"Actor: Kenneth Branagh"

• My Week with Marilyn | DVD | (16/03/2012) from £4.99   |  Saving you £15.00 (300.60%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Anyone doubting the layered, nuanced, and heartbreaking acting abilities of Michelle Williams will find My Week with Marilyn a tremendous revelation. And Williams fans will enjoy it even more. In My Week with Marilyn Williams takes on the formidable challenge of playing Marilyn Monroe, and does so with depth and assuredness, and without resorting to caricature. Williams's Marilyn commands the screen with pain and delicacy, and doesn't let go until the final credits. My Week with Marilyn focuses on a small time frame in Monroe's life, right after her marriage to Arthur Miller. Monroe, already "the world's most famous woman," still feels the need for validation as an actress. What better way to achieve that, she believes, than committing to co-starring with Laurence Olivier in The Prince and the Showgirl, a film she firmly believed would finally cement her reputation as a serious actress. My Week with Marilyn is based on the short memoir of Colin Clark, a crew member on The Prince and the Showgirl, who quickly became the confidant of the wildly insecure Monroe and watched a train wreck of egos--mostly Olivier's and Monroe's--collide in a fiery near-disaster. Kenneth Branagh gives an uncharacteristically restrained performance as the exasperated Olivier, resentful of the "new blood" in Hollywood that the young Monroe represents, and disdainful of her cult-like devotion to Method acting. (And of Monroe's chronic tardiness, which threatens to undermine the veddy, veddy strict British work schedule.) Eddie Redmayne plays Clark with a sweet, gentle veneer, someone who grows to care genuinely about the complex Monroe. Julia Ormond is clipped and proper as Olivier's then-wife, Vivien Leigh, and Emma Watson shows a lovely gravitas as Lucy, Monroe's acting coach. But it's Williams who gives the revelatory performance, capturing with painful intensity the insecurity that begins to seep out of Monroe like a fearful sweat. "Excuse my horrible face," she blurts out, while looking nothing less than her usual radiant self. Where does this tragic insecurity come from? My Week with Marilyn doesn't attempt to answer the unanswerable, but instead shines a light on the very real woman who became lost in the giant shadow of legend. --A.T. Hurley

• Walking with Dinosaurs Box Set (repack) | DVD | (26/08/2013) from £7.99   |  Saving you £5.00 (62.58%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Walking with DinosaursIn 1999 the BBC's Walking with Dinosaurs TV series changed the way we saw dinosaurs forever. This revolutionary show takes viewers right into the dinosaurs' world showing them as if they were alive and filmed in the wild. Since then the series has been seen by millions of people around the world and has won three Emmy awards. It brings to life the mystery and excitement of the age when these reptiles roamed our planet. The makers of Walking with Dinosaurs returned to make two specials The Ballad of Big Al and Land of Giants and The Giant Claw to continue to delight fans of the original series. Special Features: Enhanced Picture-in-Picture Sequences The Making of Walking with Dinosaurs The Ballad of Big AlYears ago an amazing fossil was unearthed in Wyoming USA. Not only were the bones they found those of a dinosaur 'Big Al' but the skeleton of this creature was very nearly complete. The first programme follows his life – a 15-year story of a lone battle against formidable prey and voracious predators whilst the second programme traces the scientific evidence of Big Al. Special Features: Photo Gallery Storyboard Comparison Land of Giants and The Giant ClawIn Land of Giants we join the adventuring zoologist Nigel Marven as he visits the Argentinean landscape of 100 million years ago to attempt to see the biggest land predator bring down the biggest land prey but will he succeed? In The Giant Claw Nigel travels back 75 million years to Mongolia to track down the owner of the largest claws ever discovered. Negotiating the hazards of the Cretaceous is no walk in the park - will he live to discover the true nature of his quarry? Special Features: Fact Files Interviews with Tim Haines Jasper James and Nigel Marven

• Fortunes Of War (Three Discs) (DVD) | DVD | (23/10/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £29.99

  The Balkans 1939. British professor Guy Pringle (Kenneth Branagh) arrives in Romania with his new bride Harriet (Emma Thompson) and becomes enmeshed in the politics of anti-fascism. Despite Harriet's serious misgivings Guy's social circle soon includes members of the British Secret Service who want to involve him in dangerous missions and a downtrodden prince who zeroes in on Guy's generous nature and winds up living with the Pringles. Thus the stage is set for this mesmerizing story of marriage tested by accidental betrayal callous insensitivity and a world in upheaval. Based upon the autobiographical novels of best-selling author Olivia Manning and set in places as far-flung as Bucharest Athens and Cairo Fortunes of War is majestic in both its scope and its vision.

