"Actor: Gertrude Astor"

• Jolson Story, The / Jolson Sings Again | DVD | (03/11/2003) from £12.65   |  Saving you £0.34 (2.69%)   |  RRP £12.99

  The Jolson Story: Larry Parks gives the performance of his life in the story of Al Jolson from his meteoric rise to fame to the doubts and depression that emerged later in his career. One of the greatest musicals ever made The Jolson Story is an electrifying cavalcade of lavish production numbers with an all-star cast. Winning Academy Awards for Musical Scoring and Sound Recording the film also received four Academy Award nominations in 1946 including Best Actor for Larry

• When Worlds Collide | DVD | (23/09/2002) from £15.65   |  Saving you £-2.66 (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  In this Oscar-winning science fiction movie from producer George Pal an impending collison with a runaway star signals the destruction of Earth! The government refuses to listen to scientists but private industrialists finance the building of a spaceship which will carry a limited number of people to another planet to begin a new civilisation. As doomsday approaches they race against time and the panic of those who will be left behind. The potential pulverising impact of the co

• My Dear Secretary | DVD | (22/03/2004) from £5.91   |  Saving you £2.07 (70.89%)   |  RRP £4.99

  If Charles Martin's wisecracking 1948 period-piece My Dear Secretary hasn't quite endured as a classic of its kind, it still commands attention as an appealing and often very funny curiosity. Kirk Douglas rightly earned his status as one of the titans of big-screen epic drama, so it's a surprise to encounter him in this romantic comedy as a feckless writer who can always find something to do rather than get down to work, leaving a string of outraged, frustrated or compromised secretaries in his wake. Douglas has a reasonably light comic touch and spars well with Laraine Day, in determined form as the secretary whom finally tames him and, in a notable strike for women's liberation, becomes a successful author herself in the process. But this is a film in which the supporting cast steal the best lines and scenes. Keenan Wynn is delightful as Ronnie, Douglas' neighbour and partner in the pursuit of pleasure. Some splendid high campery offers ample evidence that in a more enlightened age, Ronnie would surely have been openly gay. How else to explain his hilarious last reel marriage of convenience to the wealthy dragon of a landlady, played by the irrepressible Florence Bates? It isn't vintage screwball by any means, but My Dear Secretary is witty and literate enough to make you long for a revival in sophisticated cinema comedy. Truly, they don't make 'em like they used to. On the DVD: As the rush to release long-forgotten gems on DVD turns into a deluge, we will probably have to get used to the sort of disappointment on offer here: unrestored prints with no digital remastering and lousy sound quality, simply slammed onto the disc. The film could hardly be served less adequately. There isn't even any static background information on the production or the actors, making the package rather poor. --Piers Ford

• My Dear Secretary | DVD | (01/09/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £3.99

  If Charles Martin's wisecracking 1948 period-piece My Dear Secretary hasn't quite endured as a classic of its kind, it still commands attention as an appealing and often very funny curiosity. Kirk Douglas rightly earned his status as one of the titans of big-screen epic drama, so it's a surprise to encounter him in this romantic comedy as a feckless writer who can always find something to do rather than get down to work, leaving a string of outraged, frustrated or compromised secretaries in his wake. Douglas has a reasonably light comic touch and spars well with Laraine Day, in determined form as the secretary whom finally tames him and, in a notable strike for women's liberation, becomes a successful author herself in the process. But this is a film in which the supporting cast steal the best lines and scenes. Keenan Wynn is delightful as Ronnie, Douglas' neighbour and partner in the pursuit of pleasure. Some splendid high campery offers ample evidence that in a more enlightened age, Ronnie would surely have been openly gay. How else to explain his hilarious last reel marriage of convenience to the wealthy dragon of a landlady, played by the irrepressible Florence Bates? It isn't vintage screwball by any means, but My Dear Secretary is witty and literate enough to make you long for a revival in sophisticated cinema comedy. Truly, they don't make 'em like they used to. On the DVD: As the rush to release long-forgotten gems on DVD turns into a deluge, we will probably have to get used to the sort of disappointment on offer here: unrestored prints with no digital remastering and lousy sound quality, simply slammed onto the disc. The film could hardly be served less adequately. There isn't even any static background information on the production or the actors, making the package rather poor. --Piers Ford

