William (Martin Clunes) likes Mary. Mary (Julie Graham) likes William. However the trials and tribulations of everyday life not least William's unusual job as an undertaker means that the path of love is destined not to run smooth...
Made in Munich while Bergman was in self-imposed exile from Sweden, From the Life of the Marionettes is not so much a "whodunit" as a "whydunnit". The film opens with the shockingly violent and senseless murder of a prostitute by Peter, a young, successful businessman. Through a series of non-chronological flashbacks to a time before the crime, we attempt to fathom just what impelled Peter to perpetrate this terrible murder. Along with wife Katarina, the character Peter also featured in Bergman's 1973 film Scenes from a Marriage. Here, as there, we see that they are wedded in the sense of being emotionally chained to each other, yet hating each other for their mutual dependency. There is also a perturbing scene in which they both appear to "get off" when he takes a knife to her throat. His cold and duplicitous psychiatrist glibly ascribes the murder to a repressed homosexuality resulting in a violent outburst, while Katarina's business partner, who is gay, appears to harbour a desire to sabotage the pair's marriage. This film has an airless, fake-lit quality about it, which reflects the conditions of the characters' lives but by the end, leaves you mesmerised and still uncertain as to why what happened has happened. A late but great Bergman work. On the DVD: This edition adequately enhances the stark monochrome in which most of the film is set. Bergman's notes reveal that his depictions of Peter in his psychiatric ward were based on his own behaviour during a recent spell in a similar institution following his arrest for tax evasion. Philip Strick's critical notes observe that the sparing use of colour at the beginning and end of the film signify what may have been the only times in Peter's life when he "experienced reality". --David Stubbs
The second series of The West Wing, Aaron Sorkin's relentlessly erudite drama about life behind the scenes at the White House, continues here with the emphasis on President Bartlet's multiple sclerosis, a condition that he has hitherto concealed from the American electorate and most of his staff. Tensions grow between himself and the First Lady (Stockard Channing) as she realises, in the episode "Third State of the Union" that he intends to run for a second term in office. It becomes clear to Bartlet (Martin Sheen) that he must go public with his MS, and his staff are forced to come to terms with this, as well as deal with the usual plethora of domestic and international incidents, which apparently preclude any of them from having any sort of private lives, least of all love lives. These include crises in Haiti and Columbia, an obstinate filibuster and a Surgeon General's excessively frank remarks about the drugs situation. Thankfully, the splendid Lord John Marbury (Roger Rees) is on hand to make chief of staff Leo McGarry's life more of a misery in "The Drop-In". These episodes, though occasionally marred by a sentimental soundtrack and an earnest and wishfully high regard for the Presidential office, are masterclasses in drama and dialogue, ranging from the wittily staccato to the magnificently grave, capturing authentically the hectic pace of political intrigue and the often vain efforts of decent, brilliant people to do the right thing. "Two Cathedrals", which features flashbacks to Bartlet's schooldays and his thunderous denunciation of God following a funeral, is perhaps the greatest West Wing episode of all. On the DVD: The West Wing, Series 2 Part 2 features no extras, though the transfer is immaculate. --David Stubbs
When two trash-picking boys from Rio’s slums find a wallet in amongst the daily detritus of their local dump little do they imagine that their lives are about to change forever. But when the local police show up offering a handsome reward for the wallet’s return the boys realise that what they’ve found must be important. Based on Andy Mulligan’s best-selling novel Rooney Mara Martin Sheen Wagner Moura and Selton Mello star in this thrilling adventure directed by Stephen Daldry and written by Richard Curtis.
