A potboiler featuring a demented caretaker and a seemingly hapless suburban family, this is The Nanny of the 1990s. However, it is much more predictable than that 1965 Bette Davis psychodrama, and more graphic. It works only because Rebecca De Mornay makes us intensely uncomfortable as the disturbed au pair who wants to take care of much more than her employer's well-being. Annabella Sciorra plays the perfect mother of a flawless family. Her obstetrician, however, is less than wonderful, having enjoyed her examination much more than he should have. When she files sexual harassment charges against the repugnant doctor, he loses face--literally--after shooting himself in the head. Several months later, an ideal nanny shows up at her home. You guessed it--she's the doc's widow. The movie follows a tried and trusted formula, with the audience in on everything. However, the story does surprise us in intense and intimate ways. The visit to the obstetrician is one of the creepiest moments in the film. You definitely hear the voice of writer Amanda Silver in a plot concerned with the vulnerabilities of a family, a newborn, a marriage. Since we know so much up front, there is an overall lack of inventiveness in the plot machinations. It may not jolt us, but De Mornay does. It's unsettling to watch someone who appears so attractive and who behaves so kindly suddenly reveal hideous psychopathic tendencies. Restraining herself from going over the top, she instead oozes such malevolence you'll want to shudder. --Rochelle O'Gorman
All 24 episodes from the third season of the spin-off crime drama starring Scott Bakula and Lucas Black. In the Crescent City, Special Agent Dwayne Cassius Pride (Bakula) heads up a team of agents for the Naval Criminal Investigative Service as they investigate crimes involving the US Navy and Marine Corps. The episodes are: 'Aftershocks', 'Suspicious Minds', 'Man On Fire', 'Escape Plan', 'Course Correction', 'One Good Man', 'Outlaws', 'Music to My Ears', 'Overdrive', 'Follow the Money', 'Let It Ride', 'Hell On the High Water', 'Return of the King', 'Pandora's Box: Part II', 'End of the Line', 'The Last Stand', 'Swift, Silent, Deadly', 'Slay the Dragon', 'Quid Pro Quo', 'NOLA Confidential', 'Krewe', 'Knockout', 'Down the Rabbit Hole' and 'Poetic Justice'.
From one of Charles Dickens' most beloved novels comes some of his most unforgettable characters, vibrantly brought to life by a star-studded, award-winning cast.
Sgt. Bilko is back and up to his old tricks. The arrival of Major Thorn threatens to put a stop to the casino under-the-table deals and Bilko's other illicit businesses...
A lawyer sends his girlfriend who cannot decide whether to marry him to a psychiatrist to help her increase her confidence. However she falls hopelessly in love with the charming psychiatrist who is uncertain of his best course of action... This delightful film features a superb score from Irving Berlin including the songs 'I Used To Be Colour Blind' 'The Yam' and 'The Night Is Filled With Music'.
No one tries very hard in Big Momma's House, so your enjoyment of this Martin Lawrence vehicle pretty much depends on how much amusement you're able to derive from a guy dressed up as a very ample woman. The setup is of the eye-rolling, only-in-Hollywood nature: Lawrence, as detective Malcolm Turner, is after a killer, and apparently the only way to capture him is to pose as the bad guy's ex-girlfriend's grandmother, who--the film cannot stress this point too much--is quite large. Apparently, Sherry (Nia Long), the young woman in question--she's as attractive as Big Momma is, well, you know--is none too bright, for she falls for Malcolm's ruse, which of course ostensibly amuses mainly because it's so transparent. She at least has an excuse--she hasn't seen Big Momma in two years--but Big Momma's oblivious friends must be functional morons. Screenwriters Darryl Quarles and Don Rhymer didn't tax themselves very much, as they have Malcolm-as-Big-Momma going through fairly predictable motions--botching a meal and delivering a baby unconventionally (Big Momma's a midwife), but ruling at basketball and self-defence and protecting Sherry while trying vainly not to flirt with her. Paul Giamatti is wasted as Malcolm's partner; director Raja Gosnell's clunky sense of comic rhythm is bewildering, because he used to be an editor (he brought a similar lack of magic to Home Alone 3). Lawrence won't have anyone forgetting Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon in Some Like It Hot, Dustin Hoffman in Tootsie, or Robin Williams in Mrs Doubtfire anytime soon. Eddie Murphy in The Nutty Professor 2: The Klumps is far more accomplished, versatile, and funny. --David Kronke, Amazon.com
