"Actor: George Murdock"

• Orange County | DVD | (07/07/2003) from £3.49   |  Saving you £12.50 (358.17%)   |  RRP £15.99

  A guidance counselor mistakenly sends out the wrong transcripts to Stanford University under the name of an over-achieving high schooler.

• Final Analysis | DVD | (22/11/1999) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £13.99

  This film, which again pairs Richard Gere and Kim Basinger (who starred in 1986's No Mercy), offers up elements of classic noir: a hapless man becomes intimately involved with a beautiful blonde who may or may not be who or what she appears to be. Dedicated psychiatrist Isaac Barr (Gere) reluctantly, and then more obsessively, becomes involved with Heather Evans (Basinger), the sister of his patient, Diana Baylor (Uma Thurman). Evans is unhappily married to a gangster (appropriately played by a muscular and menacing Eric Roberts in a trademark role). Gere and Basinger make a credible, if dangerous couple, and Thurman delivers a subtle, understated performance and demonstrates her range and potential. The thriller is appropriately shot in gorgeous San Francisco, where the literal and figurative curving and hilly roads wind throughout. Credit legendary art director Dean Tavoularis for some amazing sets and scenes, notably the elegantly cavernous restaurant where Evans and her husband have a fateful dinner. This film is, in a way, glossy director Phil Joanou's Hitchcockian tribute--as a climactic lighthouse scene best demonstrates. Final Analysis doesn't offer an intimate look at its characters, but a beautifully stylized one, moody and gloomy. The intricate plot experiments with the device of "pathological intoxication," in which the subject completely loses control after drinking alcohol. And this doesn't mean a conventional ugly drunk; it means a frightening psychotic. Good and evil, hope and despair, beauty and repulsion are often juxtaposed in the film's complex world. --NF Mendoza

• The Andromeda Strain | DVD | (06/06/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Directed with clinical precision by Academy Award winner Robert Wise this compelling account of the Earth's first biological crisis is perhaps the most chillingly realistic science fiction thriller ever made. After an errant satellite crashes to earth near a remote New Mexico village the recovery team discovers that almost everyone in the town are victims of a horrible death with the mysterious exception of an infant and an old homeless man. The survivors are brought to a state-of-the-art laboratory descending five stories beneath the ground where the puzzled scientists race against time to determine the nature of the deadly microbe before it wreaks worldwide havoc. A trailblazer in the areas of special effects and inventive sets The Andromeda Strain is based on Michael Crichton's best-selling novel that created national paranoia for its topical relevance to the first moon landing.

• The Andromeda Strain | Blu Ray | (20/02/2017) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  When virtually all of the residents of Piedmont, New Mexico, are found dead after the return to Earth of a space satellite, the head of the US Air Force's Project Scoop declares an emergency. Many years prior to this incident, a group of eminent scientists led by Dr. Jeremy Stone (Arthur Hill) advocated for the construction of a secure laboratory facility that would serve as a base in the event an alien biological life form was returned to Earth from a space mission. Stone and his team - Drs. Dutton, Leavitt and Hall (David Wayne, Kate Reid, and (James Olson, respectively)- go to the facility, known as Wildfire, and try to first isolate the life form while determining why two people from Piedmont (an old wino and a six-month-old baby) survived. The scientists methodically study the alien life form unaware that it has already mutated and presents a far greater danger in the lab, which is equipped with a nuclear self-destruct device should it manage to escape.

• Spider's Web | DVD | (28/04/2003) from £6.73   |  Saving you £13.26 (197.03%)   |  RRP £19.99

  A career driven female investment executive is seduced by a young man who uses her to steal from his wealthy father. He then sets her up to take the fall for his several murders but she eventually tries to turn the tables on him...

