Tootsie inevitably looks dated in some respects now, but it's still fabulous in others--the sexual politics look distinctly faded in their sniggering approach to sexual ambiguities, while the sardonic portrayal of a showbiz that loathes perfectionism is still both timely and hysterically funny. Dustin Hoffman's portrayal of Michael Dorsey is a memorable self-caricature--the man is so obsessed with the craft of acting that he refuses to sit down when playing a tomato in a commercial, and so producers run away rather than work with him. By playing Dorothy Michaels playing her soap character, Dorsey gives himself the freedom to be a bad and popular actor. He is so busy with the surface of being a woman--the voice, the hair, the frocks--and with all the bad faith of his and Dorothy's emotional lives, that he learns to relax into the pleasure of performance. This aspect of the film is far more interesting, ironic and funny than the corny New Man moralising about sexual roles that goes with it. Jessica Lange got, and earned, an Oscar for her sensitive straight woman performance as the colleague Michael falls for, and Bill Murray, Teri Garr, Geena Davis (momentarily) and Charles Durning all turn in reliable supporting roles. Sydney Pollack directs efficiently rather than inspiredly--oddly, he earns almost more credit for his well-observed performance as Michael's world-weary agent. On the DVD: The DVD is presented in crisp Dolby Digital sound and with the original theatrical visual ratio of 2.35:1; enhanced for 16:9 widescreen televisions. It is dubbed into French, German, Italian and Spanish and has subtitles in most European languages as well as Arabic, Hindi and Hebrew. The only special features are the theatrical trailer and filmographies for the leading performers and director. --Roz Kaveney
Horton the Elephant (Jim Carrey) struggles to protect a microscopic community from his neighbours who refuse to believe it exists.
Starman is easily director John Carpenter's warmest and most beguiling film, and the only one that ever earned him an Oscar nomination. While most movie buffs are likely to call Halloween the best movie from Carpenter, die-hard romantics and anyone who cried while watching E.T. will vote in favour of the director's 1984 hit. Jeff Bridges is the alien visitor to Earth who is knocked off course and must take an interstate road trip to rendezvous with a mothership from his home planet. To complete this journey he assumes the physical form of the dead husband of a Wisconsin widow (Karen Allen) who responds first with fear, then sympathy, and finally love. Carpenter's graceful strategy is to switch the focus of this E.T.-like film from science fiction to a gentle road-movie love story, made believable by the memorable performances of Bridges and Allen. It's a bit heavy-handed with tenacious government agents who view the Starman as an alien threat (don't they always?), but Carpenter handles the action with intelligent flair, sensitivity and lighthearted humour. If you're not choked up during the final scene, well, you just might not be human. --Jeff Shannon, Amazon.com On the DVD: Starman on disc is presented in anamorphic widescreen transferred from NTSC and letterboxed at 2.35.1. The picture is clear and sharp with very little grain. The soundtrack is crisp, perfectly complementing the romantic nature of this film. The overriding reason to shell out on this special edition is the commentary from John Carpenter and Jeff Bridges, in which director and actor show a genuine affection for the film. Other extras are a featurette filmed around the original release in 1884, a music video starring Bridges and costar Karen Allen covering The Everly Brothers classic "All I Have to Do is Dream", and a trailer for Close Encounters of the Third Kind. --Kristen Bowditch
This minor 1948 film by Alfred Hitchcock beats a familiar Hitchcockian drum: an attorney (Gregory Peck), in love with the client (Alida Valli) he is defending on a murder charge, implicates himself in her guilt by trying to put the blame on another man. The no-one-is-innocent theme may be consistent with Hitchcock's best films and world view, but this is one of the movies that got away from his crucial passion for the plastic side of creative directing. Stuck in a courtroom for much of the story, the film is fit to burst with possibility but is pinned down like a freshly caught butterfly in someone's airless collection. --Tom Keogh
A man who has been invalided out of the Army takes a teaching position at the Bamfylde School during the First World War. Drama based on the novel by R.F. Delderfield.
