"Actor: Peter Jay"

• Tales of the Unexpected Vol 1 | DVD | (02/04/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £7.99

  Tales Of The Unexpected Vol 1

• Brotherhood Of Murder | DVD | (04/02/2002) from £5.99   |  Saving you £-2.00 (N/A%)   |  RRP £3.99

  Based on a true story, Brotherhood of Murder is the sorry tale of Tony Martinez, an army dropout who becomes convinced that the downturn his life has taken is attributable to the fact that America's ethnic minorities are getting a better deal than he is. There's a ghastly inevitability to what follows as he joins a group of white supremacists who are funding a survivalist community largely through criminal activities. Eventually it's more than even he can bear, so he betrays the group to the FBI. Along the way, there are a few extraordinary scenes, such as when the group cleans out the cash register of a porno video store, leaving the proprietor unharmed but demanding that he remove from his shelves any material depicting interracial sex. This low-key but compelling production gives an insight into how such a strange and very ugly culture can arise out of ignorance and blunted perception. The disc also includes a trailer and a Synergy showcase. --Roger Thomas

• Deep In My Heart | DVD | (30/06/2003) from £5.23   |  Saving you £3.75 (167.41%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Given up for adoption as a baby Barbara Ann (Gloria Reuben) a child of mixed race is facing a life of confusion prejudice and isolation. Raised by a loving foster mother in a black neighbourhood she is suddenly torn from this happy existence and placed in a world with no friends no joy and no sense of family. But she survives and grows up to become the mother of five children. And it is then that Barbara Ann finds the courage to face her past to meet with the woman who gave birth to her all those years ago and to find that place in her heart called home...

• The Santa Clause | DVD | (01/10/1999) from £12.98   |  Saving you £7.01 (54.01%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Tim Allen makes an impressive screen debut in Disney's well-written holiday film, The Santa Clause. Divorced toy company executive Scott Calvin is pleased to have his son Charlie for Christmas, though the boy himself isn't happy about it. But when Santa Claus accidentally topples off the roof of the house and falls with a thud in the snow, Scott finds himself taking the merry old elf's place and earning new respect in his son's eyes. When the night ends, the reindeer take them to the North Pole, and Scott discovers that by donning the fabled red suit, he's inadvertently agreed to become the next Santa Claus. The next morning he wakes up in his own bed and thinks it's all a dream--but Charlie remembers it with crystal clarity. Scott now has to deal with his suspicious ex-wife (Wendy Crewson) and her psychiatrist boyfriend (Judge Reinhold), who both think he's playing tricks with Charlie's mind, and also with his own out-of-control body, which is putting on weight and growing a prodigious beard. The Santa Clause probably won't supplant It's a Wonderful Life or Miracle on 34th Street as anyone's favourite Christmas film, but it's an enjoyable, straightforward family film, anchored by the affable charisma of Allen. --Bret Fetzer, Amazon.com

• Cult Action Extravaganza | DVD | (21/04/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  The Cult Action Extravaganza three-disc set offers three very different movies that have nothing in common bar residency in Siren's film archive. They are: The Most Dangerous Game (1932), Beneath the 12-Mile Reef (1953) and Get Christie Love! (1974). The Most Dangerous Game is a classic, one of the first talkies to get pictures moving after five very static years following the birth of sound. The plot finds resourceful hero Joel McCrea and heroine Fay Wray being hunted on the island of the insane Zaroff (Leslie Banks). One of the grandfathers of the summer blockbuster, the film's setup has been reworked many times since, notably in John Woo's Hard Target (1993). By modern standards it's technically primitive, though still gripping stuff, complete with the jungle set built as a test run for King Kong (1933) and graced by Max Steiner's prototype of all Hollywood action scores. Beneath the 12-Mile Reef is another landmark or rather watermark. The third-ever CinemaScope production, this was a prestige release with Technicolor location filming at Key West, Florida of never-before-achieved underwater cinematography and four-channel stereo recording of a superlative Bernard Herrmann score. Even a still-impressive underwater battle with an octopus pre-dates the more famous giant squid of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954). The humans aren't bad either, with a young Robert Wagner making a charismatic if ethnically unconvincing Greek lead as sponge fisherman Tony and Terry Moore playing Juliet to his Romeo with real vivacity. Starring Theresa Graves, Get Christie Love! is a tame TV movie imitation of early 1970s female blaxploitation films such Pam Grier's Coffy (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974). Running a standard TVM 73 minutes and with a low budget and content sanitised to US network standards, this is lightweight stuff about an undercover cop determined to smash a drugs ring. Nevertheless the movie was popular enough to spawn a short-lived TV show and is significant for being the first time a black woman took the title role in any American network production. Tarantino completists may be interested, as before he paid homage to Christie Love in the dialogue of Reservoir Dogs (1991). On the DVD: Cult Action Extravaganza presents the films in their original aspect ratio and sound format; The Most Dangerous Game and Get Christie Love! are 4:3, mono. The former is faded b/w with reasonably sturdy sound, though the transfer suffers from compression artefacting. No one would expect great quality from a 1974 TV movie, but Get Christie Love! suffers from both a poor print and a mediocre DVD transfer. Beneath the 12-Mile Reef is presented in the extra wide 2.55:1 of early CinemaScope and though sadly not anamorphic both the seascapes and underwater cinematography are still impressive. The four-channel stereo sound is revelatory, clear, detailed and years ahead of what we have come to expect early 1950s films to sound like. --Gary S Dalkin

• In Till You Die | DVD | (04/08/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Once yopu're in.... You can't get out.... Joney's a low level hired gun going nowhere fast. So when a smooth-talking criminal named Cowboy tells him that he wants to use him for a heist the eager theif jumps at the chance. There's only one problem the mark is the most viscious of all mobsters Sam the owner of Sam's Club.....

• Sign Of The Killer | DVD | (12/04/2004) from £66.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £66.99

  Variously described by critics as "Riveting", "Stunning", "Exciting..Stylish and Slick", & "An Ingenious Thriller" this is a little gem of a thriller, directed by actress turned director Kasi Lemmons, & starring the always superb, Samuel L. Jackson (Snakes On A Plane, Pulp Fiction ) as Romulus Ledbetter, a once devoted family man, now living rough on the streets os Manhattan. His home is a cave in the park and when he finds a frozen corpse outside the entrance one day he becomes determined to find out how the man died and prove he was murdered . To do this he has to re-enter the world he is no longer a part of, and most importantly confront his own inner demons. Very overlooked on it's original release it's a clever involving film, with Jackson totally believable as always.