Jan Vokes, a cleaner and bartender, recruits her reluctant husband Brian and local accountant Howard Davies to help her bring together a syndicate of villagers to breed a foal - which they raise on an allotment and name Dream Alliance. On the racetrack, he proves himself to be more than a match for the multi-million-pound race horses he comes up against - a true working-class champion, taking on the establishment at their own game. But much more than this, Dream begins to alter the lives of everyone in the syndicate, not least Jan's. He is everything to her: friend, confidant and an escape from a life of always putting other people's needs first. Dream Horse is a classic story of triumph against adversity, and a tale of how a woman strives to make her dream a reality in a place where hope is thin on the ground.
During the Second World War, Britain's women were asked to help out the farming industry by joining The Women's Land Army (The Land Girls). Three city gals make their way to the Lawrence farm in Dorset, and find themselves taking to the work easily enough. The only problem between them is each want young Joe (Steven Mackintosh) for their own reasons. Ag (Anna Friel) is the fiery sort who'll take pleasure where she finds it; Prue (Rachel Wiesz) just wants a lesson in the ways of the world; while Stella (Catherine McCormack) is looking for a way out of the private trap she's set in motion back home, but her feelings are the most sincere of the bunch. The film is Stella's story really (as adapted from the novel by Angela Huth), and has her affecting the on-off decision by Joe to join the RAF, the fight with the government to keep the East Meadow as it is and the paths the two other girls end up taking. Everything is very sweet-natured, especially when played out against a backdrop of rolling green hills, chuffing steam engines and knee-high socks tucked into Wellington boots. There's no comment on the effects of war as such, instead this film is more about the reasons why we make choices in life. --Paul Tonks
True virtue triumphs over superficiality in this distinguished BBC production of Jane Austen's celebrated novel Mansfield Park.Mansfield Park is the magnificent country residence of Sir Thomas Bertram and his family. It is here that their poor relation Fanny Price is brought up. Never allowed to forget her good fortune, Fanny is ignored by her cousins, with the exception of Edmund, who alone treats her with care and affection. But will she ever be able to win a valued place in the household and the heart of the man of her dreams?
Series OneFresh out of Glasgow Veterinary College, James Herriot (Nicholas Ralph) follows his dream to become a vet in the magnificent Yorkshire Dales. He soon discovers that treating the animals is as much about treating their owners, and the Dalesʼ farmers are a tough crowd to please.Includes the Christmas Special: The Night Before ChristmasSeries TwoA visit back home presents James with a dilemma when he's offered a position at his old mentor's forward-thinking practice in Glasgow. On his return to the Dales, James is reminded of how much he loves the place and one person in particular. Will he choose to be with his family or follow his heart?Special Features:Interviews with CastSet WalkthroughPicture GalleriesSubtitles
A student machinist (Keanu Reeves) finds himself caught in a maze of secret government cover-ups high tech espionage and murders after working on a groundbreaking scientific experiment. Eddie Kasalivich (Reeves) and Lily Sinclair (Rachel Weisz) are part of a team of scientists who have developed a revolutionary new source of energy. But no sooner have they finishes celebrating their triumph than their lab is destroyed and the head of their team killed. Named as the main suspects Ed
Anna Friel returns in the titular role for a gripping second series of the multi-layered drama. The team come together to investigate the death of a young schoolboy who was abducted a few years before.
From the arrival of Agent John Doggett in 'Within' and Mulder's miraculous resurrection in 'Deadalive' to the birth of Scully's baby in 'Existence' these Season Eight episodes are a must for every X-Files fan! Episodes comprise: 1. Within 2. Without 3. Patience 4. Roadrunners 5. Invocation 6. Redrum 7. Via Negativa 8. Surekill 9. Salvage 10. Badlaa 11. The Gift 12. Medusa 13. Per Manum 14. This Is Not Happening 15. DeadAlive 16. Three Words 17. Empedocles 18. Vienen 19. Alon
Holding Synopsis:Marcella is a crime-noir detective series starring Anna Friel. Marcella in her 30s reboots her career in the Murder Squad of the Metropolitan Police after a 12 year maternity break.
