"Actor: Bernie Hamilton"

• The Swimmer | DVD | (26/05/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Burt Lancaster gives one of his most daringly complex performances in The Swimmer, a fascinating adaptation of John Cheever's celebrated short story. At first it seems that middle-aged businessman Ned Merrill (Lancaster) is merely enjoying a spontaneous adventure, swimming from pool to pool among the well-tended estates of his affluent Connecticut neighbourhood. But as Ned encounters a variety of neighbours, we see from their reactions that he's on an entirely different kind of journey, balanced on the edge of some mysterious psychosis that we can't fully understand until the film's final, devastating image. A compelling portrait of loss, refracted memories, and deep-rooted emotional denial, The Swimmer sprung from the same late-60s soil that yielded similarly ground-breaking literary films such as The Graduate and Goodbye, Columbus. It's an egotistical showcase for the physical prowess of its 55-year-old star, but Lancaster turns it into something deeper, more disturbing, and completely unforgettable. --Jeff Shannon

• Starsky And Hutch - The Complete Third Season | DVD | (28/02/2005) from £21.58   |  Saving you £13.41 (62.14%)   |  RRP £34.99

  The complete third season of undercover adventures with Starsky and Hutch as they use their iconic Gran Torino to bust criminals following tip-offs from coolest informer on the streets Huggy Bear... Episodes comprise: 1. Starsky & Hutch on Playboy Island (a.k.a. Murder on Voodoo Island) (1) 2. Starsky & Hutch on Playboy Island (a.k.a. Murder on Voodoo Island) (2) 3. Fatal Charm 4. I Love You Rosey Malone 5. Murder Ward 6. Death in a Different Place 7. The Crying Child 8

• Starsky And Hutch - The Complete Fourth Season | DVD | (13/02/2006) from £21.58   |  Saving you £13.41 (38.30%)   |  RRP £34.99

  Dave Starsky (Paul Michael Glaser) and Ken 'Hutch' Hutchinson (David Soul) are plainclothes cops patrolling the streets of an unnamed American city (portrayed by Los Angeles) in a 1973 red Grand Torino. Dark-haired Starsky, who has an unflagging appetite and a quick quip for any situation, and tall, blond, Hutch, who is more soulful and serious, are not just partners on the job, they are also close friends. But their unorthodox methods are endlessly frustrating for their boss, Captain Dobey (Bernie Hamilton). The duo has a powerful ally on the street, however, in Huggy Bear (Antonio Fargas), a shady character who proves Starsky and Hutch with plenty of inside information.

• Cleopatra Jones | DVD | (02/08/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £13.99

  A Turkish poppy field is torched - and a U.S. drug trafficker known as ""Mommy"" is feeling pretty burned. She phones the local cops in her pocket and orders a retaliatory strike on an inner-city anti-drug headquarters. Mommy's next call should be to 911 for now she'll have to mess with Special Agent Cleopatra Jones...

• Starsky And Hutch - The Complete First Season | DVD | (15/03/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £34.99

  In the rough-and-tumble, wildly entertaining world of Starsky & Hutch, impatient cops--anxious to join a foot race in pursuit of a villain--throw themselves out of moving vehicles and roll to a bruising stop. Undercover detectives Dave Starsky (Paul Michael Glaser) and Ken "Hutch" Hutchinson (David Soul), hardly imbued with the powers of Spider-Man, routinely scale walls, hop from rooftop to rooftop, and fling themselves down steep hillsides to stop bad guys from doing what bad guys do. Years later Hill Street Blues would redefine the cop genre as a mesh of overlapping storylines and workaday frustrations, but Aaron Spelling's iconic 70s show portrays LA's finest as madly heroic creatures of reckless determination and physicality. This first season is also startlingly brutal for a primetime US show—it was later significantly toned down, much to the regret of fans—while maintaining a delightful, often incongruous, self-deprecating humour. From the series pilot on, partners and best pals Starsky and Hutch work a fine line between predator and prey, relentlessly pursuing suspects while also snared by crime chieftains or short-sighted superiors. In "The Fix", Hutch's secret romance with the former girlfriend of a mafia boss (Robert Loggia) results in the lawman's kidnapping and forced addiction to heroin. Similarly, in "A Coffin for Starsky", a mad chemist injects the wisecracking cop with a slow-acting but lethal poison. "Jo-Jo", written by Michael Mann, finds our guys at loggerheads with federal officers over a dumb deal the G-Men make with a serial rapist. The 23 episodes in this set are all fun, if sometimes shocking, viewing. Expect each character to take as much abuse as he dishes out. Still, the comic sight of Starsky and Hutch (in "Death Notice") trying to conduct business amid busy strippers is well worth the surrounding violence. --Tom Keogh

• Starsky And Hutch - The Complete Second Season | DVD | (19/07/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £34.99

