"Director: Franco Amurri"

• Monkey Trouble | DVD | (27/03/2000) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Monkey Trouble is a movie only a kid could love, which was the whole point. Harvey Keitel plays a small-time thief who performs as an organ grinder on the boardwalk at Venice Beach. His scam involves his monkey, which has been trained to pick pockets. Now a mob boss wants to borrow the monkey to pull off some big scores--but the monkey runs away and is adopted by a lonely little girl (Thora Birch). She finds herself in increasingly hot water when her new pet starts bringing her the valuables of everyone in the neighbourhood. Birch is a natural young actress, while Keitel hams it up shamelessly (he reportedly made the film to amuse his young daughter). --Marshall Fine

• Flashback | DVD | (08/12/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Inspired casting puts sparks into Flashback, a comedy of counterculture clash between an aging 1960s radical and a buttoned-down FBI agent. Dennis Hopper plays an Abbie Hoffman-esque 1960s activist and prankster who lands in the custody of a conservative young agent (a suitably uptight Kiefer Sutherland) and proceeds literally to unravel the agent's carefully constructed front through a series of slippery mind games. Hopper has a blast as the unreformed relic, and Carol Kane is delightful as a hippie holdout who puts both men back in touch with their identities. There are few surprises, plenty of heart, and even a little sentiment in this story of rebellion and the legacy of the counterculture. The soundtrack is gilded with well-chosen 1960s anthems. --Sean Axmaker