"Actor: Mervyn Johns"

• Never Let Go | DVD | (07/10/2002) from £11.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Remembered dimly as Peter Sellers' only venture into "serious" acting, Never Let Go has a lot of other things to recommend it, mostly because it manages to include a lot of the lurid elements that gained it an X certificate in 1960. It has a near-demented melodrama plot, as two desperate obsessives collide in a bizarre feud. Richard Todd, doing meek and put-upon, is a sales rep for smug Peter Jones' cosmetics firm whose life is turned upside-down when his Ford Anglia, bought on hire purchase and uninsured, is stolen by teddy boy Adam Faith. Looking like an inhabitant of Royston Vasey in The League of Gentlemen, Sellers plays a grinning, jumped-up spiv who runs a legitimate garage which is a front for the car thieves and is sugar daddy to teenage tartlet Carol White. Typical of Sellers' demonic rottenness is a scene in which he breaks down-and-out Melvyn Johns' heart by stamping on his beloved terrapin. "Peanut" Todd's crusade to get back his motor (catchphrase "what about my car?") brings trouble too: he gets repeatedly beaten up, abandoned by his wife (Elizabeth Sellars) and dragged to the edge of madness for a final punch-up in a garage. With a delightfully sleazy, jazzy John Barry score, lots of local colour in the caffs and gaffs of criminal London circa 1960 and a parade of welcome character actors (John le Mesurier, David Lodge, Noel Willman, Nigel Stock), this has its soapy spells, but it's a fascinating relic. On the DVD: Never Let Go's menu plays under Faith's theme song ("When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again--Oh Yeah Oh Yeah!"). The print is slightly letterboxed but looks a few generations away from the master with some careless transfer work that greys shadows and overexposes some scenes. --Kim Newman

• Pink String And Sealing Wax | Blu Ray | (21/03/2016) from £11.00   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  In 1890's Brighton the young son of a puritanical chemist longs to escape the repressive environment of his family life and the overbearing restraints of his cruel, pious father. Eventually finding refuge in a local tavern he is immediately attracted to the sordid glamour of the drinking classes and the gritty world that they inhabit. He also finds himself becoming infatuated with the tavern's landlady, which will inadvertently lead to him being drawn into a plot to kill her abusive husband. Directed by Robert Hamer (Kind Hearts And Coronets, School For Scoundrels), Pink String And Sealing Wax stars Googie Withers (The Lady Vanishes), Mervyn Johns (Dead Of Night) and Gordon Jackson (Whisky Galore, The Quatermass Experiment) in a film that cleverly entwines the dynamics of a thriller with biting social commentary and a multi-layered plot structure that contrasts the parallels of the British class system.

• The Captive Heart | DVD | (01/10/2007) from £10.78   |  Saving you £2.21 (20.50%)   |  RRP £12.99

  In 1940 a concentration-camp escapee assumes the identity of a dead British officer only to become a prisoner of war.

• Valley Of Songs | DVD | (18/02/2013) from £9.99   |  Saving you £6.00 (60.06%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Cliff Gordon's celebrated play Choir Practice is brought vividly to life in fifties British comedy classic Valley of Song. Directed by Gilbert Gunn (Operation Bullshine, Girls At Sea), it stars some of British cinema's most beloved stars including Mervyn Johns (Scrooge), Clifford Evans (Curse of The Werewolf), and Maureen Swanson (A Town like Alice). Valley of Song tells the story of hapless small town boy Geraint Llewellyn. Having spent five years in London, Geraint returns to the quaint Welsh village where he grew up to fulfil the role of choirmaster within the local church. Having chosen Handel's Messiah for the choir's showcase piece, he inadvertently causes fierce rivalries to surface when trying to pick a soloist. The consequences of which are hilariously catastrophic and begin to affect the entire village. This choir may have the voices of angels, but they certainly don't have the patience to match. There are two young people who genuinely suffer through this state of affairs: Cliff and Olwen. They are in love but the feud threatens to tear them apart.

• Scrooge - A Christmas Carol In Colour! | DVD | (05/11/2012) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Classic British version of Charles Dickens's Christmas tale, starring Alastair Sim. on Christmas eve, a tight-fisted businessman is visited by three ghosts who remind him of the true spirit of Christmas.

