"Director: Arlene Sanford"

• The West Wing - Season 1 Part 2 | DVD | (22/07/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £34.99

  Aaron Sorkin's American political drama The West Wing, set in The White House, has won innumerable awards--and rightly so. Its depiction of a well-meaning Democrat administration has warmed the hearts of countless Americans. However, The West Wing is more than mere feel-good viewing for sentimental patriots. It is among the best-written, sharpest, funny and moving of recent American TV series. In its first series, The West Wing established the cast of characters who comprise the White House staff. There's Chief of Staff Leo McGarry (John Spencer), a recovering alcoholic whose efforts to be the cornerstone of the administration contribute to the break up of his marriage. CJ (Alison Janney) is the formidable press spokeswoman embroiled in a tentative on-off relationship with Timothy Busfield's reporter. Brilliant but grumpy communications deputy Toby Ziegler, Rob Lowe's brilliant but faintly nerdy Sam Seaborn and brilliant but smart-alecky Josh Lynam make up the rest of the inner circle. Initially, the series' creators had intended to keep the President off-screen. Wisely, however, they went with Martin Sheen's Jed Bartlet, whose eccentric volatility, caution, humour and strength in a crisis make for such an impressively plausible fictional President that polls once expressed a preference for Bartlet over the genuine incumbent. Handled incorrectly, The West Wing could have been turgid, didactic propaganda for The American Way. However, the writers are careful to show that, decent as this administration is, its achievements, though hard-won, are minimal. Moreover, the brisk, staccato-like, almost musical exchanges of dialogue, between Josh and his PA Donna, for instance, as they pace purposefully up and down the corridors are the show's abiding joy. --David Stubbs

• I'll Be Home For Christmas / One Magic Christmas | DVD | (26/09/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  I'll Be Home For Christmas (Dir. Arlene Sanford 1998): Jake Wilkinson (Jonathan Taylor Thomas) a wheeling dealing self-centered college student has one thing on his mind: get home for Christmas dinner or forfeit the vintage Porsche his father promised him. Just days before his deadline Jake awakens in the California desert - stranded and penniless wearing a Santa suit and a white beard glued to his face! Desperate to claim his gift he flies crawls cons races bulli

• Ally McBeal - Season 2 Part 2 | DVD | (07/10/2002) from £9.39   |  Saving you £10.60 (53.00%)   |  RRP £19.99

  A blend of courtroom dramas and neurotic love affairs create the perfect formula for the second part of the acclaimed Ally McBeal season 2. Ally (Calista Flockhart) continues to suffer in the hands of love and embarks upon a series of doomed love affairs that culminate in an adulterous kiss with her old love Billy (Gil Bellows). The confusion that accompanies her fated love life follows her into the courtroom where not only does she experience bizarre Al Green hallucinations but she also tries to sue God in defence of a little boy with leukaemia (Angels and Blimps). Meanwhile as Ally encounters visions of Al Green in the courtroom an inner Barry White takes over John Cage (Peter Macnicol) leaving him re-energised and finally confident enough to conquer his infatuation with sub-zero Nelle (Portia di Rossi). Enter the magical world of Ally with these essential Season 2 Part 2 DVDs that chronicle the daily traumas of Elaine's (Jane Krawkoski) face bras imaginary extended tongues and rigorous therapy sessions that will leave us all hollering for more. This box set includes the episodes: Angels & Blimps; Pyramids on the Nile; Sideshow; Sex Lies and Politics; Civil Wars; Those Lips That Hand; Lets Dance; Only the Lonely; The Green Monster; and I Know Him by Heart.

• Dawson's Creek: The Best of Seasons 1 and 2 | DVD | (04/09/2000) from £9.94   |  Saving you £10.05 (50.30%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Dawson's Creek is, first and foremost, one of the defining shows about teen angst and complicated teenage relationships. The first two seasons were the classic ones, as Dawson oscillates in his affections between beautiful Jen and his best friend Joey and manages to fall entirely between two stools. This is a show in which indecision and failure to commit is always going to lead to nothing good, however uncertain the prospects of commitment. Michelle Williams as Jen and Katie Holmes as Joey provide the show with its emotional centre of quirky intensity. James Van Der Beek as the essentially unreliable Dawson provides good looks and a hang-dog complexity of feeling to the mix, while Joshua Jackson as his sidekick Pacey provides both reliable comic relief and a sense of more depth to come in the show's later seasons. This "Best of Seasons 1 and 2" provides good examples of what the show does best. From Season 1, "The Scare" is a finely judged commentary on teen horror films--the show's creator Kevin Williamson was also responsible for the Scream franchise--and "Beauty Contest" is a finely judged social comedy about the show's high-toned resort community. Other strands in "Beauty Contest" lead in Season 2 to the brief Joey-Dawson relationship in "The Kiss" and to its aftermath in "His Leading Lady", where Dawson directs Rachael Lee Cook as Devon in a movie script based sufficiently closely on earlier episodes that she reprises Joey's actual lines. Dawson's Creek is essential teen soap, savvy enough in its post-modern edge to play well with self-parody and intertextuality.--Roz Kaveney

