiences go on to inspire Tolkien to write his famous Middle Earth novels

• The Godfather | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £3.75   |  Saving you £16.24 (433.07%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Generally acknowledged as a bona fide classic, this Francis Ford Coppola film is one of those rare experiences that feels perfectly right from beginning to end--almost as if everyone involved had been born to participate in it. Based on Mario Puzo's bestselling novel about a Mafia dynasty, Coppola's Godfather extracted and enhanced the most universal themes of immigrant experience in America: the plotting-out of hopes and dreams for one's successors, the raising of children to carry on the good work, etc. In the midst of generational strife during the Vietnam years, the film somehow struck a chord with a nation fascinated by the metamorphosis of a rebellious son (Al Pacino) into the keeper of his father's dream. Marlon Brando played against Puzo's own conception of patriarch Vito Corleone, and time has certainly proven the actor correct. The rest of the cast, particularly James Caan, John Cazale, and Robert Duvall as the rest of Vito's male brood--all coping with how to take the mantle of responsibility from their father--is seamless and wonderful. --Tom Keogh

• Cruising Limited Edition 4K UHD | Blu Ray | (24/02/2025) from £26.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Legendary director William Friedkin brings together Al Pacino, the 70s New York gay scene and a searing punk-rock soundtrack in this one-of-a-kind serial killer thriller, finally restored to its long-unavailable original theatrical version in 4K. New York is caught in the grip of a sadistic serial killer who is preying on the patrons of the city's underground gay scene. Young rookie cop Steve Burns (Pacino) is tasked with infiltrating the S&M subculture to try and lure the killer out of the shadows... but as he immerses himself deeper and deeper into the underworld, Steve risks losing his own identity in the process. Taking the premise and title from reporter Gerald Walker's novel, Cruising was the subject of great controversy at the time of its release and remains a challenging and remarkable movie to this day, with Pacino's haunted lead performance as its magnetic centrepiece. With hours of brand-new bonus features, including never-before-seen material from the deepest recesses of the studio archives, you've never seen Cruising like this. 2-DISC 4K ULTRA HD BLU-RAY LIMITED EDITION CONTENTS ¢ Brand new 4K restoration from the original 35mm camera negative by Arrow Films ¢ 120-page perfect-bound collector's book featuring articles from The Village Voice and The New York Times, essays from the film's extras cast, an introduction from William Friedkin, and an archive interview with Al Pacino ¢ Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Sister Hyde DISC ONE - FEATURE & EXTRAS (4K ULTRA HD) ¢ 4K (2160p) Ultra HD Blu-ray presentation in Dolby Vision (HDR10 compatible) ¢ Original lossless English mono audio, 2.0 stereo, and 5.1 ¢ Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing ¢ Two archive audio commentaries by director William Friedkin, one solo and one moderated by critic and broadcaster Mark Kermode ¢ Brand new commentary featuring original musicians involved with the soundtrack ¢ I Want to Be the Curator, a brand-new interview with actress Karen Allen ¢ Deleted scenes and alternative footage ¢ On-set audio featuring the club scenes and protest coverage ¢ Censored material reels ¢ Theatrical trailer, teasers, and TV spots DISC TWO - EXTRAS (BLU-RAY) ¢ Walking the Line, a brand-new interview with actor, film consultant, and former police detective Randy Jurgensen ¢ Cut Offs, an interview with editor Bud S. Smith ¢ Who's That Guy?, an interview with actor Jay Acovone ¢ Pounding the Beat, an interview with actor Mike Starr ¢ Boy on the Bus, an interview with actor Mark Zecca ¢ Mineshaft Memories, an archive interview with Wally Wallace, former manager of the Mineshaft ¢ Breaking the Codes, a brand-new visual essay surrounding the hanky-codes featuring actor and writer David McGillivray ¢ Stop the Movie, a short film by Jim Hubbard capturing the Cruising protests ¢ The History of Cruising, an archival featurette looking at the film's origins and production ¢ Exorcising Cruising, an archival featurette looking at the controversy surrounding the film and its enduring legacy ¢ William Friedkin's BeyondFest 2022 Q&A at the American Cinematheque ¢ Extensive image gallery featuring international promotional material, on-set sketches, and more

• Glengarry Glen Ross | Blu Ray | (10/02/2017) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Like moths to a flame, great actors gravitate to the singular genius of playwright-screenwriter David Mamet, who updated his Pulitzer Prize-winning play for this all-star screen adaptation. The material is not inherently cinematic, so the Glengarry Glen Ross's greatest asset is Mamet's peerless dialogue and the assembly of the once-in-a-lifetime cast led by Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, and Alec Baldwin (the last in a role Mamet created especially for the film). Often regarded as a critique of the Reagan administration's impact on the American economy, the play and film focus on a competitive group of real estate salesmen who've gone from feast to famine in a market gone cold. When an executive "motivator" (Alec Baldwin) demands a sales contest among the agents in the cramped office, the stakes are critically high: any agent who fails to meet his quota of sales "leads" (ie, potential buyers) will lose their job. This intense ultimatum is a boon for the office superstar (Pacino), but a once-successful salesman (Lemmon) now finds himself clinging nervously to faded glory. Political and personal rivalries erupt under pressure when the other agents (Alan Arkin, Ed Harris) suspect the office manager (Kevin Spacey) of foul play. This cauldron of anxiety, tension and sheer desperation provides fertile soil for Mamet's scathingly rich dialogue, which is like rocket fuel for some of the greatest actors of our time. Pacino won an Oscar nomination for his volatile performance, but it's Lemmon who's the standout, doing some of the best work of his distinguished career. Director James Foley shapes Mamet's play into a stylish, intensely focused film that will stand for decades as a testament to its brilliant writer and cast. --Jeff Shannon, Amazon.com

• An Inconvenient Truth | DVD | (26/12/2006) from £4.99   |  Saving you £15.00 (300.60%)   |  RRP £19.99

  A documentary on Al Gore's campaign to make the issue of global warming a recognized problem worldwide.

• The Godfather: Part II | DVD | (08/07/2013) from £4.99   |  Saving you £15.00 (300.60%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Francis Ford Coppola took some of the deep background from the life of Mafia chief Vito Corleone--the patriarch of Mario Puzo's bestselling novel The Godfather--and built around it a stunning sequel to his Oscar-winning, 1972 hit film. Robert De Niro plays Vito as a young Sicilian immigrant in turn-of-the-century New York City's Little Italy. Coppola weaves in and out of the story of Vito's transformation into a powerful crime figure, contrasting that evolution against efforts by son Michael Corleone to spread the family's business into pre-Castro Cuba. As memorable as the first film is, The Godfather II is an amazingly intricate, symmetrical tragedy that touches upon several chapters of 20th-century history and makes a strong case that our destinies are written long before we're born. This was De Niro's first introduction to a lot of filmgoers, and he makes an enormous impression. But even with him and a number of truly brilliant actors (including maestro Lee Strasberg), this is ultimately Pacino's film and a masterful performance. --Tom Keogh