• Ealing Classics DVD Collection - Went The Day Well?/Dead Of Night/Nicholas Nickleby/Scott of the Antarctic | DVD | (08/09/2003) from £28.56   |  Saving you £6.43 (22.51%)   |  RRP £34.99

  While horror conventions may change from generation to generation, there are ideas that will scare us no matter what time period we inhabit. Dead of Night is a classic horror anthology that effectively plays on those timeless fears. Mervyn Johns stars as a man who has been summoned to a house with a group of strangers he has never met but has seen in his dreams. As they convene, he predicts certain events will happen as they do in his dreams and when they do, the other guests relate their own experiences with the supernatural, including tales of a possessed mirror, a sinister ventriloquist's dummy and an eerie premonition of death. Throughout the group meeting, the protagonist fears something horrible will happen to him and we are left to wonder what it might be. The film's final, revelatory sequence offers an unexpectedly horrific surprise. It may have been made in 1945 but Dead of Night is still spooky. --Bryan Reesman

• Pink String And Sealing Wax | DVD | (12/05/2008) from £4.98   |  Saving you £8.01 (160.84%)   |  RRP £12.99

  A drunken abusive tavern-keeper's adulterous wife uses the backward son of a rigid puritanical pharmacist who makes his entire family miserable.

• Next Of Kin | DVD | (10/04/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  A collection of four important wartime films. Released by the famed Ealing Studios in 1942 The Next of Kin graphically illustrated the disastrous effect of careless talk on the Home Front and how it almost wrecks a daring British commando raid. Churchill personally wanted to see it banned! The New Lot follows the adventures of raw army recruits in 1943 while 1945s Read All About It was an Army Bureau of Current Affairs film dramatising a discussion withthe ex-editor of a newspaper ab

• The Avengers: The Definitive Dossier 1966 Vol. 1 | DVD | (15/07/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £24.99

  Swingingly stylish adventures with super spies John Steed and Mrs Peel! Flashback to the Sixties with the coolest duo in crimefighting! Episodes: Too Many Christmas Trees: Steed hangs up his stocking and Emma asks for more... Silent Dust: Steed watches birds and Emma goes hunting. The Girl From Auntie: Steed almost outbids himself and Emma is a bird in a gilded cage. The Thirteenth Hole: Steed finds a bogey and Emma gets a birdy. The Quick-Quick Slow Death: Steed has two left feet and Emma dances with danger. The Danger Makers: Steed joins a secret society and Emma walks the plank. The House That Jack Built: Steed takes a wrong turning and Emma holds the key to it all.

• The Day Of The Triffids | DVD | (02/04/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  All reports confirm that the world is witnessing an unprecedented shower of meteorites - a once in a lifetime spectacle that must be seen.' Bill Masen lies in his hospital bed and listens to the radio broadcast in frustration - the bandages on his eyes are not meant to be removed until the following morning. When the time comes he is relieved to find he can see perfectly. But is soon to discover that he is one of the few people left in the world that can. The previous night's light show has blinded all those who watched. With the meteorites have come the spores of a man-eating alien plant form - Triffidus Celestus. Multiplying quickly they uproot themselves in search of a prey that stumbles helplessly in the dark. The fate of the world is in the hands of a few as the Triffids threaten the future of mankind in this classic adaptation of John Wyndham's sci-fi chiller.

• Black Beauty - Series 2 - Complete | DVD | (14/04/2008) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £29.99

  This four-disc set contains all 26 episodes from the second series of The Adventures of Black Beauty. Dr. Gordon takes a young urchin called Ned under his wing. Although he sees many admirable qualities in the young boy it's not long before Ned comes into conflict with the new Squire when he becomes the prime suspect in a burglary on the estate. Back at home Jenny also gets into the Squire's bad books when she and Beauty disrupt his foxhunt...

• The Will Hay Collection | DVD | (20/11/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £59.99

  A collection of Will Hay films. Includes: 1. The Black Sheep of Whitehall (1942) 2. Dandy Dick (1935) 3. The Ghost of St Michaels (1941) 4. The Goost Steps Out (1942) 5. My Learned Friend (1943) 6. Radio Parade of 1935 (1934) 7. Those Were the Days (1934) 8. Oh Mr Porter (1937) 9. Convict 99 (1938) 10. Windbag The Saiilor (1936) 11. Ask A Policeman (1938) 12. Boys Will Be Boys (1935) 13. Old Bones of the River (1938) 14. Where There's a Will (1936) 15. Good Morning Boys (1937) 16. Hey! Hey! USA! (1938)

• Scrooge | DVD | (02/11/2015) from £40.48   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Scrooge | DVD | (10/11/2008) from £39.98   |  Saving you £-19.99 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Digitally re-mastered Alastair Sim's Scrooge is the all time favourite Christmas family film and a genuine classic of British cinema. Scrooge is the definitive big screen adaptation of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol one of the world's best loved Christmas stories.

• The Halfway House | DVD | (25/11/2019) from £7.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  A group of travellers, all with something to hide in their past, take shelter from a storm in an old inn. The inn-keeper seems a little mysterious...

• The Devil's Disciple | Blu Ray | (24/11/2015) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A