Drama

• Phoenix (Ray Liotta) | DVD | (04/07/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £3.99

  In this town the heat can kill you. These days it seems like everybody's addicted to something and for Detective Harry Collins gambling is his ""drug."" He'll bet on anything no matter the odds just for the rush. But this time he's in over his head. Caught between a brutal bookie a lethal loan shark and a murderous heist gone wrong Harry has a daring plan to settle his debts once and for all.

• Moonstruck | Blu Ray | (13/01/2014) from £9.59   |  Saving you £3.40 (35.45%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Remember the outfit Cher wore to the Oscars when she won an Academy Award for her performance in this 1987 film? Ay-yi-yi. The actress' more retiring character in this infectious comedy leaps several psychological hurdles just giving her hair a permanent. But then the original screenplay of Moonstruck, by John Patrick Shanley (Joe Versus the Volcano), is a wonderful, gently satirical tale of an Italian-American family dealing with repression and dissatisfaction against a backdrop of cultural expectations. Cher is focused and funny as a widow who feels she should marry an older fellow (Danny Aiello), but then falls for his black-sheep brother (Nicolas Cage). Olympia Dukakis and Vincent Gardenia are perfect as her parents, and John Mahoney (of TV's Frasier) has a memorable, small role as a middle-aged man on the make who gets a lecture from Dukakis's character. Shanley's dialogue is comically stylised in a way that makes one appreciate how much words can inform an actor's performance. Taking its cues from him and director Norman Jewison (And Justice for All), the cast immerse themselves in a pool of hilariously operatic emotion. --Tom Keogh

• The Grand Seduction | DVD | (05/01/2015) from £7.90   |  Saving you £13.35 (201.05%)   |  RRP £19.99

  A small fishing village is in dire need of a doctor in order to secure a lucrative business contract and ensure the economic survival of their community. When unlikely candidate and big city doctor Paul Lewis lands in their lap for a trial residency they believe their prayers have been answered and hilarity ensues as the villagers rally together to charm him into staying.

• Welcome To Sarajevo | DVD | (07/06/2004) from £6.92   |  Saving you £-0.93 (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Whether as a subject for historical investigation or social drama, the war in the former Yugoslavia is made for film, as 1997's Welcome to Sarajevo demonstrates. Inspired by the book Natasha's Story by ITN reporter Michael Nicholson, this takes very much a human-interest angle on the conflict. Stephen Dillane plays a journalist whose involvement moves from the professional to the personal as he faces up to marauding Serbian mercenaries, then family ties, to get the apparently orphaned Emira out of Sarajevo and back to the security of his own family in the UK. It could have been awash with journalists-are-good-guys-really sentiment, but director Michael Winterbottom is mindful to present the story in the context of the siege--some of the filming here is harrowingly realistic--and draws responsive performances from a cast including Woody Harrelson as a hard-living American reporter and Marisa Tomei as an aid worker determined to save children's lives at all costs. As a film about the "why" of the Yugoslavian war, Pretty Village, Pretty Flame is unsurpassed, but Welcome to Sarajevo is a potent look into the "how". On the DVD: Welcome to Sarajevo comes to DVD with a decent 16:9 anamorphic picture and Dolby Digital 5.1 sound that has the necessary immediacy. English subtitles are included, rightly so in a film of this nature. Special features include 30 minutes of interview snippets with cast and crew, "on location" sequences and three theatrical/TV trailers. --Richard Whitehouse

• Heimat | Blu Ray | (01/07/2024) from £44.89   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Heimat is one of the most compelling and highly praised dramas in television history. This epic tale of a family and their rural life in a small German village is told against the changing backdrop of a country's turbulent history from 1919 to 1982.Special Features Restored from the original negative by The Edgar Reitz Film Foundation The Hunsruek Villages: Stories From The Film Locations Edgar Reitz's 2-hour documentary ˜prologue' to HeimatAn interview with Edgar Reitz on the making of HeimatAn interview with Christian Reitz on the restoration of Heimat An interview with Marita Breuer on acting in HeimatAn introduction by Jan Harlan on the significance of Heimat for Stanley KubrickA Visual Essay by Daniel Bird6 disc set in 2 digipacks and rigid slipcase

• The Great Gatsby | Blu Ray | (11/11/2013) from £7.99   |  Saving you £19.00 (237.80%)   |  RRP £26.99

