"Actor: Herman"

• Dumbo (Special Edition) | DVD | (22/03/2010) from £5.45   |  Saving you £1.54 (28.26%)   |  RRP £6.99

  A Disney "classic" that actually is a classic, Dumbo should be part of your movie collection whether or not you have children. The storytelling was never as lean as in Dumbo, the songs rarely as haunting (or just plain weird), the characters rarely so well defined. The film pits the "cold, cruel, heartless" world that can't accept abnormality against a plucky, and mute, hero. Jumbo Jr. (Dumbo is a mean-spirited nickname) is ostracised from the circus pack shortly after his delivery by the stork because of his big ears. His mother sticks up for him and is shackled. He's jeered by children (an insightful scene has one boy poking fun at Dumbo's ears, even though the youngster's ears are also ungainly), used by the circus folk, and demoted to appearing with the clowns. Only the decent Timothy Q. Mouse looks out for the little guy. Concerns about the un-PC "Jim Crow" crows, who mock Dumbo with the wonderful "When I See an Elephant Fly", should be moderated by remembering that the crows are the only social group in the film who act kindly to the little outcast. If you don't mist up during the "Baby Mine" scene, you may be legally pronounced dead. --Keith Simanton

• Dumbo | Blu Ray | (31/10/2011) from £4.78   |  Saving you £18.21 (380.96%)   |  RRP £22.99

  A Disney "classic" that actually is a classic, Dumbo should be part of your movie collection whether or not you have children. The storytelling was never as lean as in Dumbo, the songs rarely as haunting (or just plain weird), the characters rarely so well defined. The film pits the "cold, cruel, heartless" world that can't accept abnormality against a plucky, and mute, hero. Jumbo Jr. (Dumbo is a mean-spirited nickname) is ostracised from the circus pack shortly after his delivery by the stork because of his big ears. His mother sticks up for him and is shackled. He's jeered by children (an insightful scene has one boy poking fun at Dumbo's ears, even though the youngster's ears are also ungainly), used by the circus folk, and demoted to appearing with the clowns. Only the decent Timothy Q. Mouse looks out for the little guy. Concerns about the un-PC "Jim Crow" crows, who mock Dumbo with the wonderful "When I See an Elephant Fly", should be moderated by remembering that the crows are the only social group in the film who act kindly to the little outcast. If you don't mist up during the "Baby Mine" scene, you may be legally pronounced dead. --Keith Simanton

• Shazam! Blu-Ray | Blu Ray | (12/08/2019) from £6.95   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  We all have a superhero inside us, it just takes a bit of magic to bring it out. In Billy Batson's (Angel) case, by shouting out one wordSHAZAM!this streetwise 14-year-old foster kid can turn into the adult Super Hero Shazam (Levi), courtesy of an ancient wizard. Still a kid at heartinside a ripped, godlike bodyShazam revels in this adult version of himself by doing what any teen would do with superpowers: have fun with them! Can he fly? Does he have X-ray vision? Can he shoot lightning out of his hands? Can he skip his social studies test? Shazam sets out to test the limits of his abilities with the joyful recklessness of a child. But he'll need to master these powers quickly in order to fight the deadly forces of evil controlled by Dr. Thaddeus Sivana.

• Dances With Wolves | DVD | (23/04/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Dances with Wolves is the film that sent director-producer-actor Kevin Costner on his hubristic way; yet it is such a resonant and powerful film that we can almost forgive him for inflicting upon us his later "epic" The Postman. Here Costner plays a Union solder stationed at the far edges of the West, and left there to rot at his post. He finally sees the wisdom of the Lakota Sioux and finds peace within their community. But his decision to "go native" is greatly frowned upon by his military commanders, and the subsequent culture clash forms the backbone of the narrative. The story is told simply, and wastes not one word of dialogue, while the South Dakota locations provide a magnificent backdrop. Costner is sympathetic and accessible as an American Everyman who awakens to himself and the world around him... --Rochelle O'Gorman, Amazon.com

• Shazam! DVD | DVD | (12/08/2019) from £7.19   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  We all have a superhero inside us, it just takes a bit of magic to bring it out. In Billy Batson's (Angel) case, by shouting out one wordSHAZAM!this streetwise 14-year-old foster kid can turn into the adult Super Hero Shazam (Levi), courtesy of an ancient wizard. Still a kid at heartinside a ripped, godlike bodyShazam revels in this adult version of himself by doing what any teen would do with superpowers: have fun with them! Can he fly? Does he have X-ray vision? Can he shoot lightning out of his hands? Can he skip his social studies test? Shazam sets out to test the limits of his abilities with the joyful recklessness of a child. But he'll need to master these powers quickly in order to fight the deadly forces of evil controlled by Dr. Thaddeus Sivana.