  Starsky & Hutch: The Complete Second Season proves the 1970s series, in its sophomore year, both codified its earliest strengths while continuing to evolve into a sharper, wittier and often darker show. Contributing to those improvements were the stars themselves: David Soul (who plays maverick police detective, intellectual and health nut Ken Hutchinson) and Paul Michael Glaser (as Hutch's more impulsive, junk-food-junkie partner Dave Starsky), each of whom directed exemplary episodes in the second series. The series' creators also struck a more entertaining balance between the comic and dramatic possibilities inherent in Starsky and Hutch's bluntly honest, fraternal relationship. A number of stories placed the guys in intentionally funny undercover situations: as garish gamblers in the two-part opener "The Las Vegas Strangler"; entertainment directors (named Hack and Zack) on a luxury cruise ship in "Murder at Sea"; gigolo-like dance aficionados in the playfully-titled "Tap Dancing Her Way Right Back into Your Hearts"; and, most amusingly, stunt men in "Murder on Stage 17". Those are all good shows, and the duo often bicker within them, to great comic effect, like an old married couple. But it's the relentlessly tougher episodes that prove each character's mettle and demonstrate the depth of Starsky and Hutch's mutual trust. Among these is the powerful "Gillian", in which Starsky discovers Hutch's classy new girlfriend is a prostitute and breaks the news to his shattered friend. Somewhat lighter but just as revealing is "Little Girl Lost", starring a young Kristy McNichol as an orphaned street urchin whom Hutch, lately in a misanthropic, anti-Christmas mood, takes into his home. Glaser's directorial debut, the harrowing "Bloodbath", gives Soul a lot of room for an intensely physical and psychological performance as Hutch scurries to find his kidnapped partner. Soul returns the favour with "Survival", in which Starsky desperately seeks his missing pal, trapped and slowly dying beneath a car wreck. All in all, a very good series, with (of course) Antonio Fargas still sharp as sidekick Huggy Bear. --Tom Keogh

• The Organization | DVD | (03/02/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  The Organization was the second and final sequel to 1967's In the Heat of the Night and sees Sidney Poitier's homicide detective Virgil Tibbs called in to investigate the murder of a factory manager. In a lengthy, dialogue-free opening (the film's best sequence), it appears that we are witnessing the culprits in action. However, this group turns out to be a gang of idealistic young vigilantes who knew that the factory was a front for an international drugs cartel--the Organization of the title--and have made off with a haul of heroin secreted there. Suspected of the manager's murder, they meet Tibbs and seek his cooperation. He agrees to help them, pitting himself not only against the Organization but his own police department. Set in San Franscisco, The Organization invites invidious comparisons with Bullitt: its somewhat cheesy contemporary soundtrack, derived from Miles Davis' Bitches Brew, certainly marks it as a piece of its period, as do the occasionally less-than-convincing action sequences, risible acting and far-fetched plot. Poitier, as ever, lends the film a certain dignity and poise, worthy of better material to work with than this. The film is also notable for providing early showcases for two of Cop TV's most famous Captains: Daniel J Travanti (Hill Street Blues) and Bernie Hamilton (later Captain Dobey in Starsky & Hutch) are both assigned minor roles here. On the DVD: The Organization comes to disc in an adequate transfer, though still a little grainy. The sole extra is the original trailer. --David Stubbs

• Devil At Four O'Clock | DVD | (19/06/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  They jumped into hell to save a part of heaven. A seaplane lands on the island of Talua to unload three criminals-including Harry (Frank Sinatra) plus a young priest Father Perreau (Kerwin Mathews) who has come to succeed aging irascible Father Doonan (Spencer Tracy). When an earthquake and volcanic eruption strike Talua Father Doonan persuades Harry to parachute with him into the mountains on a daring rescue to an isolated hospital. The party-mostly children - is menaced

• Starsky and Hutch - Season 1 Vol. 1 | DVD | (26/03/2007) from £9.98   |  Saving you £0.01 (0.10%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Produced by the late Aaron Spelling (TV's Charlies Angels) Starsky & Hutch roared into small screens in 1975 to become one of the most popular iconic series of the decade. This was TV's coolest buddy cop show fuelled by full-throttle car chases offbeat humour colourful characters and a hip vibe. The hit series (1975-1979) followed streetwise undercover detectives Dave Starsky and Ken ""Hutch"" Hutchinson as they cruised around town in Starsky's red and white-striped Gran Torino battling thugs and hoodlums with the help of jive-talking informant Huggy Bear. Episodes comprise: 1. Snowstorm 2. Savage Sunday 3. Death Ride 4. Texas Longhorn

• Starsky And Hutch - Series 1 Vols 1-3 | DVD | (01/10/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £14.99

  All the episodes from the first season of the classic U.S. cop show starring David Soul and Paul Michael Glaser as immortal detective Starsky and Hutch. Episodes comprise: Savage Sunday Texas Longhorn Death Ride Snowstorm The Fix Death Notice Pariah Kill Huggy Bear The Bait Lady Blue ""Captain Dobey You're Dead!"" Terror on the Docks The Deadly Impostor Shootout The Hostages Losing Streak Silence The Omaha Tiger Jojo Running A Coffin for Starsky The Bounty Hunter.