"Actor: Robert James"

• Breathless | DVD | (19/03/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Breathless, Jim McBride's 1983 remake of Au Bout de Souffle rewrites Godard's existential hipster as a vain, style-obsessed hood and in the process loses some of the point. Godard's hero was a translation and productive misunderstanding of a quintessentially American sort of delinquent; because it is a retranslation, Gere's intelligent, nervy performance as Jesse Lujack suffers by comparison, however admirable it is taken in itself. McBride's direction strokes Gere's face and body lovingly--his every foxy smile, or glance at himself in a mirror, is played for passionate significance. This is also a good-looking film: the back alleys of LA and sunset over the Mojave desert have rarely looked as good. Valerie Kaprisky's Monica is inevitably given secondary importance; the decision to make the woman who goes along with Jesse's wild final ride on a whim an exchange student makes her at once more and less like her equivalent in the Godard--she has a touching exoticism that is at the same time somehow beside the point. The DVD includes the original theatrical trailer. --Roz Kaveney

• Meet The Parents | DVD | (02/07/2006) from £3.13   |  Saving you £12.86 (410.86%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Randy Newman's opening song, "A Fool in Love", perfectly sets up the scenario of Meet the Parents: "Show me a man who is gentle and kind and I'll show you a loser". Greg Focker (Ben Stiller) is the fool in love. Just as he's about to propose to his girlfriend Pam (Teri Polo), he learns that her sister's fiancé asked their father, Jack Byrnes (Robert De Niro), for permission to marry. Now he feels the need to do the same thing. When Greg meets Jack, he is so desperate to be liked that he makes up stories and feebly attempts to ingratiate himself with his prospective father-in-law rather than having the courage of his convictions. It doesn't take an elite member of the CIA to see right through Greg, but unfortunately that's precisely what Jack is. Directed by Jay Roach (the Austin Powers films), Meet the Parents is a well-crafted comedy that makes for a pleasant contrast to the sloppy excesses of the Farrelly brothers. Stiller is great at playing up the uncomfortable comedy of errors, balancing just the right amount of selfishness and self-deprecating humour, while De Niro's excels as the intimidating father. Blythe Danner as his wife, the Gracie to De Niro's George Burns, is the true heart of the film and Owen Wilson turns in yet another terrific comic performance as Pam's ex-fiancé. --Andy Spletzer, Amazon.com

• El Dorado | DVD | (22/04/2002) from £10.78   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• About A Boy / Notting Hill | DVD | (02/02/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £17.99

  About A Boy: Will (Grant) is a 38-year old Londoner living a bachelor lifestyle on the back of royalties earned from a Christmas song penned by his father some years previously. A serial womaniser Will comes up with the idea of attending a single parents group as a new way to pick up women. Inventing a two-year old son for himself he meets lonely bullied schoolboy Marcus (Nicholas Hoult) and his depressed music therapist mother (Toni Collette). The intelligent Marcus soon learns Will's secret and so blackmails him into letting him hang out at his place and watch afternoon telly. However what starts out as an uneasy quiz show watching alliance turns into an unlikely friendship... Notting Hill: William Thacker (Hugh Grant) is the owner of a bookshop in the heart of Notting Hill in London. One day by a one-in-a-million chance the worlds most famous actress Anna Scott (Julia Roberts) comes into his shop. He watches in amazement as she leaves and he thinks he'll never see her again. But fate intervenes - and minutes later William collides with Anna on Portobello Road. So begins a tale of romance and adventure in London W11. With a little help from his chaotic flatmate Spike (Rhys Ifans) and his friends Max and Bella (Tim McInnerny and Gina McKee) William seeks the face he can't forget...

• The Naked Gun 2 1/2 - The Smell Of Fear | DVD | (09/04/2001) from £9.98   |  Saving you £8.00 (100.13%)   |  RRP £15.99

  It's more of Leslie Nielsen's Lt Frank Drebin, the bumbling cop from the old Police Squad! television series. This time, Drebin uncovers a plot--led by supervillain Robert Goulet!--to sabotage America's energy policy. The jokes don't stick as well as those of the first film (Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!), but there are some very funny slapstick moments, including several involving former First Lady Barbara Bush (played by an actress, of course). --Tom Keogh

• Up Close And Personal | DVD | (01/10/1999) from £11.95   |  Saving you £4.04 (33.81%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Tally Atwater (Michelle Pfeiffer) has a dream: to be a prime-time network newscaster. She pursues this dream with nothing but ambition raw talent and a homemade demo tape. Warren Justice (Robert Redford) is a brilliant hard edged veteran newsman. He sees Tally has talent and becomes her mentor. Tally’s career takes a meteoric rise and she and Warren fall in love. The romance that results is as intense and revealing as television news itself. Yet each breaking story ev