• Idiocracy | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £8.25   |  Saving you £7.74 (93.82%)   |  RRP £15.99

  In the future intelligence is extinct From Mike Judge one of the creative minds behind Beavis and Butt-Head King Of The Hill and Office Space comes an outrageous sci-fi comedy that'll make you think twice about the future of mankind. Meet Joe Bowers (Luke Wilson). He's not the sharpest tool in the shed. But when a government hibernation experiment goes awry Bowers awakens in the year 2505 to find a society so dumbed-down by mass commercialism and mindless TV programming that he's become the smartest guy on the planet. Now it's up to an average Joe to get human evolution back on track! Filled with razor-sharp sarcasm and outrageous sight gags Idiocracy will make you laugh out loud whether you're an absolute genius or a complete idiot!

• The French Love | Unknown | (07/07/2025) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  They do say that Paris is the city of love and that's certainly true for American TV reporter Bryan Deal: he's barely out of the airport when he's picked up by a pair of beautiful bisexual air-hostesses and whisked back for a spot of le nookie. But can his conservative Anglo-Saxon upbringing allow him to embrace these new freedoms? More ambitious than most seventies soft-core, The French Love captures the mood of fashionable French youth of the time, with sexual liberation linked to political transformation. 88 Films are proud to present this explicit manifesto to a new generation completely uncut. HIGH-DEFINITION BLU-RAY PRESENTATION IN 1.66:1 ASPECT RATIO ORIGINAL FRENCH MONO 2.0 AUDIO ENGLISH SUBTITLES

• Radio Days | DVD | (11/03/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Woody Allen's gentlest and most unassuming movie, Radio Days isn't so much a story as a series of anecdotes loosely linked together by a voice-over spoken by the director. The film is strongly autobiographical in tone, presenting the memories of a young lad Joe (clearly a stand-in for Allen himself) growing up in a working-class Jewish family in the seafront Brooklyn suburb of Rockaway during the late 1930s and early 40s. In this pre-TV era the radio is ubiquitous, a constant accompaniment churning out quiz shows, soap operas, dance music, news flashes and Joe's favourite, the exploits of the Masked Avenger. Given Allen's well-publicised gallery of neuroses, you might expect childhood traumas. But no, everything here is rose-tinted and even the outbreak of war makes little impact on the easygoing, protective tenor of family life. Now and then Allen counterpoints his family album with the doings of the radio folk themselves (blink, and you'll miss a young William H Macy in the studio scene when the news of Pearl Harbour comes through). The rise to fame of Sally (Mia Farrow), a former night-club cigarette girl turned crooner, is the nearest the film comes to a coherent storyline. But most of the time Allen is content to coast on a flow of easy nostalgia, poking affectionate fun at the broadcasting conventions of the period and basking in the mildly rueful Jewish humour and small domestic crises of Joe's extended family. There aren't even any of his snappy one-liners, and the humour is kept low-key, raising at most an indulgent smile. A touch of Allen's usual acerbity wouldn't have come amiss. But for anyone who shares these memories, Radio Days will surely be a delight. On the DVD: Not much besides the theatrical trailer, scene menu and a choice of languages. The screen's the full original ratio, but nothing seems to have been done to enhance the soundtrack, and the dialogue's not always clear. A boost in volume may help.--Philip Kemp

• Dances with Wolves (Three Disc Special Edition) | DVD | (11/10/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Kevin Costner's 1990 epic won a bundle of Oscars for a moving, engrossing story of a white soldier (Costner) who singlehandedly mans a post in the 1870 Dakotas, and becomes a part of the Lakota Sioux community who live nearby. The film may not be a masterpiece, but it is far more than the sum of good intentions. The characters are strong, the development of relationships is both ambitious and careful, the love story between Costner and Mary McDonnell's character is captivating. Only the third-act portrait of white intruders as morons feels overbearing, but even that leads to a terribly moving conclusion. Costner's direction is assured, the balance of action and intimacy is perfect--what more could anyone want outside of an unqualified masterpiece? --Tom Keogh

• Office Space | DVD | (06/10/2003) from £8.72   |  Saving you £-2.73 (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Peter Gibbons, thanks to a hypnotic suggestion, decides not to go to work at the same time his company is laying people off.