• The Sword And The Sorcerer | DVD | (08/04/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  A Kingdom Ruled By Evil. A Princess Enslaved By Passion. A Warrior Driven By Justice. Meet Talon a daring mercenary who conquers castles and dungeons alike with his lethal three-bladed sword. But when Talon learns that he is the prince of a kingdom controlled by an evil sorcerer he is thrust into the wildest fight of his life. Can Talon rescue the beautiful princess and slay the warlock or will he fall prey to the black magic of medieval mayhem? Lee Horsley Kathleen Beller Simon MacCorkindale and Richard Moll star in this action-packed adventure saga filled with brutal battles luscious maidens savage monsters and more!

• Star Trek 5 : The Final Frontier - Special Edition (2 discs) | DVD | (22/12/2003) from £10.79   |  Saving you £17.19 (220.38%)   |  RRP £24.99

  Almost universally derided on its first release as the worst of the Star Trek movies to date, The Final Frontier might just have been the victim of bad press. Following in the wake of the massively successful fourth instalment The Voyage Home didn't help matters (notoriously, even-numbered entries are better), nor did having novice director and shameless egomaniac William Shatner at the helm. But if the story, conceived and cowritten by Shatner, teeters dangerously on the verge of being corny, it redeems itself with enough thought-provoking scenes in the best tradition of the series, and a surprisingly original finale. Granted there are a few too many yawning plot holes along the way, and the general tone is over-earnest (despite some painfully slapstick comedy moments), but the interaction of the central trio (Kirk, Spock and McCoy) is often funny and genuinely insightful; while Laurence Luckinbill is a charismatic adversary as the renegade Vulcan Sybok. The rest of the cast scarcely get a look in, and the special effects betray serious budgetary restrictions, but with a standout score from Jerry Goldsmith and a meaty philosophical premise to play around with, Star Trek V looks a lot more substantial in retrospect. Certainly it's no worse than either Generations or Insurrection, the next "odd-numbered" entries in the series. --Mark Walker

• Randy Rides Alone | DVD | (11/08/2003) from £4.98   |  Saving you £1.01 (20.28%)   |  RRP £5.99

  The territory has been invaded by a gang of renegades threatening the town and its people. Only one person has the strength to stand and fight on behalf of others...

• Breaker Breaker | DVD | (05/09/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Chuck Norris is a Vietnam veteran searching the country for his lost brother. When he and his fellow truckers have to pass through a corrupt town where everyone is on the take they decide to take things into their own hands by plotting revenge against the local bullies. Filled with martial arts action adventure and plenty of 18 wheelers the truckers teach the town a lesson they won't soon forget.

• Firepower | DVD | (12/04/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Two tough cops go undercover to locate and return a precious vaccine but are sequestered to a gladiatorial hand to hand combat tournament...

• Jack Black Pack - School Of Rock / Orange County | DVD | (12/07/2004) from £6.34   |  Saving you £23.64 (705.67%)   |  RRP £26.99

  While it invites charges of Hollywood nepotism, Orange County overcomes that stigma with a delightful cast of newcomers and veterans alike. It's no better or worse than many teen comedies, but director Jake Kasdan (son of director Lawrence Kasdan) astutely combines teen-flick staples (stoner gags, raucous parties) with a biting undercurrent of southern California absurdity. This comedic texture helps Colin Hanks (son of Tom) and Schuyler Fisk (daughter of Sissy Spacek) to prove their big-screen promise. They play (respectively) an Orange County teen and aspiring writer named Shaun who yearns for admission to Stanford, and his sensible girlfriend who knows just how to nurture his dreams. Much of the comedy arises from the foibles of Shaun's dysfunctional family (played to perfection by Jack Black, Catherine O'Hara and John Lithgow), while unbilled cameos by Ben Stiller and Kevin Kline add zest to a movie that tries to be different, and mostly succeeds. --Jeff Shannon

• Randy Rides Alone | DVD | (10/12/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  The territory has been invaded by a gang of renegades threatening the town and its people. Wyne shows up takes control and single-handedly rides them out of town.