"Actor: Gloria LeRoy"

• Day Of The Locust | DVD | (05/07/2004) from £20.00   |  Saving you £-4.01 (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Nathanael West's The Day of the Locust is by consensus the great Hollywood novel, a poison-pen letter aimed squarely at the tinsel heart of the movie biz. Only in the 1970s could Hollywood actually hazard a film of this story, and the result is suitably corrosive. William Atherton is the observer Tod, Karen Black the blond starlet Faye, and Donald Sutherland the hulking Homer--but they are easily out-acted by the colorful supporting cast. In particular, Burgess Meredith's exhausted showbizzy salesman and Billy Barty's strutting dwarf are superbly crafted gargoyles in this Hollywood wax museum. Director John Schlesinger piles on the rancid atmosphere and rampant hypocrisy until the movie fairly drowns in its own grotesque vision. Long before the climactic apocalyptic riot, the film has torn itself up. There's no substitute for West's wicked prose, so the adaptation comes across as a literal-minded screech rather than a true bonfire of the vanities. --Robert Horton

• Phantom Of The Air, The: 4k Restored Special Edition | Blu Ray | (06/07/2021) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• The Alex Cox Collection | DVD | (12/11/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £39.99

  THREE BUSINESSMEN:; Two lone businessmen, Bennie (Miguel Sandoval) and Frank (Alex Cox) find themselves alone one night in the dining room, of a large Victorian hotel in Liverpool, England. Abandoned by the staff of the wierd dining room, they tentatively join forces and go in search of food, in a city neither of them knows. But restaurant after restaurant fails them.; ; Without realising their destination, Bennie and Frank travel halfway around the planet, via public transport. Prattling abo.