• Henry V | DVD | (10/08/2015) from £5.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Very few first-time film directors would have been capable of making such a triumphant adaptation of Henry V; but a still-youthful Kenneth Branagh's years of stage experience paid off handsomely and his 1989 version qualifies as a genuine masterpiece, the kind of film that comes along once in a decade. He eschews the theatricality of Laurence Olivier's stirring, fondly remembered 1945 adaptation to establish his own rules: Branagh plays it down and dirty, seeing the Bard's play through revisionist eyes, framing it as an anti-war story in contrast to Olivier's patriotic spectacle. Branagh gives us harsh close-ups of muddied, bloody men, and of himself as Henry, his hardened mouth and wilful eyes revealing much about the personal cost of war. Not that the director-star doesn't provide lighter moments: his scenes introducing the French Princess Katherine (Emma Thompson) trying to learn English quickly from her maid are delightful. What may be the crowning glory of Branagh's adaptation comes when the dazed leader wanders across the battlefield, not even sure who has won. As King Hal carries a dead boy (a young Christian Bale) over the hacked bodies of both the English and French, a panorama of blood and mud and death greet the viewer as Branagh opens up the scene and Patrick Doyle's rousing hymn "Non nobis, Domine" provides marvellous counterpoint (like the director, the composer was another filmic first-timer). A more potent expression of the price of victory could scarcely be imagined. --Rochelle O'Gorman, Amazon.com

• Harry Potter: The Complete 8 Film Collection | Blu Ray | (25/07/2016) from £21.98   |  Saving you £17.00 (85.04%)   |  RRP £36.99

  The Complete 8-Film Collection (16-discs): Year 1: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - The magical adventure begins when Harry Potter is to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Year 2: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets - Cars fly, trees attack and a mysterious house-elf warns Harry of great danger as he returns for his second year. Year 3: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - Harry must confront soul-sucking Dementors, outsmart a werewolf and learn the truth about the escaped prisoner of Azkaban - Sirius Black. Year 4: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - Harry must overcome a deadly dragon, fierce water demons and an enchanted maze only to find himself in the cruel grasp of He Who Must Not Be Named. Year 5: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - When few believe that Lord Voldemort has returned, Harry must secretly train his friends for the wizarding war ahead. Year 6: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - As Lord Voldemort tightens his grip on both Muggle and wizarding worlds, Harry and Dumbledore work to find the key to unlock Voldemort's defenses. Year 7 - Part 1: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1 - Harry, Ron and Hermione set out to track down and destroy the secret to Voldemort's power - the Horcruxes. On their own and on the run, the three must rely on one another more than ever...but Dark Forces threaten to tear them apart. Year 7 - Part 2: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2 - In the epic finale, the battle between the good and evil forces of the wizarding world escalates into all-out war. The stakes have never been higher and no one is safe. But it is Harry who may be called upon to make the ultimate sacrifice as he draws closer to the climactic showdown with Lord Voldemort. It all ends here.

• Tenet | DVD | (14/12/2020) from £4.91   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Fighting for the survival of the entire world, the Protagonist journeys through a twilight world of international espionage on a mission that will unfold in something beyond real-time.

• Dunkirk | 4K UHD | (18/12/2017) from £19.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Dunkirk opens as hundreds of thousands of British and Allied troops are surrounded by enemy forces. Trapped on the beach with their backs to the sea, they face an impossible situation as the enemy closes in.

