"Actor: Norman"

• Blake's 7 - Series 1 | DVD | (01/03/2004) from £17.75   |  Saving you £32.24 (181.63%)   |  RRP £49.99

  Blake's 7 was the hit BBC space opera launched in the wake of Star Wars, though with a grittier sensibility and produced on a fraction of the budget. Over 13 episodes the first series introduced freedom-fighter Blake (Gareth Thomas) as he escaped from the Orwellian Federation, gathered a crew of low-life rebels, salvaged an alien starship called the Liberator, and began striking back against the forces of Supreme Commander Servalan (sultry Jacqueline Pearce). The effects were cheap, and alien planets were represented by a disused quarry or an industrial complex, but the strong characters and cynical storylines created by Doctor Who veteran Terry Nation remain involving. The perfect foil for Blake was Paul Darrow's Avon, a near psychopathic criminal mastermind who only fought to save his skin. The cowardly Vila (Michael Keating) was almost as memorable, while the female leads were Jenna (Sally Knyvette), a smuggler and pilot, and determined Auron telepath Cally (Jan Chappell). Also on board was Gan (David Jackson), inhibited from violence by a brain implant. With even the good guys being criminals, including murderers, this was a galaxy far, far away from previous screen space opera. Though undeniably dated, the show is still vintage TV SF, right from the opening three-parter "The Way Back / Spacefall / Cygnus Alpha" to the cliff-hanging shocker "Orac", which introduces the final member of the un-magnificent seven. On the DVD: Blake's 7, Series 1 presents the 13 episodes across five DVDs so as to maximise picture quality. Following the BBC's Doctor Who DVDs the 4:3 images are as strong as one could expect from a 1970s TV show shot partly on video (interiors) and 16 mm film (exteriors). Film shots have some grain and vary considerably in quality while the video material shows occasional minor tearing and flaws in the tape. Otherwise these are as good as Blake's 7 is ever going to look. The same is true of the mono sound, which is clear and undistorted. Each DVD is introduced with a CGI reincarnation of the series' famous logo and three episodes are offered with a commentary. These are "Spacefall" (Sally Knyvette, Michael Keating and producer David Maloney), "Seek-Locate-Destroy" (Keating, Jacqueline Pearce and Stephen Greif) and "Project Avalon" (Knyvette, Pearce and Greif). The chat ranges from high-school reunion playfulness, including singing the title music, to some more serious insights into making the show, to an amusing running debate as to whether Glynis Barber appears in "Project Avalon". Other extras are "2 out takes, a missing scene, 1 robot, 2 flat feet and a blooper". These are exactly what they say: an extract from Blue Peter in 1978 with Lesley Judd making a Blake's 7 bracelet; nine clip compilations introducing the main characters; a synopsis for each episode; and a trailer for the Series 2 DVDs. --Gary S Dalkin

• The Sword In The Stone | DVD | (03/06/2002) from £10.37   |  Saving you £7.62 (73.48%)   |  RRP £17.99

  As far as Disney is concerned, The Sword in the Stone was a portent of things to come, with slapstick upstaging storytelling, and cultural in-jokes substituting for wonder. Based on TH White's beloved novel The Once and Future King, this Disney version chronicles King Arthur's boyish adventures. There's much to enjoy here as coach Merlin the magician shows the young Arthur, nicknamed Wart, the skills that will help him become the future ruler of the Britons. The transformation sequences, where the boy is turned into a fish, a bird and a squirrel are vintage Disney. The oft-repeated scene of Merlin battling it out with mean old Madame Mim still is worth a few chuckles, but it underlines the problem with most of the film--most of its scenes are only played for laughs. References by Merlin to television and other items of modern life also mar the generally innocuous landscape. Younger children will like it, while older kids will find it slower compared with recent Disney films. --Keith Simanton, Amazon.com

• Seinfeld: Seasons 1 - 3 | DVD | (01/11/2004) from £36.99   |  Saving you £23.00 (62.18%)   |  RRP £59.99