• Scream House Triple Terror 1 | DVD | (25/09/2006) from £12.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  A triple DVD pack of nostalgic horror featuring Just Before Dawn Devil's Hand and Fear In The Night. Just Before Dawn (1981 Dir. Jeff Lieberman): Despite the local Ranger's ominous warning a party of three boys and two girls take a camping trip to the mountain. In the steamy backwoods they sense an atmosphere of mounting tension. Soon they realise there is some deadly horror lurking in the woods. The Ranger had been right! They meet a strange girl and her equally strange family. Then one of them is murdered...then another...and another... Will any of them survive those dark hours JUST BEFORE DAWN? Devil's Hand (1962 Dir. William J. Hole Jr.): Robert Alda stars as a man who becomes entranced by the beautiful high-priestess of a voodoo cult. Totally bewitched he realizes that he has to break his own spell when his fiance is kidnapped and due to be sacrificed. Fear In The Night (1972 Dir. Jimmy Sangster): Joan Collins stars in this this tense study of paranoia set in a boy's prep school that has pervasive surrealistic qualities. A young woman (Geeson) who has recently suffered a nervous breakdown moves with her husband to a rural English boarding school. However her nerves are not assuaged when she meets the school's intimidating headmaster (Cushing) and his vampy wife (Collins). Unfortunately Geeson's tension only gets worse when she finds herself being stalked and harassed by a one-armed man who seems to be a deranged psychotic. Unable to convince anyone that what is happening to her is real Geeson begins to suspect her husband of trying to kill her until one night of almost unbearable terror that reveals a secret more shocking than anything she could have imagined...

• My Dear Secretary | DVD | (27/08/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  If Charles Martin's wisecracking 1948 period-piece My Dear Secretary hasn't quite endured as a classic of its kind, it still commands attention as an appealing and often very funny curiosity. Kirk Douglas rightly earned his status as one of the titans of big-screen epic drama, so it's a surprise to encounter him in this romantic comedy as a feckless writer who can always find something to do rather than get down to work, leaving a string of outraged, frustrated or compromised secretaries in his wake. Douglas has a reasonably light comic touch and spars well with Laraine Day, in determined form as the secretary whom finally tames him and, in a notable strike for women's liberation, becomes a successful author herself in the process. But this is a film in which the supporting cast steal the best lines and scenes. Keenan Wynn is delightful as Ronnie, Douglas' neighbour and partner in the pursuit of pleasure. Some splendid high campery offers ample evidence that in a more enlightened age, Ronnie would surely have been openly gay. How else to explain his hilarious last reel marriage of convenience to the wealthy dragon of a landlady, played by the irrepressible Florence Bates? It isn't vintage screwball by any means, but My Dear Secretary is witty and literate enough to make you long for a revival in sophisticated cinema comedy. Truly, they don't make 'em like they used to. On the DVD: As the rush to release long-forgotten gems on DVD turns into a deluge, we will probably have to get used to the sort of disappointment on offer here: unrestored prints with no digital remastering and lousy sound quality, simply slammed onto the disc. The film could hardly be served less adequately. There isn't even any static background information on the production or the actors, making the package rather poor. --Piers Ford

• The Strong Man - Harry Langdon | DVD | (06/01/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £16.99

  Under the direction of legendary filmmaker Frank Capra (It's a Wonderful Life) Harry Langdon is at this charming childlike best in this handsomely produced and utterly hilarious film that vividly represents the great tradition of American Slapstick. After a tour of duty in the No-Man's-Land of World War 1 a witless young Belgian (Langdon) comes to America and seeks out the dedicated pen pal (Priscilla Bonner) whose letters lifted his spirits during the heat of battle. But to Paul t