A World War II double-bill comes to DVD with the pairing of The Young Lions (1958) and D-Day the Sixth of June (1956). Edward Dmytryk's The Young Lions is one of the most thoughtful films about the War. Based on a novel by Irwin Shaw, it tells parallel stories of two American soldiers (Montgomery Clift and Dean Martin) and one German officer (Marlon Brando), whose war experiences we follow until they intersect outside a concentration camp. Martin plays what he calls "a likable coward", Clift is intense as a Jewish GI, and Brando experiments with the limits of his part as a Nazi re-evaluating his beliefs. Legend has it that Clift accused Brando of bleeding-heart excessiveness. Interestingly, the two Method actors share no scenes together. --Tom Keogh D-Day the Sixth of June is a misleading title for a very tame wartime romance with barely 10 minutes of combat in the last reel. What we mostly get is a year's worth of flashbacks depicting the reluctant, London-based affair of a married US staff officer (Robert Taylor) and a British Red Cross worker (Dana Wynter) whose commando suitor (Richard Todd) is fighting in Africa. To be sure, the emotional desperation and embattled decency of good people in time of war is as worthy of film treatment as any military campaign, and the script works pre-invasion Anglo-American tensions into the story. But the CinemaScope production is utterly formulaic, with leaden direction by Henry Koster. Wynter's porcelain beauty apparently didn't permit changes of expression, and Taylor looks about 15 years past his prime. --Richard T Jameson
Actor Kiefer Sutherland makes his directorial debut with Truth or Consequences NM, a ho-hum film about a threadbare subject: a drug heist that goes badly, resulting in the bad guys having to kidnap two people and the ensuing complications. A fine cast assures good performances all around, but it's hard to go down this narrative road for the umpteenth time in the 90s. One bonus is the presence of Kim Dickens, an interesting actress who started becoming more visible in films in 1997 and 1998 (Zero Effect, Great Expectations). The DVD release has optional full-screen and widescreen presentations, optional French and Spanish soundtracks and subtitles, and theatrical trailer. --Tom Keogh, Amazon.com
Lyle Mollencamp is an alcoholic. His wife Joyce struggles to cover their family's distress. When Lyle's drinking costs him his job and spoils his son Brian's birthday. The confrontation between father and son is so explosive that Lyle must deal with his problem. Will he succeed? Or remain in a home of shattered spirits?
West of the Pecos (1945): Robert Mitchum stars in this well plotted exciting Zane Grey Western. Thurston Hall and his daughter Barbara Hale are accosted by robbers en route to their Texas ranch from Chicago. This is only the start of their troubles as they encounter hold-ups horse stampedes and outlaws. Hiring Robert Mitchum and his sidekick to run their ranch leads to further problems because of Mitchum's checkered past. Plot twists and Suspense highlight this old west cla
The living nightmare of the Lutz family. They got out alive! but another family wasn't as lucky. They lived at 112 Ocean Avenue Amityville before the luckless Lutz family and what is the real history of this desirable family residence? In a sequel to the original film ""The Amityville Horror"" which tells the true story of the Lutz family's chilling supernatural encounter ""Amityville: The Possession"" dramatises other terrifying events which took place at the same house. Not f
Smile? In 1966, the legendary abandoned Beach Boys' album and "teenage symphony to God" left its visionary, Brian Wilson, with the devil to pay. Disc One of this double DVD set offers David Leaf's glorious documentary "Beautiful Dreamer", interviewing all those involved with the project's development (save, bizarrely, any of the surviving Beach Boys, least of all Smile's most trenchant naysayer Mike Love) and charting Brian Wilson's ascendancy to the cusp of creative immortality and subsequent crash-and-burn to a bedridden, burnt-out recluse. In the South Pole-style "production race" with The Beatles for popular music's brave new frontier (a contest more self-justificatingly important to Wilson than to Lennon/McCartney) it was to be The Beatles who planted the flag and Wilson who perished in the snow; Smile was to be Brian Wilson's nemesis. The albums' eventual completion and re-recording (hats off to Brian Wilson's musical sidekicks The Wondermints) in 2003 was the happiest and unlikeliest conclusion to pop music's most fascinating and infuriating chapter. The entire live performance of Smile in Los Angeles - beautifully filmed on Disc 2 - is a fitting happy ending. The work - especially the waxing and waning chorales of the "Child Is Father Of The Man" section - is a marvel; beautiful, bold, coherent and deft enough to leave the myth - the great "what if?" of 20th Century music history - intact. --Kevin Maidment
Jurassic Park (Dir. Steven Spielberg 1993): Director Steven Spielberg presents a masterpiece of imagination suspense science and cinematic magic that quickly became one the most successful film in worldwide box-office history. On a remote island a wealthy entrepreneur (Richard Attenborough) secretly creates a theme park featuring live dinosaurs drawn from prehistoric D.N.A. Before opening it to the public he invites a top palaeontologist (Sam Neill) and his paleobotanist girl friend (Laura Dern) a renowned mathematician (Jeff Goldblum) and his two eager grandchildren to experience the park - and help calm anxious investors. But their visit is anything but tranquil as the prehistoric predators break out and begin stalking the island's human inhabitants. Based on Michael Crichton's best-selling novel Jurassic Park is a breathtaking adventure you'll want to experience again and again... The Lost World (Dir. Steven Spielberg 1997): Director Steven Spielberg takes us back to the scene of Jurassic Park in The Lost World the blockbuster sequel with even more dinosaurs more action and more breathtaking visual effects than its record-breaking predecessor. This DVD edition contains exclusive interviews and rare behind-the-scenes footage. The Lost World remains among the most successful films of all time and features an all-star cast including Jeff Goldblum Julianne Moore and Pete Postlethwaite. It has been four years since the disaster at Jurassic Park and two groups are in a race against time that will determine the fate of the remote island's prehistoric inhabitants. Jurassic Park 3 (Dir. Joe Johnston 2001): Adventure runs wild when renowned palaeontologist Dr. Alan Grant (Sam Neill) agrees to accompany a wealthy adventurer (William H. Macy) and his wife (Tea Leoni) on an aerial tour of Isla Sorna InGen's former breeding ground for prehistoric creatures. But when they're terrifyingly stranded Dr. Grant discovers that his hosts are not what they seem and the island's native inhabitants are smarter faster and fiercer than he ever imagined in this heart-stomping thriller.