  Seinfeld is widely regarded as one of the finest examples of American sitcoms, and this long-delayed box set goes a long way in demonstrating why. From the first episode of the first season, it hit the ground running with its collection of oddball New Yorkers: There’s stand-up comedian Jerry Seinfeld, who plays himself; Elaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), his pushy ex-girlfriend; his neurotic loser of a best friend George (Jason Alexander); and Jerry’s wacky neighbour Kramer (Michael Richards). Co-written and co-created by Seinfeld and Larry David (who later went on to plumb greater depths of misanthropy with Curb Your Enthusiasm), it revolutionised American sitcoms with its cynical and mature comedy, and its ability to find comic gems in the most mundane situations (one classic episode is set entirely in a mall car-park). Seinfeld was, as all involved frequently admitted, a show about nothing. But this extras-laden collection--which features extensive cast and creator commentaries, deleted scenes, trivia tracks, outtakes, interviews and more--is most definitely something. --Ted Kord

• Our House | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £9.45   |  Saving you £3.54 (37.46%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Created by Norman Hudis, who scripted the earliest Carry On films, this popular sitcom reunited him with some of the films' most charismatic and best-loved stars, including Hattie Jacques, Charles Hawtrey, Joan Sims, and Norman Rossington.Enjoying a highly popular run in the early 1960s, Our House centres on the comic interactions between the contrasting characters who share a large house together. They include a librarian who transforms into a foghorn outside the hushed confines of her workplace (Hattie Jacques); an easy-going oddball employed by the local rates office (Charles Hawtrey); a woman with a slightly alarming employment record (Joan Sims); and a law student (Norman Rossington) in thrall to his overbearing father. Deryck Guyler (Please Sir!) and Roy Hudd guest-star.Of the 39 original episodes, only three survive in the archive. Unseen for over fifty years, what remains of Our House are essential viewing for all Carry On aficionados and lovers of vintage British comedy.

• Romancing The Stone / The Jewel Of The Nile | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £12.55   |  Saving you £2.44 (19.44%)   |  RRP £14.99

  In 1984 Romancing the Stone was a huge hit for director Robert Zemeckis (who later went on to make Forrest Gump, Contact and Castaway among others) thanks in no small part to the winning team of Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny DeVito. The chemistry between all three stars is infectious, but Turner steals the show from the guys, playing a pushy romance novelist who gets stuck among some dangerous figures in Colombia and has only a rumpled guide (Michael Douglas) as an ally. Zemeckis--whose specialty at the time was creating set pieces of raucous action (as in his Back to the Future trilogy)--keeps things hopping with lots of kinetic material. --Tom Keogh, Amazon.com The Jewel of the Nile is a moderately entertaining sequel that pales by comparison to its predecessor. Romance novelist Kathleen Turner and retired soldier-of-fortune Michael Douglas return as a now-complacent couple. Bored with life on a yacht, they find excitement thrust upon them when she accepts a speaking engagement in the Middle East. Once there, she is abducted and finds herself involved with the "jewel" everyone is chasing. Douglas teams up once more with Danny DeVito to rescue his love. Less charming and more predictable than the original, this suffers for one simple reason: the characters have nowhere to go. In the original story we watched Turner blossom from timid storyteller to lusty adventuress. In this flick she is too much like all the other action adventure babes we've seen before. The same trio of stars reunited to better effect in DeVito's dark comedy The War of the Roses. --Rochelle O'Gorman, Amazon.com

• The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon Seasons 1-3 Boxset | Blu Ray | (08/12/2025) from £59.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  This boxset contains seasons 1 - 3 of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon.It's undeniably thrilling to see Daryl and Carol back together again, to see this spin-off become the show it was always supposed to be Radio Times

• The Graduate | DVD | (26/03/2001) from £6.27   |  Saving you £11.72 (186.92%)   |  RRP £17.99

  Few films have defined a generation as much as The Graduate did. The alienation, the nonconformity, the intergenerational romance, the blissful Simon and Garfunkel soundtrack--they all served to lob a cultural grenade smack into the middle of 1967 America, ultimately making the film the third most profitable up to that time. Seen from a later perspective, its radical chic has dimmed a bit, yet it's still a joy to see Dustin Hoffman's bemused Benjamin and Anne Bancroft's deliciously decadent, sardonic Mrs Robinson. The script by Buck Henry and Calder Willingham is still offbeat and dryly funny and Mike Nichols, who won an Oscar for his direction, has just the right, light touch. --Anne Hurley, Amazon.com