• The Wizarding World 9 Film Collection | Blu Ray | (27/11/2017) from £37.86   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  YEAR 1 Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone™: The magical adventure begins when Harry Potter is invited to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. YEAR 2 Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets™: Cars fly, trees attack and a mysterious house-elf warns Harry of great danger as he returns for his second year. YEAR 3 Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban™: Harry must confront soul-sucking Dementors, outsmart a werewolf and learn the truth about the escaped prisoner of Azkaban Sirius Black. YEAR 4 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire™: Harry must overcome a deadly dragon, fierce water demons and an enchanted maze only to find himself in the cruel grasp of He Who Must Not Be Named. YEAR 5 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix™: When few believe that Lord Voldemort has returned, Harry must secretly train his friends for the wizarding war ahead. YEAR 6 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince™: As Lord Voldemort tightens his grip on both Muggle and wizarding worlds, Harry and Dumbledore work to find the key to unlock Voldemort's defenses. YEAR 7 Part 1 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows™: Harry, Ron and Hermione set out to track down and destroy the secret to Voldemort's power the Horcruxes. The three must rely on one another more than ever...but Dark Forces threaten to tear them apart. YEAR 7 Part 2 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows™ Part 2: In the epic finale, the battle between the good and evil forces of the wizarding world escalates into an all-out war. The stakes have never been higher and no one is safe. But it is Harry who may be called upon to make the ultimate sacrifice as he draws closer to the climactic showdown with Lord Voldemort. It all ends here. Includes the complete 8-Part Documentary Series ˜Creating the World of Harry Potter'. Fantastic Beasts Something mysterious is leaving a path of destruction in the streets of 1926 New York, threatening to expose the wizarding community. Newt Scamander arrives in the city nearing the end of a global excursion to research and rescue magical creatures. When unsuspecting No-Maj Jacob Kowalski inadvertently lets some of Newt's beasts loose, a band of unlikely heroes must recover the missing beasts before they come to harm, but their mission puts them on a collision course with Dark forces. Extras: Fantastic Beasts - Over an Hour of Expansive, Multipart Featurettes - Meet the fantastic characters and beasts and learn their stories, then immerse yourself in MACUSA, Newt's case and more of the film's locations. Harry Potter: A New Era of Magic Begins! - Deleted Scenes

• Mary Shelley's Frankenstein | DVD | (14/09/1998) from £6.51   |  Saving you £13.48 (207.07%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Let's be honest: this should be titled Wretched Excess' Frankenstein. Swooping, wild, bloody, and energetic, this is bad moviemaking from the best, which makes it all the more loveable. Kenneth Branagh plays Victor Frankenstein, a man so obsessed with conquering death that he decides to create life. What he gets, after a protoplasmic mud wrestle, is a Mean Streets monster (Robert De Niro) that isn't particularly happy to be back from the dead or thrilled about all the stitches. Helena Bonham Carter may, at several points in this film, actually be channelling Ramtha. The supporting cast couldn't be peopled with better performers (Tom Hulce, John Cleese, Ian Holm) but they all look like they're ringside at some Ultimate Fighting competition. A must for any midnight movie collector for the shock factor alone. A hoot. --Keith Simanton

• Rabbit-Proof-Fence | DVD | (09/05/2011) from £10.78   |  Saving you £9.21 (85.44%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Molly Daisy and Gracie are all born of an Aboriginal mother and a white father. Forcibly removed from their family by the Australian government the girls are taken 1 500 miles to a severe Anglican education camp. There they are trained as domestic servants in order to be 'assimilated' into white society. Molly Craig the oldest of the three leads her younger sister and cousin in a daring escape back to their home and family. The film follows the trio on an epic journey across the breathtaking Australian Outback. A government built rabbit proof fence that stretches from the north to the south of Australia ironically provides the girls with something that they can follow all the way home away from the cruelty of their oppressors.

• Dunkirk | Blu Ray | (18/12/2017) from £22.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Dunkirk opens as hundreds of thousands of British and Allied troops are surrounded by enemy forces. Trapped on the beach with their backs to the sea, they face an impossible situation as the enemy closes in.