A mysterious bomber is planting explosive devices in Seattle. The former head of the Bomb Squad reluctantly faces his worst nightmare.
A long forgotten ancient spacecraft discovered on Earth. Investigations carried out by Scout transport her to the moon whereupon she meets the impressive machines preserving the wisdom of that long lost civilization.
A young man is on trial for a wealthy widow's murder after he suspiciously profits from her will. His only hope for aquital is his wife's testimony but his airtight alibi shatters when she reveals some shocking secrets of her own...
An old, old story as told circa 1980, Breaking Glass, written and directed by Brian Gibson, follows the path of Stardust not to mention A Star is Born and most other films about showbusiness, by following the rise of a talented young hopeful who learns that success comes with strings. Kate Crowley (Hazel O'Connor) begins as a bleached New Wave ranter, fly-posting on the tube and yelling songs about dehumanisation over fascist chants in rowdy pubs, but ends up a stoned glam zombie dressed as a robot, packaging her anger for the benefit of corporate music biz baddies and retreating to a sanatorium. The plot may be familiar, but the film still works, thanks to persuasive central performances from O'Connor, who wrote her own songs and shows real acting muscle that sadly didn't lead to anything like a film career, and Phil Daniels as her hustling manager/boyfriend/conscience. The fine supporting cast includes Jon Finch and Jonathan Pryce as a Bond villain-style record producer and a deaf junkie sax player, with glimpses of later perennials such as Jim Broadbent and Richard Griffiths. Made and set at the start of the 1980s, it catches its times exactly: a "Rock Against 1984" outdoor gig that turns into a riot, a routine police harrassment of a band rehearsal, a power cut that transforms a concert into a before-its-time "unplugged" session. Credits trivia: the executive producer was Dodi al Fayed. On the DVD: A nice letterboxed transfer looks a bit soft and grainy--but that's the way it's supposed to be. The only extras are cribbed-from-the-IMDB filmographies, a trailer with a wonderfully unconvincing narration and an image gallery (posters, ads and stills). --Kim Newman
A story of teenage tearing-away in 1950s America, The Young Stranger fails to make a serious, gripping narrative of the events that follow the somewhat innocuous pivotal moment when 16-year-old Harold "Hal" Ditmar (James MacArthur) punches a cinema manager. Adapted from a TV play and released two years after the benchmark for delinquency movies, Rebel Without a Cause, it has none of that film's raw urgency, seeming staid and inconsequential in comparison. The primary problem is that Hal makes an unconvincing hoodlum. His misdemeanour is less an act of rebellion than a brief misunderstanding. Far from articulating the angst of a generation, his angry tirades against his parents (Kim Hunter and James Daly) and the police set him apart from his peers and feel more like the self-pitying whines of a privileged individual. This sensation is further exacerbated by the fact that all of his problems are swiftly resolved in an all-too-neat ending. Still, The Young Stranger is an interesting period piece, not least for an amusingly tame car chase from first-time feature director John Frankenheimer. --Paul Philpott
Ghostbusters makes its long-awaited return with Director Paul Feig's unique and hilarious take on the classic, supernatural comedy, led by the freshest minds in comedy today, Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon, Leslie Jones, and Chris Hemsworth. Together they team-up to save Manhattan from a sudden invasion of spirits, spooks and slime that engulfs the city. Robert Abele of TheWrap says, this new A-team of ghostbusters are fresh and funny. Special Features: Disc 1 - Blu-ray with both theatrical and extended cut + 1 hour of bonus features including filmmaker commentary Disc 2 - Bonus disc featuring over 2 hours of content exclusive to Blu-ray including deleted scenes, featurettes and more Packed with even more laughs and fun scares Two filmmaker commentaries Over 15 minutes of hilarious bloopers 30 minutes of laugh out loud alternate takes Four deleted scenes Slime time featurette Bonus disc includes 30 extended and alternate scenes More alternate takes Supernatural featurettes Photo gallery
Charles Mingus showcases three exceptional concerts performed in April 1964 featuring his most celebrated lineup - Jaki Byard (piano), Dannie Richmond (drums), Johnny Coles (trumpet), Clifford Jordan (tenor sax) and the great Eric Dolphy (alto sax, flute and bass clarinet). Recorded with an eight-day span, less than three months before Dolphy's death, the three concerts showcase Mingus's visionary leadership and the band's incredible depth and diversity with unique performances and arrangements of classics including So Long Eric and the groundbreaking Meditations On Integration.