• Shazam! Blu-Ray 3D | Blu Ray | (12/08/2019) from £13.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  We all have a superhero inside us, it just takes a bit of magic to bring it out. In Billy Batson's (Angel) case, by shouting out one wordSHAZAM!this streetwise 14-year-old foster kid can turn into the adult Super Hero Shazam (Levi), courtesy of an ancient wizard. Still a kid at heartinside a ripped, godlike bodyShazam revels in this adult version of himself by doing what any teen would do with superpowers: have fun with them! Can he fly? Does he have X-ray vision? Can he shoot lightning out of his hands? Can he skip his social studies test? Shazam sets out to test the limits of his abilities with the joyful recklessness of a child. But he'll need to master these powers quickly in order to fight the deadly forces of evil controlled by Dr. Thaddeus Sivana.

• Crazy Heart | Blu Ray | (08/04/2013) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £24.99

  Four-time Academy Award nominee Jeff Bridges stars as the richly comic, semi-tragic romantic anti-hero Bad Blake in the debut feature film Crazy Heart from writer-director Scott Cooper. In London cinemas from 19 February, nationwide from 5 March.

• La Traviata | DVD | (07/06/2007) from £15.85   |  Saving you £-5.86 (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Verdi La TraviataHere is the opera event of 2005, the Salzburg Festival's La Traviata featring Anna Netrebko, Rolando Villazon, and Thomas Hampson In a dramatic staging by Willy Decker - this is the trilling production that prompted riotous ovations not seen since Karajan's heyday.This standard-version DVD is also available as a premium-edition 2 DVDset with additional behind-the-scenes material.

• Pi | DVD | (19/07/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Patterns exist everywhere: in nature, in science, in religion, in business. Max Cohen (played hauntingly by Sean Gullette) is a mathematician searching for these patterns in everything. Yet, he's not the only one, and everyone from Wall Street investors, looking to break the market, to Hasidic Jews, searching for the 216-digit number that reveals the true name of God, are trying to get their hands on Max. This dark, low-budget film was shot in black and white by director Darren Aronofsky. With eerie music, voice-overs, and overt symbolism enhancing the somber mood, Aronofsky has created a disturbing look at the world. Max is deeply paranoid, holed up in his apartment with his computer Euclid, obsessively studying chaos theory. Blinding headaches and hallucinogenic visions only feed his paranoia as he attempts to remain aloof from the world, venturing out only to meet his mentor, Sol Robeson (Mark Margolis), who for some mysterious reason feels Max should take a break from his research. Pi is complex--occasionally toocomplex--but the psychological drama and the loose sci-fi elements make this a worthwhile, albeit consuming, watch. Pi won the Director's Award at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival. --Jenny Brown

• Crazy Heart | DVD | (04/06/2012) from £6.35   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Four-time Academy Award nominee Jeff Bridges stars as the richly comic, semi-tragic romantic anti-hero Bad Blake in the debut feature film Crazy Heart from writer-director Scott Cooper. In London cinemas from 19 February, nationwide from 5 March.

• Dude Where's my Car? | DVD | (10/12/2001) from £6.22   |  Saving you £6.77 (108.84%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Two twenty-something wasters wake up one morning with no recollection of the night before and where they left their car!

• Dumbo (Disney) | DVD | (07/05/2007) from £4.95   |  Saving you £15.04 (303.84%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Dumbo remains one of Disney's greatest animated treasures - a heart-warming and inspiring tale overflowing with charm and memorable songs. When a slow stork finally delivers Mrs. Jumbo's pint-sized baby elephant he's the talk of the circus. But with a pair of oversized ears baby Dumbo is laughed at and ridiculed. With remarkable courage and the help of his loyal friend Timothy Mouse Dumbo overcomes all odds in a triumphant celebration of love and determination!

• Shazam! Blu-Ray 4K | Blu Ray | (12/08/2019) from £8.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  We all have a superhero inside us, it just takes a bit of magic to bring it out. In Billy Batson's (Angel) case, by shouting out one wordSHAZAM!this streetwise 14-year-old foster kid can turn into the adult Super Hero Shazam (Levi), courtesy of an ancient wizard. Still a kid at heartinside a ripped, godlike bodyShazam revels in this adult version of himself by doing what any teen would do with superpowers: have fun with them! Can he fly? Does he have X-ray vision? Can he shoot lightning out of his hands? Can he skip his social studies test? Shazam sets out to test the limits of his abilities with the joyful recklessness of a child. But he'll need to master these powers quickly in order to fight the deadly forces of evil controlled by Dr. Thaddeus Sivana.