In the first season of The X Files, creator Chris Carter was uncertain of the series' future, so each of the episodes is a self-contained suspense story; they do not delve deep into the ongoing X Files mythology or turn to self-parody and humour as do episodes in later seasons. Yet, these episodes display the elements for which the show would become famous: the cinematic production values and top-notch special effects, the stark lighting of the Vancouver sets, the atmospheric halo of Mark Snow's score, and the clever plots dealing with subjects ranging from the occult, religion, and monsters to urban legends, conspiracy theories and science fiction. Most importantly, Season 1 introduces FBI agents Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) and Fox "Spooky" Mulder (David Duchovny), two of the most attractive government officials around. Scully is the serious-minded medical scientist assigned to join Mulder on the X Files, a division of the FBI dealing with the paranormal. Mulder is the intuitive thinker with a dry wit, a passionate believer in the existence of paranormal phenomena and one of the few characters on television smart enough to figure out who the bad guy is before the audience does. Their muddled relationship, a deep friendship laced with sexual tension, provides the human heart in a world where the bizarre and horrible lurk in everyday society. The materials on the bonus disc provide some interesting trivia and background, but it is the 24 episodes themselves that make this seven-disc boxed set a true find. Those unfamiliar with The X Files often view all the fuss with the same scepticism with which Scully first regards her new partner's ideas. But just as she comes to realise the uncanny accuracy of Mulder's outlandish theories, newcomers to The X Files who sample a few episodes in this boxed set will likely find themselves riveted to their television late into the night. And undoubtedly, the shadows and creaking noises in the house that evening will seem more menacing than usual. --Eugene Wei, Amazon.com
In the first season of The X Files, creator Chris Carter was uncertain of the series' future, so each of the episodes is a self-contained suspense story; they do not delve deep into the ongoing X Files mythology or turn to self-parody and humour as do episodes in later seasons. Yet, these episodes display the elements for which the show would become famous: the cinematic production values and top-notch special effects, the stark lighting of the Vancouver sets, the atmospheric halo of Mark Snow's score, and the clever plots dealing with subjects ranging from the occult, religion, and monsters to urban legends, conspiracy theories and science fiction. Most importantly, Season 1 introduces FBI agents Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) and Fox "Spooky" Mulder (David Duchovny), two of the most attractive government officials around. Scully is the serious-minded medical scientist assigned to join Mulder on the X Files, a division of the FBI dealing with the paranormal. Mulder is the intuitive thinker with a dry wit, a passionate believer in the existence of paranormal phenomena and one of the few characters on television smart enough to figure out who the bad guy is before the audience does. Their muddled relationship, a deep friendship laced with sexual tension, provides the human heart in a world where the bizarre and horrible lurk in everyday society. The materials on the bonus disc provide some interesting trivia and background, but it is the 24 episodes themselves that make this seven-disc boxed set a true find. Those unfamiliar with The X Files often view all the fuss with the same scepticism with which Scully first regards her new partner's ideas. But just as she comes to realise the uncanny accuracy of Mulder's outlandish theories, newcomers to The X Files who sample a few episodes in this boxed set will likely find themselves riveted to their television late into the night. And undoubtedly, the shadows and creaking noises in the house that evening will seem more menacing than usual. --Eugene Wei
The complete series of the multi-BAFTA® award-winning drama SKINS. Follow the chaotic lives and loves of three generations of college students as they grab life by the balls and live it to the max. Join the rollercoaster as their teen lives mix with the madness of the adult world around them. This ground-breaking series stars some of the UK's finest young acting talent: Dev Patel (Slumdog Millionaire), Kaya Scodelario (Wuthering Heights), Nicholas Hoult (X-Men), Jack O'Connell (Harry Brown), Hannah Murray (Game of Thrones), Luke Pasqualino (The Borgias).