• Red Dwarf: Series 2 | DVD | (10/02/2003) from £8.71   |  Saving you £11.28 (129.51%)   |  RRP £19.99

  The second series of Red Dwarf is, as Danny John-Jules says in the accompanying DVD commentary, "the one where it really went good". First broadcast in the autumn of 1988, these six episodes showcase Rob Grant and Doug Naylor's sardonic, sarcastic humour to perfection. The writing has matured, no longer focussing solely on SF in-jokes and gags about bodily functions, instead allowing the humour to develop from the characters and their sometimes surprisingly poignant interactions: Lister's timeless love for Kochanksi, for example, or Rimmer's brief memory-implanted love for one of Lister's ex-girlfriends. The cast had gelled, too, and there's even more colour this year as the drab sets are spiced up, a little more money has been assigned to models and special effects, and the crew even go on location once in a while. "Kryten" introduces us to the eponymous house robot (here played by David Ross), although after this first episode he was not to reappear until Series 3, when Robert Llewellyn made the role his own. Then in "Better Than Life" the show produced one of its all-time classic episodes, as the boys from the Dwarf take part in a virtual reality game that's ruined by Rimmer's tortured psyche. Other highlights include "Queeg", in which Holly is replaced by a domineering computer personality, the baffling time travel paradox of "Stasis Leak", the puzzling conundrum of "Thanks for the Memory", and the astonishingly feminine "Parallel Universe". On the DVD: Red Dwarf, Series 2 has another chaotic and undisciplined group commentary from the cast, all clearly enjoying the opportunity to reminisce. The second disc has a host of fun extras, including an "A-Z of Red Dwarf", outtakes, deleted scenes, a Doug Naylor interview, model shots, and the full, unexpurgated "Tongue Tied" music video. As with the first set, the animated menus are great fun and the "Play All" facility is the most useful little flashing button ever created. --Mark Walker

• Blade / Blade 2 / Blade: Trinity | DVD | (25/04/2005) from £35.00   |  Saving you £-5.01 (N/A%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Blade: A blood chilling action-packed thriller about modern day vampires unlike any previously encountered. Wesley Snipes is Blade the ultimate vampire hunter and immortal warrior who possesses the superhuman strength and cunning of a vampire but shares none of their weakness. Able to walk by day and stalk by night Blade must confront his ultimate adversary the omnipotent vampire overlord Deacon Frost Stephen Dorff who is intent on leading an underground legion of vamp

• A Handful Of Dust | DVD | (19/09/2005) from £7.98   |  Saving you £-5.99 (N/A%)   |  RRP £1.99

  Adapted from Evelyn Waugh's Jazz Age satire, A Handful of Dust is a brutal story of a failed marriage with shattering consquences. James Wilby stars as a country gentleman, Tony Last, who loves rattling around his expansive estate, Hetton Abbey. Tony's wife, Brenda (Kristin Scott Thomas), however, pines for London's excitement and commences an affair in the city with penniless aristocrat John Beaver (Rupert Graves). The fallout of Brenda's betrayal includes a family tragedy and creative divorce settlement ultimately undone when fed-up Tony goes on a naturalist trek through Brazil and becomes the hostage of a mad, illiterate explorer (Alec Guinness). One might wonder whether it's more appropriate to laugh or tremble at these events, and director Charles Sturridge's handsome, graceful production ingeniously accommodates the story's streaks of dark comedy and horror. With brief, memorable supporting roles for Anjelica Huston and Stephen Fry.----Tom Keogh

• Cobweb | DVD | (30/10/2023) from £7.05   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• The Walking Dead: The Complete Series 1-11 Boxset | DVD | (03/07/2023) from £76.50   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  The Walking Dead follows a group of survivors who travel in search of a safe and secure home during the zombie apocalypse. The series explores the challenges of life in a world overrun by walkers who take a toll on the survivors, and sometimes the interpersonal conflicts present a greater danger to their continuing survival than the zombies that roam the country. Over time, the characters are changed by the constant exposure to death, and some grow willing to do anything to survive.

• Frenchman's Farm | DVD | (27/08/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  A woman's car breaks down in the country and when she goes to get help she's whisked back in time to 1944 and witnesses a murder. Returning to her car time reverts to normal but unable to convince anyone of her story she investigates the crime herself...

