"Actor: Joan Call"

• The Alamo | DVD | (18/10/2004) from £5.49   |  Saving you £4.50 (81.97%)   |  RRP £9.99

  John Wayne produces directs and stars in this larger than life chronicle of one of the most remarkable events in American history. At the Alamo - a crumbling adobe mission - 185 exceptional men joined together in a sacred pact: they would stand firm against an army of 7 000 and willingly give their lives for freedom. Filmed entirely in Texas only a few miles from the site of the actual battle The Alamo is a visually stunning and historically accurate celebration of courage and h

• Carry On At Your Convenience | DVD | (07/07/2003) from £9.49   |  Saving you £3.50 (36.88%)   |  RRP £12.99

  In 1971 when Carry On at Your Convenience hit our screens, the series had long since become part of the fabric of British popular entertainment. Never mind the situation, the characters were essentially the same, film after film. The jokes were all as old as the hills, but nobody cared, they were still funny. But it's just too easy to treat them as a job lot of postcard humour and music hall innuendo. This tale of revolt at a sanitary ware factory--Boggs and Son, what else?--certainly chimed in with the state of the nation in the early 1970s when strikes were called at the drop of a hat. Here, tea urns, demarcation and the company's decision to branch out into bidets all wreak havoc. Kenneth Williams as the company's besieged managing director, Sidney James and Joan Sims give their all as usual, but it's the lesser roles that really add some lustre. Hattie Jacques as Sid's budgerigar-obsessed, sluggish put-upon wife and Renee Houston as a superbly domineering battleaxe with a penchant for strip poker remind us that in the hands of fine actors, even the laziest of caricatures become real human beings. --Piers Ford

• Mysterious Island | DVD | (02/12/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Notable neither for its director nor its stars, Mysterious Island has been given the widescreen DVD treatment rather because of its special-effects man, the legendary Ray Harryhausen. And though his input here is minimal compared with other movies, his stop-motion contributions add zest to a cracking good yarn. A gang of American Civil War soldiers hijack a hot-air balloon and escape from the frying-pan of a military prison to the fire of a deserted tropical island. When a couple of English girls are washed ashore and a legendary nautical figure resurfaces, the scene is set for a ripping survival adventure, taking in weighty theories of political democracy, equality and cowardice, and still managing to add a healthy dollop of stirring music, dodgy accents, old-fashioned sexism, pirates, giant bees, a giant crab and a fearsome, err, giant chicken. Harryhausen's eighth feature contains all the elements that make his movies great, and the pacey script, based on the Jules Verne novel, has you gripped from the off. One of his more modern-feeling early films, the colour film stock, the exotic settings and wider stable of stars (black and English actors feature alongside a pre-Clouseau Herbert Lom) move it forward an era from his dated black-and-white schlock-fests. Gripping, erudite and easily on a par with the more well-known Sinbad and Argonauts movies, this is one to be marooned with. On the DVD: Mysterious Island's colour picture is bright, clean and crisp in this anamorphic 1.85:1 widescreen transfer, and the Dolby digital mono soundtrack is clear enough. The theatrical trailer will please the kitsch fans, as will the featurette "This Is Dynamation" produced at the same time as the first Sinbad movie. The real corker here though is the generously lengthy documentary "The Harryhausen Chronicles". Narrated by Leonard Nimoy, it features a stellar cast of devotees (George Lucas among them) waxing lyrical about the influence of Harryhausen's films, and allows the man himself to ramble fascinatingly over clips of his filmic canon. If you're a fan, it's Harryhausen heaven. --Paul Eisinger

• Carry On Loving | DVD | (07/07/2003) from £11.27   |  Saving you £1.72 (15.26%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Setting a Carry On film in a marriage bureau has a certain self-serving obviousness, so it's hardly surprising that Carry On Loving milks the idea for all it's worth. The Wedded Bliss Agency is of course a pretty dubious outfit, being run by Sid (James) and Sophie Bliss (Hattie Jacques), who together are the worst possible example for both marriage and their own profession: they constantly snipe at each other, they aren't actually married and their sophisticated computer matching system is in fact a complete fake. The remainder of the team are mostly cast as hapless clients, with predictable but often very funny situations arising from the various mismatches engineered by the agency, such as the inevitable misunderstanding over one client's interest in modelling. Yes, the humour is about as subtle as a flatulent elephant, but you can't help entering into the spirit of the thing. If there's an outstanding performance it has to be that of Imogen Hassall, who handles her transformation from round-shouldered frump to well-bred love goddess with considerable expertise and a genuine sense of fun. --Roger Thomas