• Tenet | Blu Ray | (14/12/2020) from £20.69   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Fighting for the survival of the entire world, the Protagonist journeys through a twilight world of international espionage on a mission that will unfold in something beyond real-time. Special Features: LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET - An exploration of the development and production of the film as told by the cast and crew. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: I. THE PRINCIPLE OF BELIEF - Christopher Nolan talks about why he wanted to make this film and the twists he wanted to bring to the spy genre. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: II. MOBILIZING THE TROUPE - The filmmakers to talk about casting and what the actors brought to their roles. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: III. THE APPROACH - The company discusses how Nolan's filmmaking philosophies and in-camera approach applied to the challenges in this film. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: IV. THE PROVING WINDOW - A look at the cinematography and the unique ways they shot the movie. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: V. THE ROADMAP - Examining the ways the cast and crew kept track of the continuity across multiple perspectives and timelines. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: VI. ENTROPY IN ACTION - Breaking down the complex action in the film and the stunt requirements for the actors. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: VII. TRAVERSING THE GLOBE - Exploring the logistics of travelling and shooting in real locations as well as capturing the epic marine sequences in different countries around the world. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: VIII. HOW BIG A PLANE? - The story of the dramatic crashing of a real 747. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: IX. THE DRESS CODE - Costume Designer Jeffrey Kurland takes us through some of the iconic costumes from the film. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: X. CONSTRUCTING THE TWILIGHT WORLD - A look at the practical sets designed and built by Nathan Crowley's team and the techniques they used to enhance the scope and scale of the film. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: XI. THE FINAL BATTLE - Inside the epic sequence which had the cast and crew using everything that they had learned on the film to pull it off. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: XII. COHESION - Nolan discusses his approach of involving the composer and the editor early on in the pre-production and all the way through the completion of the film to truly integrate them into the creative process. LOOKING AT THE WORLD IN A NEW WAY: THE MAKING OF TENET: XIII. DOESN'T US BEING HERE NOW MEAN IT NEVER HAPPENED? - The cast and crew discuss the unique experience of working on the film.

• Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets | DVD | (15/06/2009) from £5.35   |  Saving you £2.64 (49.35%)   |  RRP £7.99

  The latest instalment in the Harry Potter series finds young wizard Harry and his friends Ron and Hermoine facing new challenges during their second year at Hogwarts as they try to uncover a dark force that is terrorising the school.

• Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit | Blu Ray | (02/06/2014) from £7.99   |  Saving you £19.00 (237.80%)   |  RRP £26.99

  Jack Ryan as a young covert CIA analyst uncovers a Russian plot to crash the U.S. economy with a terrorist attack.

• Peter's Friends | DVD | (26/11/2001) from £4.99   |  Saving you £8.00 (160.32%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Ten years after leaving university Peter and his best friends reunite for a New Year's party to end all parties. Having weathered most of life's triumphs and disasters there doesn't seem to be much left to shock them - but Peter has a special surprise that will test their friendship to the utmost. A wonderfully wicked comedy about life love and other natural disasters.

• Conspiracy | DVD | (15/09/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £13.99

  Based on the only surviving record of the infamous 1942 Wannsee Conference, the BBC/HBO produced Conspiracy reconstructs the two-hour meeting during which leading members of the SS and the Nazi government made definitive plans for the genocide of Europe's Jews. Sixteen men sit around a table and politely discuss the mechanics and ramifications of murdering millions. As SS General Reinhard Heydrich, overall architect of the Final Solution, Kenneth Branagh is brilliant, charming, manipulative and threatening, a cultured man seemingly without a soul. As his aid, SS Colonel Adolf Eichmann, Stanley Tucci is the incarnation of the banality of evil, an efficient and self-effacing bureaucrat in a fine performance marred only by a hint of the actor's American accent. Colin Firth is a powerful foil for Branagh as Dr Wilhelm Stuckart, author of Nazi Germany's race laws and a stickler for the rule of law, no matter how insane the law may have become; while David Threlfall makes a striking impression as the one man who comes closest to taking a moral stand, Dr Wilhelm Kritzinger. Directed in an elegantly controlled style by Frank Pierson, Conspiracy is the Janus face of the 1957 classic 12 Angry Men and a chilling companion to the BBC/HBO Churchill drama The Gathering Storm (2002). On the DVD: Conspiracy comes to DVD with text profiles of the four leading actors and the director and two featurettes, one running two minutes, the other four, neither of which is any more than an electronic press-kit. Sound is clear, perfectly good Dolby Surround, while the picture, though anamorphically enhanced at 16:9, is no more than adequate. --Gary S Dalkin

• Wallander - The Complete Collection | DVD | (04/07/2016) from £28.89   |  Saving you £21.10 (73.04%)   |  RRP £49.99

  All 12 feature-length episodes from the first four series of the BBC crime drama starring Kenneth Branagh as the Swedish detective. Inspector Kurt Wallander (Branagh) and his team at Ystad police station investigate a number of violent and terrifying murders in the beautiful setting of Skane County, Southern Sweden. Series 1 episodes are: 'Sidetracked', 'Firewall' and 'One Step Behind'. Series 2 episodes are: 'Faceless Killers', 'The Man Who Smiled' and 'The Fifth Woman'. Series 3 episodes are: 'An Event in Autumn', 'The Dogs of Riga' and 'Before the Frost'. Series 4 episodes are: 'The White Lioness', 'A Lesson in Love' and 'The Troubled Man'.