• The Anniversary | DVD | (09/07/2007) from £7.99   |  Saving you £5.00 (62.58%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Mrs Taggart (Bette Davis) a wealthy tyrannical and manipulative matriarch holds a social gathering to celebrate her wedding anniversary even though her husband has been dead for years. She demands the presence of her three sons: a timid cross-dresser a stressed father of five and a secretly engaged youngster. But the party is just an excuse for Mrs. Taggart to maintain her mercilessly firm grip over her offsprings lives. Made by Britains Hammer Studios this deliciously nasty

• Classic Taggart - The Mark McManus Collection | DVD | (20/08/2012) from £29.98   |  Saving you £-9.99 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  This unforgettable collection includes seven vintage episode starring Mark McManus, the actor who remains synonymous with DCI Jim Taggart. So sit back and enjoy 15 hours of Taggart at its very best. They just don't make them like this anymore.

• Water For Elephants | DVD | (14/11/2011) from £3.74   |  Saving you £16.25 (434.49%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Sara Gruen's bestselling novel comes to glossy life in this period romance. A sparkle-free Robert Pattinson plays Jacob Jankowski, who studies veterinary medicine during the Great Depression. After a family tragedy, he loses everything, including the chance to graduate from prestigious Cornell, so he hops a train, where he finds himself part of the struggling Benzini Brothers Circus. Ringleader August (Christoph Waltz, echoing his Oscar®-winning Inglourious Basterds performance) has doubts about the softhearted lad, but a fellow Pole smoothes the way, and Jacob becomes the company vet, which leads him to platinum-blonde equestrian Marlena (Reese Witherspoon), August's wife. The two make eyes at each other, but an affair would surely end badly, so they concentrate on their work. When Marlena's prize steed falls ill, August purchases an elephant, hoping Rosie will turn their fortunes around, and enlists Jacob to train her. Unfortunately, she's slow to respond to commands until Jankowski unlocks her secret--and after August has beaten the poor thing into submission. After that, things start to look up until Jacob steals a kiss from his dream girl. As in The Notebook, the film it most closely resembles, an elderly version of the central character (Hal Holbrook, touching) narrates in the present day (screenwriter Richard LaGravenese also adapted The Bridges of Madison County). He tells an interesting tale, so it's too bad the leads strike so few sparks. For those who find big-top classics like Nightmare Alley too dark, however, Francis Lawrence's feel-better variant may be just the ticket. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

• That Mitchell And Webb Look - Series 3 | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  More skits and sketches from comedy duo Mitchell And Webb.

• All Creatures Great And Small - The Complete Series | DVD | (09/11/2009) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £129.99

  Based on James Herriot's autobiographical best sellers 'If Only They Could Talk' and 'It Shouldn't Happen to a Vet' the long running TV series All Creatures Great and Small continued to satisfy the Herriot hysteria of the British public.

• That'll Be The Day / Stardust | DVD | (25/08/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £16.99

  That'll Be The Day: Abandoned by his father at an early age Jim MacLaine seems to have inherited the old man's restlessness. Despite his apparent intelligence Jim decides not to take the exams that would pave his way to university; he begins to think that the life of a pop musician might be the thing for him... Stardust: Jim is now enjoying the nomadic gigs and groupies' life of The Stray Cats. When he achieves all his wildest dreams of international stardom the sweet taste of success begins to turn sour...

• Casino - 20th Anniversary Edition | Blu Ray | (04/05/2015) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £26.99

  Director Martin Scorsese reunites with members of his GoodFellas gang (writer Nicholas Pileggi; actors Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, and Frank Vincent) for a three-hour epic about the rise and fall of mobster Sam "Ace" Rothstein (De Niro), a character based on real-life gangster Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal. (It's modeled after on Wiseguy and GoodFellas and Pileggi's true crime book Casino: Love and Honor in Las Vegas.) Through Rothstein, the picture tells the story of how the Mafia seized, and finally lost control of, Las Vegas gambling. The first hour plays like a fascinating documentary, intricately detailing the inner workings of Vegas casinos. Sharon Stone is the stand out among the actors; she nabbed an Oscar nomination for her role as the voracious Ginger, the glitzy call girl who becomes Rothstein's wife. The film is not as fast paced or gripping as Scorsese's earlier gangster pictures (Mean Streets and GoodFellas), but it's still absorbing. And, hey--it's Scorsese! --Jim Emerson

• Trainspotting | DVD | (01/10/1999) from £6.18   |  Saving you £15.07 (306.30%)   |  RRP £19.99