• Carry On At Your Convenience | DVD | (27/08/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  In 1971 when Carry On at Your Convenience hit the screen, the series had long since become part of the fabric of British popular entertainment. Never mind the situation, the characters were essentially the same, film after film. The jokes were all as old as the hills, but nobody cared, they were still funny. But it's just too easy to treat them as a job lot of postcard humour and music hall innuendo. This tale of revolt at a sanitary ware factory--Boggs and Son, what else?--certainly chimed in with the state of the nation in the early 1970s when strikes were called at the drop of a hat. Here, tea urns, demarcation and the company's decision to branch out into bidets all wreak havoc. Kenneth Williams as the company's besieged managing director, Sidney James and Joan Sims give their all as usual, but it's the lesser roles that really add some lustre. Hattie Jacques as Sid's budgerigar-obsessed, sluggish put-upon wife and Renee Houston as a superbly domineering battleaxe with a penchant for strip poker remind us that in the hands of fine actors, even the laziest of caricatures becomes a real human being. On the DVD: Presented in 4:3 format with a good clean print and standard mono soundtrack, Carry On at Your Convenience feels as comfortable as an old pair of shoes. But where's the context? The lack of extras leaves the viewer wanting biographies and some documentary sense of the film's position in the series. The scene index is often arbitrary and the budget packaging means that we don't even get a full cast list. --Piers Ford

• Bullitt / Getaway / Cincinnati Kid / Tom Horn / Never So Few | DVD | (06/02/2006) from £42.90   |  Saving you £8.09 (18.86%)   |  RRP £50.99

  A celebration of the life and career of Steve McQueen with five of his classic movies. Bullitt SE (Dir. Peter Yates 1968): Special Edition (English - Dolby Digital (2.0) Stereo / 1.85:1 Widescreen / 1 hour and 49 minutes) In one of his most memorable roles Steve McQueen stars as Detective Frank Bullitt a hard-driving tough-as-nails San Francisco cop. Bullitt has just received what sounds like a routine assignment: keep a star witness out of sight and out of danger for 48

• 3 Classic Musicals Of The Silver Screen - Vol. 1 - Second Chorus / The Duke Is Tops / Private Buckaroo | DVD | (07/03/2005) from £4.03   |  Saving you £0.96 (19.20%)   |  RRP £4.99

  Second Chorus: Trumpet players Danny (Fred Astaire) and Hank (Burgess Meredith) have been avoiding graduation for seven years so that they can continue playing with their college band. They hire pretty Ellen Miller (Paulette Goddard) as the band's agent and as she quickly increases their earning power the boys find themselves with flourishing musical careers. Ellen is one day hired as Artie Shaw's band manager and makes plans for Danny and Hank to audition for Shaw. Both ho

• Cats And Dogs | DVD | (25/04/2005) from £5.90   |  Saving you £0.09 (1.53%)   |  RRP £5.99

  After years of international crime experience Bud Spencer is back in action battling crooks in this hilarious parody of all cops and robber films. Elaborate action stunts and nonsensical humor is the order of the day as Spencer is assigned the task of finding and arresting cat burglar Tomas Milian. When Tony Roma (Milian) seduces and rips-off a senator's wife Lieutenant Parker (Spencer) is sent to track him down. While escaping from the cops and then escaping from a bedroom Roma en

• Carry On Loving | DVD | (27/08/2001) from £7.93   |  Saving you £2.06 (25.98%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Setting a Carry On film in a marriage bureau has a certain self-serving obviousness, so it's hardly surprising that Carry On Loving milks the idea for all it's worth. The Wedded Bliss Agency is of course a pretty dubious outfit, being run by Sid (James) and Sophie Bliss (Hattie Jacques), who together are the worst possible argument both for marriage and for their own profession: they constantly snipe at each other, they aren't actually married and their sophisticated computer matching system is in fact a complete fake. The remainder of the team are mostly cast as hapless clients, with predictable but often very funny situations arising from the various mismatches engineered by the agency, such as the inevitable misunderstanding over one client's interest in modelling. Yes, the humour is about as subtle as a flatulent elephant, but you can't help entering into the spirit of the thing. If there's an outstanding performance it has to be that of Imogen Hassall, who handles her transformation from round-shouldered frump to well-bred love goddess with considerable expertise and a genuine sense of fun. On the DVD: The picture ratio is 4:3, and as is usual for this series the disc has no added features, which always seems like a terribly missed opportunity.--Roger Thomas

• Grizzly | Blu Ray | (18/05/2021) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Last Of The Mohicans, The / Daniel Boone | DVD | (25/08/2003) from £19.99   |  Saving you £-14.00 (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  James Fenimore Cooper's classic tale of the English Indian scout Hawkeye and his Mohican friends during the French and Indian War remains a favourite adventure.