• The West Wing - Complete Seasons 1-3 (Amazon.co.uk Exclusive) | DVD | (29/03/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £99.99

  This box set containing the complete first three series of The West Wing is available exclusively from Amazon.co.uk. Aaron Sorkin's American political drama The West Wing, set in the White House, has won innumerable awards--and rightly so. Its depiction of a well-meaning Democrat administration has warmed the hearts of countless Americans. However, The West Wing is more than mere feel-good viewing for sentimental patriots. It is among the best-written, sharpest, funniest and moving US TV series of all time. Martin Sheen leads a strong ensemble cast: his Jed Bartlet is such an impressively plausible fictional President that polls once expressed a preference for Bartlet over the genuine incumbent. Handled incorrectly, The West Wing could have been turgid, didactic propaganda for The American Way. However, the writers are careful to show that, decent as this administration is, its achievements, though hard-won, are minimal. Moreover, the brisk, staccato-like, almost musical exchanges of dialogue, between Josh and his PA Donna, for instance, as they pace purposefully up and down the corridors are the show's abiding joy. --David Stubbs

• Frank McKlusky | DVD | (04/10/2004) from £4.98   |  Saving you £10.01 (201.00%)   |  RRP £14.99

  As a child Frank McKlusky (Sheridan) watched his daredevil father ""Madman"" McKlusky become comatose in an ill-fated motorcycle stunt. Now as a risk-avoiding adult he lives with his parents always wears protective gear and works by the Claims Investigator handbook. Insurance fraud wiped out the family finances but Frank's career compensates. When he suspiciously loses his partner on the job Frank must become a master of disguise take on a sexy new partner and grab evidence to bus

• Seeds of Deception | DVD | (25/11/2002) from £3.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  They call him the 'baby maker'. To married couples, desperate to have children but unable to conceive, he seems like the answer to their prayers. Dr Cecil Jacobson is larger than life - both physically, and professionally as a respected expert on fertility medicine and artificial insemination. His reputation attracts those from all levels of society, including Mary Bennet, whose main aim in life is to have a child. But the joy of Mary and other prospective parents is destroyed as terrible ...

• The Christmas Star / One Magic Christmas / I'll Be Home For Christmas | DVD | (02/10/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £17.99

  The Christmas Star (Dir. Alan Shapiro 1986): Disney gives families a gift full of the spirit of the season as Ed Asner plays Horace McNickle a counterfeiter who escapes prison through his extraordinary likeness to St. Nick. The Police are closing in but Christmas is near so there are redsuited ones everywhere. McNickle is desperate to recover loot from an earlier caper and can't make a move until he takes advantage of two neighborhood kids who really believe he is Santa. After the kids come through it dawns on him that he has always missed the true meaning of the holidays. rather than make good on his escape he tries to make good on his promises. I'll Be Home For Christmas (Dir. Arlene Sanford 1998): Jake Wilkinson (Jonathan Taylor Thomas) a wheeling dealing self-centered college student has one thing on his mind: get home for Christmas dinner or forfeit the vintage Porsche his father promised him. Just days before his deadline Jake awakens in the California desert - stranded and penniless wearing a Santa suit and a white beard glued to his face! Desperate to claim his gift he flies crawls cons races bullies and even sleighs his way east. But his non-stop mission turns into a non-stop comedy of errors as a multitude of colourful and offbeat strangers look to 'Santa' for help and kindness. The closer Jake gets to home the closer he gets to the true meaning of Christmas and the importance of family... One Magic Christmas (Dir. Phillip Borsos 1985): Christmas is a time of enchantment... when a wondrous feeling larger than life captures the soul...but not for everyone. Academy Award-Winner Mary Steenburgen stars as a young mother Ginny Grainger who is disillusioned with Christmas and finds its approach as adding only more pressures to an already stress-filled existence. Thanks to the unshakable faith of her young daughter Abbie and a guardian angel named Gideon (played by Harry Dean Stanton) Ginny's spirit of hope and Christmas is re-kindled through a miraculous yuletide experience in which she sees what life would be like if Christmas did not exist. In the tradition of It's A Wonderful Life and A Christmas Carol One Magic Christmas is a renowned holiday favourite not to be missed! It will touch your heart and warm your soul but most of all...it will leave you inspired with the true spirit of Christmas!