Season Two, the 1994-95 run, of The X Files was the one where creator Chris Carter, having had a surprise hit when he expected a one-season wonder, started trying to make sense of all the storylines he had thrown into the pile in the first year. Moreover, he had to cope with Gillian Anderson's maternity leave by having Scully get abducted by aliens (back then, a pretty fresh device) for a few episodes and come back strangely altered. The season also inaugurated the tradition of opening ("Little Green Men") and closing ("Anasazi") with the show's worst episodes, both pot-boiling attempts to keep the alien infiltration/government conspiracy balls up in the air while seeming to offer narrative forward-thrusts or revelations. But it's also a show noticeably surer of itself than Season One, with its stars reading from the same page in terms of their characters' relationship and attitudes to the wondrous. Scully's no-longer-workable scepticism finally starts to erode in the face of Mulder's increasingly cracked belief. There are fewer marking-time leftover-monster-of-the-week shows--although we do get a human fluke ("The Host"), vampires ("3"), an invisible rapist ("Excelsius Dei") voodoo ("Fresh Bones")--and the flying-saucer stories at last seem to be going somewhere. The powerful two-episode run ("Duane Barry", "Ascension") features Steve Railsback as Mulder's possible future, an FBI agent burned out after a UFO abduction who has become a hostage-taking terrorist, which climaxes with Scully's disappearance into the light. The standout episode is also a stand-alone--"Humbug"--the first and still most successful of the show's self-parodies (written by Darin Morgan, who had played the Flukeman in "The Host"), in which the agents investigate a murder in a circus freakshow, allowing the actors to make fun of the mannerisms they have earnestly built up in a run of solemn, even somnolent, explorations of the murk. Other worthy efforts: "Aubrey", about genetic memory; "Irresistible", a rare (and creepy) straight psycho-chiller with little paranormal content; and "The Calusari", a good ghost/mystery. Rising deputy characters include Nicholas Lea as the perfidious Krycek and Brian Thompson as the shapeshifting alien bounty hunters. Notable guest stars: Charles Martin Smith, C.C.H. Pounder, Leland Orser, Terry O'Quinn, Bruce Weitz, Daniel Benzali, John Savage, Vincent Schiavelli, Tony Shalhoub. --Kim Newman
A man of action who can fight with the best of them and a cab driver who would give the Transporter a run for his money, pair up to save a young girl from the clutches of an evil criminal magnate in the exciting adventure thrill-ride Bloodstone! The Bloodstone, a priceless stolen ruby, accidentally ends up in the possession of American newlyweds Sandy (Brett Stimely, Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death) and Stephanie (Anna Nicholas, Remington Steele). Now, their honeymoon in India is interrupted as they become the target of international fence Van Hoeven (Christopher Neame, The Prestige) and his evil henchmen. When Van Hoeven kidnaps Stephanie and ransoms her for the jewel, Sandy joins forces with cabby and dormant stunt-driver Shyam Sabu (Rajinikanth, 2.0) to rescue his young bride. Co-written and produced by genre film luminary Nico Mastorakis (Island of Death, The Wind) and featuring a stellar performance by legendary Tamil megastar Rajinikanth in his first English-language role, Bloodstone is an action-packed romp full of thrills, kick-ass one liners and venomous cobras! SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation Original 2.0 Stereo PCM Uncompressed audio and 5.1 Surround audio options Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing Optional Greek subtitles Brand new audio commentary by Bryan Reesman Keeping it to Myself brand new interview with producer and co-writer Nico Mastorakis Brand new video essay on Bloodstone's star Rajinikanth by Indian cinema expert Josh Hurtado Trailers Image gallery Original screenplay [BD-ROM content] Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly-commissioned artwork by Graham Humphreys FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated collector's booklet featuring new writing on the film by Mark Cunliffe
