"Actor: Elizabeth Arlen"

• Marked For Death | DVD | (25/08/2003) from £8.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  The glowering brutality that is aikido head-banger Steven Seagal's substitute for a star persona at least gives us a rancid taste of authenticity in Marked for Death, a cookie-cutter action picture. This glum lug seems really to enjoy hurting people; he snaps limbs and shatters noses with visible relish. Pitted against a gang of Jamaican gangsters who invade his (white ethnic) Chicago neighbourhood and threaten his family, retired DEA agent John Hatcher sets out to solve the case with robotic efficiency, kicking butt in just about every scene. Not quite as pudgy in this 1990 outing as he became a few films later, Seagal looks like the genuine, lethal article in the fight sequences but like a hopeless amateur when he tries to act his way out of the waterlogged-paper-bag of a script. So what else is new? The one bright spot here is Basil Wallace, a mostly unsung actor who throws himself into the showy role of the Rasta gang-boss Screwface, a garishly scarred psycho with piercing ice-blue eyes. --David Chute, Amazon.com

• D.O.A. | DVD | (20/05/2002) from £20.00   |  Saving you £-5.01 (N/A%)   |  RRP £14.99

  A stylish piece of neo-noir, D.O.A. was directed by Rocky Morton and Annabel Jankel during their glory days as creators of Max Headroom. Sometimes mocked at the time for its extravagant visual imagery, this is a film which has aged better than might have been expected. Vastly reworked from the 40s original, D.O.A. stars Dennis Quaid as the burned-out campus novelist who discovers he has been fatally poisoned and sets out to find his killer in the short time left to him, along the way rediscovering his love for the life he is going to lose. Quaid is good enough both at chain-smoking cynicism and angry zest that this becomes emotionally credible; a worryingly young Meg Ryan is excellent as the hero-worshipping sophomore he co-opts into his search. With camerawork of sometimes hallucinatory vividness, rather too many shots of fans and Ferris wheels, and Charlotte Rampling playing a dragon-lady villainess to the hilt, this is a film which teeters on the brink of camp, but has the courage of its individuality. On the DVD: D.O.A. comes to disc with almost no special features whatever save for a Spanish soundtrack and subtitles in Spanish and the Scandinavian languages. Its widescreen visual aspect is 1.85:1 and the Dolby sound does full justice to a very loud score by bands like Timbuk 3.--Roz Kaveney

• Rancho Deluxe | DVD | (16/08/2005) from £17.66   |  Saving you £-1.68 (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  This cult send-up of the pretensions of the American west stars Jeff Bridges and Sam Waterston as Jack McKee and Cecil Colson; two cattle rustlers who use a panel truck and chainsaws in their work instead of a lariat. Henry Beige (Slim Pickens) is hired by the recently arrived ranchers to investigate the losses and brings a touch of the old West to the story and the solution of the crime. Rancho Deluxe's script was written by cult author (and sometimes script-writer) Thomas McGu

• Separate Lives | DVD | (18/09/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £7.99

  Linda Hamilton stars as a psychiatrist who herself has a split-personality problem: she keeps waking up in strange houses with odd clothes on and weapons. She hires a private detective James Belushi to follow her and he works out the problem quick enough. However the mystery deepens when some of her close friends are found dead. Is her other half the killer?

• Separate Lives | DVD | (04/03/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £3.99

  Ex-homicide detective Tom Beckwith (James Belushi) is hired by psychologist Lauren Porter (Linda Hamilton) to watch her every move. Haunted by a secret fear that she is leading a dangerous double life Lauren confronts a dark incident from her past.

• Racing With The Moon | DVD | (31/01/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Henry (Penn) and Nicky (Cage) are small town pals from blue-collar families with only a short time before they ship off to World War II. Henry begins romancing new-to-town Caddie Winger (McGovern) believing her to be wealthy. Mischievous and irresponsible Nicky gets into trouble which forces the other two to become involved testing their relationship as well as the friendship between the boys...