• The Walking Dead - Season 3 | Blu Ray | (30/09/2013) from £4.59   |  Saving you £35.40 (771.24%)   |  RRP £39.99

  In the highly anticipated new season, Rick and his fellow survivors continue to seek refuge in a desolate and post-apocalyptic world and soon discover that there are greater forces to fear than just the walking dead. The struggle to survive has never been so perilous.

• C.H.U.D. 2 - Bud The Chud | Blu Ray | (28/08/2017) from £9.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  In Bud the C.H.U.D. a couple of high-school kids loose the cadaver for the next day's science experiment, then hit on a plan to steal a body from the local hospital to replace it. Unfortunately what they don’t know is that the hospital is home to a rather more sinister and dubious military trial, the sole remaining C.H.U.D (Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dweller), who has been cryogenically frozen after the experiment went horribly wrong. Unwittingly they thaw Bud the C.H.U.D, who has the rebel-boy charm of James Dean and the personal tastes of Hannibal Lector. Bud then lumbers off on a cannibalistic rampage infecting everyone he munches on (including the family dog) and turning the town into a whole army of C.H.U.Ds. Only the Colonel (played with great melodramatic gusto by Robert "Napoleon Solo" Vaughn) and the kids who unleashed him can save the town from a fate worse than death. This tongue-in-check schlock horror movie is worth watching just for the late-80s nostalgia, the performances are clichéd and the plot wafer thin, but the humour hits the spot and Brian Robbins as the eponymous Bud positively eats his way into your heart. On the DVD: the DVD is unfortunately devoid of any special features other than a filmography and the film stock has a kind of graininess that comes from being low budget (rather than purposefully art house). It won’t be to everyone’s taste but you can’t beat the pure entertainment factor of a cannibalistic poodle. --Kristen Bowditch

• Bluebeard's Castle | Blu Ray | (27/11/2023) from £18.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Discover a 'lost' masterpiece from acclaimed director Michael Powell (The Red Shoes and Peeping Tom), with this stunning adaptation of Béla Bartok's expressionist opera. Starring Norman Foster as the murderous Bluebeard and Ana Raquel Satre as his doomed wife, Judith, this boldly original production was made for West German television in 1963. Combining outstanding performances with spectacular production designs (by Academy Award-winner Hein Heckroth), Powell concocts a daring and inventive interpretation of this haunting work, equal to the creative innovation of the iconic The Tales of Hoffmann. Unavailable for many years, Bluebeard's Castle has been painstakingly restored by the BFI National Archive and The Film Foundation, and is presented here on its 60th anniversary - in its original 1963 version and the revised 1978 edition and featuring limited English subtitles added by Powell. Product Features Newly restored by the BFI National Archive and The Film Foundation in association with The Ashbrittle Film Foundation and presented in High Definition Newly recorded interview with film scholar Ian Christie (2023) Gallery All extras are TBC and subject to change **FIRST PRESSING ONLY** Fully illustrated booklet featuring new and archive writing

• Red Dwarf: Just The Shows (Vol. 1) | DVD | (18/10/2004) from £13.12   |  Saving you £21.87 (166.69%)   |  RRP £34.99

  Notoriously, and entirely appropriately, the original outline for Doug Naylor and Rob Grant's comedy sci-fi series Red Dwarf was sketched on the back of a beer mat. When it finally appeared on our television screens in 1988 the show had clearly stayed true to its roots, mixing jokes about excessive curry consumption with affectionate parodies of classic SF. Indeed, one of the show's most endearing and enduring features is its obvious respect for the conventions of SF, even as it gleefully subverts them. The scenario owes something to Douglas Adams's satirical Hitch-Hiker's Guide, something to The Odd Couple and a lot more to the slacker SF of John Carpenter's Dark Star. Behind the crew's constant bickering there lurks an impending sense that life, the universe and everything are all someone's idea of a terrible joke. Later series broadened the show's horizons until at last its premise was so diluted as to be unrecognisable, but in the earlier episodes contained in this box set the comedy is witty and intimate, focusing on characters and not special effects. Slob Dave Lister (Craig Charles) is the last human alive after a radiation leak wipes out the crew of the vast mining vessel Red Dwarf (episode 1, "The End"). He bums around the spaceship with the perpetually uptight and annoyed hologram of his dead bunkmate, Arnold Rimmer (Chris Barrie, the show's greatest comedy asset) and a creature evolved from a cat (dapper Danny John Jules). They are guided rather haphazardly by Holly, the worryingly thick ship's computer (lugubrious Norman Lovett). --Mark Walker