Focused lightning bolts, stigmata, possession, and ancient curses become secondary in Season 3 of The X-Files as more episodes are devoted to pursuing the increasingly complex story threads. "The Blessing Way" is an explosive start, introducing the Syndicate's well-manicured man (John Neville), while Scully's sister Melissa is shot and Mulder experiences Twin Peaks-like prophetic visions. We learn of medical records of millions, including Scully, who have been experimented upon ("Paper Clip"): the fast-paced train-bound two-parter "Nisei" and "731" suggests the experiments are about alien hybridisation. Krycek turns out to be hosting an alien in the next double-act, "Piper Maru" and "Apocrypha", in which Skinner is shot by Melissa's killer. Two great one-offs outside the arc are "Clyde Bruckman's "Final Repose", a bittersweet tale of foreseeing death (featuring an Emmy-winning performance from Peter Boyle) and Jose Chung's "From Outer Space", a spoof of alien conspiracy theories through an author's investigations into abductees. --Paul Tonks
Season Two, the 1994-95 run, of The X Files was the one where creator Chris Carter, having had a surprise hit when he expected a one-season wonder, started trying to make sense of all the storylines he had thrown into the pile in the first year. Moreover, he had to cope with Gillian Anderson's maternity leave by having Scully get abducted by aliens (back then, a pretty fresh device) for a few episodes and come back strangely altered. The season also inaugurated the tradition of opening ("Little Green Men") and closing ("Anasazi") with the show's worst episodes, both pot-boiling attempts to keep the alien infiltration/government conspiracy balls up in the air while seeming to offer narrative forward-thrusts or revelations.But it's also a show noticeably surer of itself than Season One, with its stars reading from the same page in terms of their characters' relationship and attitudes to the wondrous. Scully's no-longer-workable scepticism finally starts to erode in the face of Mulder's increasingly cracked belief. There are fewer marking-time leftover-monster-of-the-week shows--although we do get a human fluke ("The Host"), vampires ("3"), an invisible rapist ("Excelsius Dei") voodoo ("Fresh Bones")--and the flying-saucer stories at last seem to be going somewhere. The powerful two-episode run ("Duane Barry", "Ascension") features Steve Railsback as Mulder's possible future, an FBI agent burned out after a UFO abduction who has become a hostage-taking terrorist, which climaxes with Scully's disappearance into the light. The standout episode is also a stand-alone--"Humbug"--the first and still most successful of the show's self-parodies (written by Darin Morgan, who had played the Flukeman in "The Host"), in which the agents investigate a murder in a circus freakshow, allowing the actors to make fun of the mannerisms they have earnestly built up in a run of solemn, even somnolent, explorations of the murk. Other worthy efforts: "Aubrey", about genetic memory; "Irresistible", a rare (and creepy) straight psycho-chiller with little paranormal content; and "The Calusari", a good ghost/mystery. Rising deputy characters include Nicholas Lea as the perfidious Krycek and Brian Thompson as the shapeshifting alien bounty hunters. Notable guest stars: Charles Martin Smith, C.C.H. Pounder, Leland Orser, Terry O'Quinn, Bruce Weitz, Daniel Benzali, John Savage, Vincent Schiavelli, Tony Shalhoub. --Kim NewmanOn the DVD: The individual episode discs have a small selection of deleted scenes, foreign language clips and behind-the-scenes footage, but the bulk of the extra material is on the final disc. There's not a lot to get to grips with, but what there is consists of a 14-minute documentary about the making of Season Two, with contributions from Chris Carter, various directors, writers and actors (but not the two principals); Carter talking briefly about each episode in turn; a series of short TV spots and pieces about the show's FX and secondary characters; and three very short behind-the-scenes glimpses, one of which has the self-explanatory title "Gillian eats a cricket". There's also a DVD-ROM utility with Web links and a game. --Mark Walker
True virtue triumphs over superficiality in this distinguished BBC production of Jane Austen's celebrated novel Mansfield Park. Set in 18th century England Jane Austen's tale of virtue and vice tells of young impoverished Fanny Price who arrives at the elegant country estate of her uncle Sir Thomas Bertam. Snubbed by everyone except her cousin Edmund Fanny begins her long struggle for acceptance by her shallow relatives who believe wealth automatically means quality. When
Outspoken, intelligent, attractive and down-to-earth, single mother Merrily Watkins is not what you'd expect to see upon hearing the words Church of England priest.