Hobson's Choice (1953) and The Sound Barrier (1952) is a double bill of cleverly juxtaposed films from David Lean's early canon, demonstrating that even without the landmark epics to come, British cinema would have been an infinitely poorer place without his tremendous contribution. Both films reflect his endlessly penetrating view of human behaviour and its perseverance through obstacles great and small. And both are effectively prisms that reflect all the aspects of that view, keeping the audience's sympathies constantly on the move. Hobson's Choice, based on Harold Brighouse's eternally popular 1916 comedy, boasts fine turns from Charles Laughton--at his brilliant, physical best--as the boot-shop owner with three troublesome daughters, and John Mills as the lowly boot maker, elevated and improved by the eldest daughter Maggie in a neat inversion of the Pygmalion fable. But both are kept in their place by Brenda de Banzie's portrayal of Maggie, a performance that glows with intelligence, truth and increasing warmth. The Sound Barrier is a drama about the race for a supersonic aeroplane. Superficially, its setting is quintessential post-World War II Britain: stiff upper lips, twin beds and clipped Rattigan dialogue. But it's prescient stuff. Ralph Richardson's aircraft manufacturer, sinister in his obsession, is an ominously skilful film performance. And Lean's take on the unthinkable cost of human achievement, interwoven with some spectacular cinematography, absorbs and unsettles. It's especially poignant now that the supersonic age has been summarily ended by Concorde's retirement. On the DVD: Hobson's Choice and The Sound Barrier are both black-and-white films presented in 4:3 picture format, from reasonable prints, and with a mono soundtrack of suitably robust quality for Malcolm Arnold's inventive scores. There are no extras, apart from scene indexes. --Piers Ford
Go Kart Go Rival groups build their own Go-Karts and encounter excitement and trouble in their efforts to win the local Go-Kart race. Featuring a very young Dennis Waterman! A Hitch In Time An erratic time machine cuts a bullying teacher down to size...
After being shot on duty DI Crabbe decides to retires from the police force to set up his own restaurant 'Pie In The Sky'. While he would much rather be left to his own devices in the kitchen he is constantly called back on duty by his needy ex-boss Chief Constable Fisher (Malcolm Sinclair). Featuring the final 5 episodes of series 2: 6. Black Pudding 7. Swan In His Pride 8. The Mild Bunch 9. The Mystery Of Pikey 10. Lemon Twist
Martin Lawrence brings down the house as crafty FBI agent Malcolm Turner - he's willing to go through thick and thin in order to catch an escaped federal prisoner. Sherry (Nia Long) is the con's sexy former flame - she might have the skinny on millions in stolen bank loot and she's headed for Georgia to lay low for a while. That's enough to send Malcolm deep undercover as Big Momma an oversized overbearing Southern granny with an attitude as tough as her pork chops. The result is a genuinely clever comedy caper of epic proportions filled with nonstop laughs and tons of fun!
Hired by a secret group of scientists and ex-military men retired submarine commander Adam Jones (Widmark) takes to the helm again on a mission to investigate a possible communist nuclear base on an island in the Arctic. But danger lurks in the deep for Jones' crew and the closer they get to their destination the deeper their predicament gets. Hostile subs and tensions on board are only the beginning as Jones discovers that this mission isn't what it seems and the real danger of a
A predictable vehicle for the resistable Martin Lawrence, Black Knight is yet another rerun of Mark Twain's Connecticut Yankee at the Court of King Arthur concept which here plays like a horror-free, considerably less funny take on Army of Darkness. Jamal (Lawrence), minion in a mediaeval theme park, reaches into a moat for a magic amulet and is transported to the 14th century, where he is appalled by the toilet facilities, pals around with a disgraced knight (an equally disgraced Tom Wilkinson), romances a feminist lady-in-waiting (Marsha Thomason), introduces soul music to the court in a bit done better in A Knight's Tale, and becomes the legendary black knight to help the rebels overthrow the wicked king. It has a bigger, more lavish feel than most of Lawrence's makeshift knockabouts, but that may also be why it is even less funny, since his rants are rather reined-in and his screen character comes across as just overly pleased with himself rather than a comic foul-up who turns heroic. --Kim Newman No-one tries very hard in Big Momma's House so your enjoyment of this Martin Lawrence vehicle pretty much depends on how much amusement you are able to derive from a guy dressed up as a very ample woman. The setup is of the eye-rolling, only-in-Hollywood nature: Lawrence, as detective Malcolm Turner, is after a killer, and apparently the only way to capture him is to pose as the bad guy's ex-girlfriend's grandmother, who--the film cannot stress this point too much--is quite large. Apparently, Sherry (Nia Long), the young woman in question--she's as attractive as Big Momma is, well, you know--is none too bright, for she falls for Malcolm's ruse, which of course ostensibly amuses mainly because it's so transparent. Paul Giamatti is wasted as Malcolm's partner, while director Raja Gosnell's clunky sense of comic rhythm is bewildering, because he used to be an editor (he brought a similar lack of magic to Home Alone 3). Eddie Murphy in The Nutty Professor 2: The Klumps is far more accomplished, versatile and funny. --David Kronke
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