Iliac is a twenty-year-old masseur in a massage parlor that caters to a gay clientele. In here sex is an immediate consequence of massage. Outside the parlor his current girlfriend a bar girl who works in Japan asserts her sexual dominion over him. Back home his estranged father dies and as he makes the trip to the province he is faced with the reality of decay love life and survival - all within the context of the performance of duty.
Academy Award nominee Don Cheadle portrays the one and only Ralph Waldo "Petey" Greene Jr. in "Talk To Me". Petey's story is funny, dramatic, inspiring - and real.
On a small island off the California coast it's July 4th and tourists are washing up dead in Babylon Bay... Aquanoids is a sea creature horror film that delivers a healthy dose of horror combined with a sexy star breathtaking scenery extensive underwater photography state of the art creature effects and a fast paced story with enough action to make anyone have to come up for air....
More episodes from the cult television series starring Lewis Collins Martin Shaw and Gordon Jackson. Episodes include: 'The Purging of CI5' 'Backtrack' 'Stopover' 'Dead Reckoning' 'The Madness of Mickey Hamilton' 'A Hiding to Nothing' 'Runner' 'Servant of Two Masters'.
In the early days of criminal investigation before guilt and innocence were determined by forensic science there was a detective “a man of mystery” with an uncanny ability to read the human character and an unswerving instinct for the truth. In Victorian England justice depended onThe Suspicions of Mr Whicher. Beyond the Pale Whicher is hired by his one-time political master the former Home Secretary Sir Edward Shore to investigate violent threats made against his son who has recently returned from India with his young family. Sir Edward is desperate to avoid a damaging scandal and even after a murder refuses to let Whicher involve his former colleagues in the Metropolitan Police. Whicher’s quest for justice takes him into the most dangerous corners of London’s docks and to the exposure of a terrible crime and brings him into contact with a woman who touches his heart. The Ties That Bind Commissioned by a wealthy west-country landowner Sir Henry Coverley private inquiry agent Jack Whicher reluctantly takes on a divorce case following Sir Henry’s young wife as she meets her lover for a romantic assignation in London. But one of the key witnesses mysteriously fails to attend the divorce court and an apparently simple case of adultery spirals into something darker which leads Whicher into the heart of the English countryside and to the uncovering of the most disturbing and destructive of secrets.
A summer spent at music camp is all about fun, friends, and making music together, and Mitchie (Demi Lovato) can't wait to return to Camp Rock to see her friends (Alyson Stoner, Meaghan Martin) and spend some quality time with Shane (Joe Jonas). Unfortunately, greed, rivalry, and the relentless pursuit of perfection threaten to sour the whole Camp Rock experience when the new Camp Star across the water lures many of the Camp Rock campers and counselors away. The new enterprise promises industry exposure and higher pay and then challenges Camp Rock to a high-stakes final jam challenge that threatens to put the camp out of business. Mitchie rises to the challenge and takes on a huge leadership role, finding replacement counselors and working to create a winning show for the final jam, but the pressure to win affects everyone's camp experience, making it less about fun and the enjoyment of music and more about winning the competition. It also leaves Mitchie and Shane with virtually no time to spend together. Camp Rock 2 has an abundance of good, memorable songs presented with lots of energetic choreography. The characters are generally more likable and believable than they were in the original Camp Rock, but the plot could be more engaging: while viewers will certainly root for Mitchie and the camp to succeed, neither Mitchie nor this film's new characters (Chloe Bridges, Matthew "Mdot" Finley) inspire a particularly overwhelming emotional investment. Nonetheless, tweens and teens will love Camp Rock 2--they'll watch it repeatedly, memorize the words with the help of the rock-along special feature, and probably learn a few new dance moves. (Ages 7 and older) --Tami Horiuchi
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