  The film that effectively launched the star careers of Robert Carlyle, Ewan McGregor and Jonny Lee Miller is a hard, barbed picaresque, culled from the bestseller by Irvine Welsh and thrown down against the heroin hinterlands of Edinburgh. Directed with abandon by Danny Boyle, Trainspotting conspires to be at once a hip youth flick and a grim cautionary fable. Released on an unsuspecting public in 1996, the picture struck a chord with audiences worldwide and became adopted as an instant symbol of a booming British rave culture (an irony, given the characters' main drug of choice is heroin not ecstasy).McGregor, Lee Miller and Ewen Bremner play a slouching trio of Scottish junkies; Carlyle their narcotic-eschewing but hard-drinking and generally psychotic mate Begbie. In Boyle's hands, their lives unfold in a rush of euphoric highs, blow-out overdoses and agonising withdrawals (all cued to a vogueish pop soundtrack). Throughout it all, John Hodge's screenplay strikes a delicate balance between acknowledging the inherent pleasures of drug use and spotlighting its eventual consequences. In Trainspotting's world view, it all comes down to a question of choices--between the dangerous Day-Glo highs of the addict and the grey, grinding consumerism of the everyday Joe. "Choose life", quips the film's narrator (McGregor) in a monologue that was to become a mantra. "Choose a job, choose a starter home... But why would anyone want to do a thing like that?" Ultimately, Trainspotting's wised-up, dead-beat inhabitants reject mainstream society in favour of a headlong rush to destruction. It makes for an exhilarating, energised and frequently terrifying trip that blazes with more energy and passion than a thousand more ostensibly life-embracing movies. --Xan Brooks

• The X Files: Season 2 | DVD | (11/10/2004) from £14.93   |  Saving you £20.06 (134.36%)   |  RRP £34.99

  Season Two, the 1994-95 run, of The X Files was the one where creator Chris Carter, having had a surprise hit when he expected a one-season wonder, started trying to make sense of all the storylines he had thrown into the pile in the first year. Moreover, he had to cope with Gillian Anderson's maternity leave by having Scully get abducted by aliens (back then, a pretty fresh device) for a few episodes and come back strangely altered. The season also inaugurated the tradition of opening ("Little Green Men") and closing ("Anasazi") with the show's worst episodes, both pot-boiling attempts to keep the alien infiltration/government conspiracy balls up in the air while seeming to offer narrative forward-thrusts or revelations. But it's also a show noticeably surer of itself than Season One, with its stars reading from the same page in terms of their characters' relationship and attitudes to the wondrous. Scully's no-longer-workable scepticism finally starts to erode in the face of Mulder's increasingly cracked belief. There are fewer marking-time leftover-monster-of-the-week shows--although we do get a human fluke ("The Host"), vampires ("3"), an invisible rapist ("Excelsius Dei") voodoo ("Fresh Bones")--and the flying-saucer stories at last seem to be going somewhere. The powerful two-episode run ("Duane Barry", "Ascension") features Steve Railsback as Mulder's possible future, an FBI agent burned out after a UFO abduction who has become a hostage-taking terrorist, which climaxes with Scully's disappearance into the light. The standout episode is also a stand-alone--"Humbug"--the first and still most successful of the show's self-parodies (written by Darin Morgan, who had played the Flukeman in "The Host"), in which the agents investigate a murder in a circus freakshow, allowing the actors to make fun of the mannerisms they have earnestly built up in a run of solemn, even somnolent, explorations of the murk. Other worthy efforts: "Aubrey", about genetic memory; "Irresistible", a rare (and creepy) straight psycho-chiller with little paranormal content; and "The Calusari", a good ghost/mystery. Rising deputy characters include Nicholas Lea as the perfidious Krycek and Brian Thompson as the shapeshifting alien bounty hunters. Notable guest stars: Charles Martin Smith, C.C.H. Pounder, Leland Orser, Terry O'Quinn, Bruce Weitz, Daniel Benzali, John Savage, Vincent Schiavelli, Tony Shalhoub. --Kim Newman

• Recess - School's Out | DVD | (26/11/2001) from £21.09   |  Saving you £-9.10 (N/A%)   |  RRP £11.99

  In this big-screen version of the Saturday-morning animated series, the school year is finally over, and T J Detweiler is looking forward to a fun-filled summer. Boredom quickly sets in until T J uncovers a scheme to do away with summer vacation.

• Psycho | DVD | (01/01/1999) from £14.98   |  Saving you £-4.99 (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Marion Crane is a Phoenix, Arizona working girl fed up with having to sneak away during lunch breaks to meet her lover, Sam Loomis, who cannot get married because most of his money goes towards alimony.

• Meet The Parents (Special Edition) | DVD | (03/07/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  This new comedy from the director of Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me follows Greg Focker (Ben Stiller) in his doomed attempts to impress his would-be father-in-law Jack Byrnes (Robert De Niro)

• The Inheritance | DVD | (13/11/2023) from £12.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• The Mexican | DVD | (04/02/2002) from £5.63   |  Saving you £14.36 (255.06%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Jerry Welbach (Brad Pitt) is a reluctant bagman who has a score to settle with a crime kingpin and his even more dangerous girlfriend (Julia Roberts).