• The Graduate 50th Anniversary Edition | Blu Ray | (14/08/2017) from £7.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  50th ANNIVERSARY EDITION BRAND NEW RESTORATION A complete sensation on its original release in 1967, THE GRADUATE was a one-of-a-kind cinematic portrait of America which captured the mood of disaffected youth seething beneath the laid-back exterior of 1960s California. It earned Mike Nichols a Best Director Oscar, introduced the music of Simon & Garfunkel to a wider audience and featured one of the most famous seductions in movie history and a truly iconic final scene. THE GRADUATE also introduced the world to a young actor named Dustin Hoffman, perfectly cast as the jaw-droppingly naïve Benjamin. Benjamin Braddock (Dustin Hoffman) has just finished college and is already lost in a sea of confusion as he wonders what to do with his life. He returns to his parents' luxurious Beverly Hills home, where he idles away the summer floating in the pool and brooding in silence. He is rescued from the boredom when he is seduced into a clandestine affair with a middle-aged married friend of his parents, Mrs Robinson (Anne Bancroft). That liaison is soon complicated by Benjamin's infatuation with her college-age daughter Elaine (Katharine Ross). Visually imaginative and impeccably acted, with a witty, endlessly quotable script by Calder Willingham and Buck Henry (based on the novel by Charles Webb), with a supporting cast that includes William Daniels, Murray Hamilton, Walter Brooke and Elizabeth Wilson, THE GRADUATE had the kind of cultural impact that comes along only once in a generation.

• Night Mail | DVD | (16/02/2009) from £12.45   |  Saving you £0.54 (4.34%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Night Mail (1936) remains one of the most popular and instantly recognised films in British film history and was one of the most critically acclaimed films to be produced with the British documentary film movement. Night Mail is an account of the operation of the Royal mail train delivery service and shows the various stages and procedures of that operation. The film begins with a voiceover commentary describing how the mail is collected for transit. Then as the train proceeds along the course of its journey we are shown the various regional railway stations at which it collects and deposits mail. Inside the train the process of sorting takes place. As the train nears its destination there is a sequence - the best known in the film - in which Auden's spoken verse and Britten's music are combined over montage images of racing train wheels. Night Mail has been re-mastered and digitally restored and beautifully packaged in a clamshell box. Music by Benjamin Britten. Poetry by WH Auden.

• The Transformers: The Movie - 4K | Blu Ray | (25/10/2021) from £38.50   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Exclusive Art By Matt FergusonThe year is 2005 For millennia, the heroic Autobots, led by Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen), have been at war with the evil Megatron (Frank Welker) and his Decepticons over control of their home planet of Cybertron. However, an even greater threat Unicron (Orson Welles, Citizen Kane), a colossal converting planet that devours everything in its path is heading right for Cybertron. The only hope is the Autobot Matrix of Leadership. Will the Autobots be able to save themselves and their home world in time?An all-star cast, including Judd Nelson (The Breakfast Club), Leonard Nimoy (Star Trek), Eric Idle (the Monty Python films) and Robert Stack (The Untouchables), brings this inimitable, explosively entertaining Autobot adventure to life.Special FeaturesNew 4k Transfer From Original Film ElementsNew Feature-Length Storyboards, including deleted, alternate and extended sequencesNew Fathom Events 30th Anniversary Featurette, including Stan Bush's acoustic performances of The Touch and Dare 'Til All Are One A comprehensive documentary looking back at The Transformers: The Movie with members of the cast and crew, including story consultant Flint Dille, cast members Gregg Berger, Neil Ross, Dan Gilvezan, singer/songwriter Stan Bush, composer Vince Dicola and others!Audio Commentary with Director Nelson Shin, story consultant Flint Dille and star Susan BluFeaturettesAnimated StoryboardsTrailers and TV Spots