• Futurama: Season 1 | DVD | (28/01/2002) from £8.26   |  Saving you £31.73 (384.14%)   |  RRP £39.99

  Set in the year 3000, Futurama is the acme of sci-fi animated sitcom from Simpsons creator Matt Groening. While not as universally popular as The Simpsons, Futurama is equally hip and hilarious, thanks to its zippy lateral-thinking contemporary pop cultural references, celebrity appearances (Pamela Anderson and Leonard Nimoy are among a number of guest stars to appear as disembodied heads in jars) and Bender, a distinctly Homer Simpson-esque robot. Part of Futurama's charm is that with decades of sci-fi junk behind us we've effectively been living with the distant future for years and can now have fun with it. Hence, the series stylishly jumbles motifs ranging from Lost in Space-style kitsch to the grim dystopia of Blade Runner. It also bridges the gap between the impossible dreams of your average science fiction fan and the slobbish reality of their comic reading, TV-gawping existence. Groening himself distinguishes his two series thus: "The Simpsons is fictional. Futurama is real." The opening series (premiered in 1999) sees nerdy pizza delivery boy Fry transferred to the 31st century in a cryogenic mishap. There, he meets the beautiful, one-eyed Leela (voiced by Married with Children's Katey Sagal) and the incorrigible alcoholic robot Bender. The three of them join Fry's great (x30) nephew Professor Farmsworth and work in his intergalactic delivery service. Hyper-real yet strangely recognisable situations ensue--Fry discovers he is a billionaire thanks to 1,000 years accrued interest, Leela must fend off the attentions of Captain Kirk-like Lothario Zapp Brannigan, and Fry accidentally drinks the ruler of a strange planet of liquid beings. --David StubbsOn the DVD: As with the earlier Fox release of The Simpsons, Season 1 this otherwise excellent three-disc set is let down by clunky menu navigation. There are way too many copyright warnings, no "Play All" facility, and you have to click back and forth to begin each new episode or find the additional features. By way of compensation, the menus look great and there's a goodly selection of extras on each disc. The entertaining commentaries are by Matt Groening and various members of his creative team, including producer David X Cohen and John DiMaggio (the voice of Bender) and Billy West (Fry). There are a handful of deleted scenes for certain episodes, plus the script and storyboard for the very first episode and an interactive stills gallery. The 4:3 picture is pin-sharp as is the Dolby 2.0Surround.--Mark Walker

• Futurama: Season 4 | DVD | (29/03/2004) from £6.93   |  Saving you £33.06 (477.06%)   |  RRP £39.99

  No more good news everybody--this fourth series of Futurama is the show's last. By turns frenetic and far-sighted, Matt Groening's futuristic comedy provided belly-laughs for self-confessed SF nerds, but somehow failed to connect with a broader audience, even though it was often funnier and sharper than stablemate The Simpsons. So now bid farewell to the Planet Express team--Fry, Leela, Zoidberg, Bender, Amy, Hermes, Prof Farnsworth--as well as to kindly Kif, cloned Cubert, megalomaniac Mom, mutants in the sewer, the cast of robo-sitcom All My Circuits, swashbuckling space lothario and William Shatner wannabe Zapp Brannigan, Elzar the four-armed chef, and all the other characters that made Futurama such a unique experience. This fourth and final year has all the elements that fans enjoyed so much--but also those elements that partially explain its cancellation. Recurring characters are great if you've watched the show before, as are the in-jokes; and the many parodies of classic science fiction are fine for the initiated, but risk leaving other viewers out in the cold. The show's strengths and perceived weaknesses are exemplified in the episode "Where No Fan Has Gone Before", in which the original cast of Star Trek play themselves: hilarious for Trekkers, but not really for anyone else. Elsewhere we find Leela discovering her real parents aren't aliens at all but in fact live in the sewers; Kif getting pregnant; Fry discovering the fossilised remains of his faithful pet dog; and Bender being converted to steam power. Despite some ups and downs, it's still the funniest animated show on TV. Those responsible for cancelling it can bite my shiny metal … On the DVD: Futurama, Series 4 DVD box set includes a "Play All" function on each disc. Multifarious extras include cast and crew commentaries, deleted scenes, animatics, galleries and Easter eggs. --Mark Walker