In his writing and directing debut Sean Penn delivers a profound picture of two very different brothers one a cop with a loving family the other a lawbreaking Vietnam vet. Both coming to terms with each other and trying to maintain the bond they shared as children.
ULTIMATE JORDAN: DELUXE EDITION is the ultimate tribute to the greatest basketball player of all time. Newly re-mastered and packed with exclusive bonus features, this collection is a slam dunk for Michael Jordan fans. Includes the Classic Highlight Films: Come Fly with Me Michael Jordans Playground Airtime Above and Beyond His Airness Plus Five of Michaels Greatest Games in their Entirety: 1986 Playoffs: Chicago vs Boston (Scores 63 pts.) 1990 Playoffs: Chicago vs Cleveland (Scores 69 pts.) 1993 Finals Game 4: Chicago vs Phoenix (Scores 55 pts.) 1997 Finals Game 5: Chicago vs Utah (The Flu Game) 1998 Finals Game 6: Chicago vs Utah (The Sixth Title) More than an hour of Bonus Features: 2009 Hall of Fame Induction Speech Slam Dunk Contest Highlights Michaels Great 8 The Making of Michael Jordans Playground And much more!
Based on the succesful alternative graphic novel this tells the story of two girlfriends spending the summer after high school graduation together.
A deceptively simple film, Francois Truffaut's The Man Who Loved Women is neither an indictment nor an apology for philandering; rather, it's a courageous, lovingly detailed portrait of a complex, intelligent man suffering from an altogether intractable complaint. Scientist Bertrand Morane, "never in the company of men after 5", seduces women by evening and writes about the experiences in the early morning. Though 40-ish and somewhat square, no woman in the town of Montpelier seems capable of resisting his earnest advances. Not much else happens in them film, but in the hands of master visual storyteller Truffaut, the threadbare plot accumulates deep and ominous philosophical resonances. What drives Morane from woman to woman, and what accounts for his remarkable success? Does he secretly dislike women and consider them interchangeable (as one of the more prurient characters charges, to Morane's genuine befuddlement), or is his enthusiasm a kind of celebration? Truffaut refuses to answer plainly, but does drop clues; as his camera focuses on everyday objects, many take on a chilling, otherworldly lustre, and coldly foreshadow Morane's fate. This film was clumsily remade in English in 1983 by Blake Edwards, with Burt Reynolds assuming the role played here with such understated skill by the wonderful Charles Denner. --Miles Bethany
Two giant asteroids are on a collision course with earth hurtling towards us at 34 000mph and each could hit with 10 000 megatons of explosive power creating shock waves and a fireball that would obliterate the human race. From the producers of Courage Under Fire and Predator and the special effects team behind Star Trek. This epic disaster movie is guaranteed to make a big big impact.
Get on board for one of the very best hard-boiled thrillers ever to hurtle out of Hollywood. Charles McGraw (His Kind Of Woman) stars as Detective Walter Brown a cop with a simple mission - get mobster's wife Frankie Neale (Marie Windsor Force of Evil) on the train and take her to the grand jury in Los Angeles where she's going to testify against her late husband's colleagues. But the mob don't want her to spill the beans and they'll stop at nothing to stop her taking the stand; Brown realises they've planted assassins on the train with them and it's up to him to keep her safe. It's going to be one hell of a journey...
After a chimpanzee gets loose in a pharmaceutical lab and randomly concocts a youth-restoring drug staid scientist Dr. Barnaby Fulton (Cary Grant) unknowingly samples the potion and acquires the energy and tempement of a college student!
Please wait. Loading...
This site uses cookies.
More details in our privacy policy