• The First World War In Colour | DVD | (01/09/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £14.99

  World War I in Colour is a Channel 5 documentary (6 x 50-minute episodes) made with the cooperation of the Imperial War Museum, designed to make the Great War come alive for a 21st-century audience. The events of 1914-18 are authoritatively narrated by Kenneth Branagh, who presents the military and political overview, while interviews with historians add different perspectives. The human cost is conveyed by moving interviews with the now very elderly survivors, and by extracts from letters and memoirs. All aspects of the war, on land, sea and air are covered in separate programmes. In theory the series continues the heritage of ITV's The Second World War in Colour (1999) and Britain at War in Colour (2000), and with 75 per cent of the material never shown on television before there is every reason to watch. The crucial difference between this and the WWII programmes is that the Great War wasn't filmed in colour, and the footage has been computer colourised. The programme-makers argue the conflict itself was in colour--but however realistic the digital processing, it still feels inauthentic and historically a distortion. Worse still is their destroying the original compositions by cropping the top and bottom of the material to fit widescreen TVs. The result is a potentially excellent series badly presented, best watched with the colour turned off. Even then it cannot compete with the BBC's 26-part The Great War (1964), still one of the finest documentaries ever made. On the DVD: World War I in Colour is presented on two discs with three episodes on each disc. The modern interview clips look and sound immaculate, while the historical footage varies from very poor to quite good. Even so, the picture resolution is not helped by discarding a third of the original images and stretching what remains to widescreen. The budget spent on colourisation would have been better used to restore the often very scratchy black-and-white film, and to pay for an orchestra to rerecord the score, which is realised with a clichéd palette of preset electronic samples. Both DVDs reproduce the same general background facts, timeline and 20 biographies as static text screens. Disc One has a 15-minute behind-the-scenes feature in which producer Philip Nugus and director Jonathan Martin justify the colourisation. Disc Two offers Tactics & Strategy, which at 52 minutes amounts to a whole seventh programme, mixing archive footage with new computer graphics to illustrate in detail 13 specific aspects of the conflict. Presented in 4:3 ratio this is the most creative, original and rewarding part of the entire package. --Gary S Dalkin

• Walking with Dinosaurs (repack) | DVD | (26/08/2013) from £5.49   |  Saving you £0.50 (9.11%)   |  RRP £5.99

  In 1999 the BBC's Walking with Dinosaurs TV series changed the way we saw dinosaurs forever. This revolutionary show takes viewers right into the dinosaurs' world showing them as if they were alive and filmed in the wild. It covered an amazing 155 million years of prehistory with the most cutting-edge technology ever seen on television. Since then the series has been seen by millions of people around the world and has won three Emmy awards. Watch insectivorous pterosaurs chase moths in the hot evening air and see bull triceratops lock horns over a young female - Walking with Dinosaurs makes this distant world as real and natural as images from today's Serengeti. Tracing the 160 million-year history of dinosaurs from their first appearance to their abrupt demise this series marked a watershed in television imagery. Walking With Dinosaurs brings to life the mystery and excitement of the age when these reptiles roamed our planet.

• Death on the Nile Blu-ray | Blu Ray | (13/04/2022) from £6.59   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Although Belgium's premiere sleuth Hercule Poirot (Kenneth Branagh) plans a spectacular Egyptian vacation aboard a glamorous river steamer, the trip turns into a terrifying search for a murderer after a picture-perfect couple's honeymoon is cut tragically short. Set against a sweeping landscape of pyramids and desert vistas, DEATH ON THE NILE features a stunning ensemble cast. Based on Agatha Christie's beloved novel, this tale of unbridled passion and jealousy is filled with wicked twists and turns that will have you guessing until the shocking finale. Product Features Death on the Nile: Novel to Film Agatha Christie: Travel Can Be Murder Design on the Nile Branagh/Poirot Deleted Scenes x 8 Official Trailer