The Class of 2009 is headed up by the beautiful and mysterious Effy (Kaya Scodelario) returning as the new queen bee; her best friend Pandora (Lisa Backwell) is sweet and kooky and keeps the new gang together. Twins Katie (Megan Prescott) and Emily (Kathryn Prescott) are pulling in different directions. One wants to shed her identity as a twin and gain social status while the other hangs on crippled by shyness. Naomi (Lily Loveless) a beautiful idealist who is passionate political and principled completes the girls. The guys are led by the irrepressible and irresponsible Cook (Jack O'Connell - This is England Eden Lake) the daring and charismatic leader of the gang. His best mates sometimes despair sometimes struggle to keep up but are always there for him when he needs them. Freddie (Luke Pasqualino) skateboards smokes weed and loves his mates. JJ aka Jonah Jeremiah Jones (Ollie Barbieri) is a master illusionist and also their strategist - together they get in and just about out of numerous scrapes in their scheme to succeed. Finally there's Thomas (Merveille Lukeba) who has travelled from the Congo to set up home for his family and has to find his feet in strange new surroundings. Together the gang bond as they compete against each another fight one another and fall in and out of love and lust.
Mulder continues his search for a cure for Scully's illness even as her genetically altered DNA takes her to the brink of death. Scully's DNA comes into play once again when it proves that she is somehow the mother of a little girl named Emily an incident that could only be related to her abduction years earlier. But in the end it is a young boy named Gibson Praise whose body may actually contain the elusive proof Mulder has been searching for so desperately. Episodes comprise:
In Season 4 of The X-Files, Scully is a bit upset by her on-off terminal cancer and Mulder is supposed to shoot himself in the season finale (did anyone believe that?), but in episode after episode the characters still plod dutifully around atrocity sites tossing off wry witticisms in that bland investigative demeanour out of fashion among TV cops since Dragnet. Perhaps the best achievement of this season is "Home", the most unpleasant horror story ever presented on prime-time US TV. It's not a comfortable show--confronted with this ghastly parade of incest, inbreeding, infanticide and mutilation, you'd think M & S would drop the jokes for once--but shows a willingness to expand the envelope. By contrast, ventures into golem, reincarnation, witchcraft and Invisible Man territory throw up run-of-the-mill body counts, spotlighting another recurrent problem. For heroes, M & S rarely do anything positive: they work out what is happening after all the killer's intended victims have been snuffed ("Kaddish"), let the monster get away ("Sanguinarium") and cause tragedies ("The Field Where I Died"). No wonder they're stuck in the FBI basement where they can do the least damage. The series has settled enough to play variations on earlier hits: following the liver vampire, we have a melanin vampire ("Teliko") and a cancer vampire ("Leonard Betts"), and return engagements for the oily contact lens aliens and the weasely ex-Agent Krycek ("Tunguska"/"Terma"). Occasional detours into send-up or post-modernism are indulged, yielding both the season's best episode ("Small Potatoes") and its most disappointing ("Musings of a Cigarette-Smoking Man"). "Small Potatoes", with the mimic mutant who tries out Mulder's life and realises what a loser he is (how many other pin-up series heroes get answerphone messages from their favourite phone-sex lines?), works as a genuine sci-fi mystery--for once featuring a mutant who doesn't have to kill people to live--and as character insight. --Kim Newman
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