  From the uniquely imaginative mind of writer/producer/director Baz Luhrmann comes the new big screen adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby. The filmmaker created his own distinctive visual interpretation of the classic story bringing the period to life in a way that has never been seen before in a film starring Leonardo DiCaprio in the title role. The Great Gatsby follows would-be writer Nick Carraway as he leaves the Midwest and comes to New York City in the spring of 1922 an era of loosening morals glittering jazz bootleg kings and sky-rocketing stocks. Chasing his own American Dream Nick lands next door to a mysterious party-giving millionaire Jay Gatsby and across the bay from his cousin Daisy and her philandering blue-blooded husband Tom Buchanan. It is thus that Nick is drawn into the captivating world of the super rich their illusions loves and deceits. As Nick bears witness within and without of the world he inhabits he pens a tale of impossible love incorruptible dreams and high-octane tragedy and holds a mirror to our own modern times and struggles. Special Features: The Greatness of Gatsby Within and Wihout with Tobey Maguire The Swinging Sounds of Gatsby The Jazz Age Razzle Dazzle: The Fashion of the '20s Fitzgerald's Visual Poetry Gatsby Revealed: Gatsby's Party Disconcerting Ride The Plaza Pool Scene Deleted Scenes

• Columbo The Final Years 1989-2003 The Complete Collection | Blu Ray | (18/11/2024) from £90.29   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• City Lights (1931) (Criterion Collection) UK Only | Blu Ray | (12/12/2022) from £22.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  The most cherished film by CHARLIE CHAPLIN (Modern Times) is also his ultimate Little Tramp chronicle. The writer-director-star achieved new levels of grace, in both physical comedy and dramatic poignancy, with this silent tale of a lovable vagrant falling for a young blind woman who sells flowers on the street (a magical VIRGINIA CHERRILL) and mistakes him for a millionaire. Though this Depression-era smash was made after the advent of sound, Chaplin remained steadfast in his love for the expressive beauty of the pre-talkie form. The result was the epitome of his art and the crowning achievement of silent comedy. Product Features New, restored 4K digital film transfer, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack New audio commentary by Charlie Chaplin biographer Jeffrey Vance Chaplin Today: City Lights, a 2003 documentary on the film's production, featuring Aardman Animations cofounder Peter Lord Chaplin Studios: Creative Freedom by Design, a new interview program featuring visual effects expert Craig Barron Archival footage from the production of City Lights, including film from the set, with audio commentary by Chaplin historian Hooman Mehran; a costume test; a rehearsal; and a complete scene not used in the film Excerpt from Chaplin's short film The Champion (1915), along with footage of the director with boxing stars at Chaplin Studios in 1918 Trailers PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic Gary Giddins and a 1966 interview with Chaplin

• Vincent and Theo | DVD | (10/09/2007) from £27.80   |  Saving you £-7.81 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  In life he was impoverished his work largely ignored; yet today paintings by Vincent Van Gogh fetch millions of dollars at auction. This supreme irony is laid bare in the passionate story of an obsessive artist driven by inexorable demons and his alternately devoted and despairing younger brother who seems unable to live with him.....or without him.

• Millions Like Us | DVD | (20/07/2015) from £4.99   |  Saving you £8.00 (160.32%)   |  RRP £12.99

  When shy working-class girl Celia Crowson (Roc) is called up for war service during World War Two, she dreams of a glamorous job in one of the services. But as a young unmarried woman, she is given a position in a local factory manufacturing aircraft parts. There she makes friends with other girls from very different social backgrounds, and begins a tentative relationship with a young airman, Fred Blake (Gordon Jackson).

• Una | Blu Ray | (08/01/2018) from £11.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Based on David Harrower's celebrated, Olivier Award-winning play Blackbird, Benedict Andrews' UNA stars the Oscar-nominated Rooney Mara (Carol, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo) and Emmy-nominated Ben Mendelsohn (Animal Kingdom, Starred Up, Star Wars: Rogue One), following a young woman's journey to reclaim her past.

• South Riding | DVD | (23/07/2007) from £17.98   |  Saving you £14.00 (87.55%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Based on Winifred Holtby's popular novel South Riding was one of the biggest television hits of its year and starred Dorothy Tutin as headmistress Sarah Burton. Burton is left-wing and a feminist and is disgusted by the social injustices faced by her pupils. In spire of her beliefs she reluctantly finds herself falling in love with a Tory landowner.

• The Brave | DVD | (02/02/2009) from £9.82   |  Saving you £-3.83 (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Raphael (Johnny Depp also making his directorial debut) and his young family live in Morgantown on the edge of the American Dream. With one step over the poverty line he sees only one way out... money. Raphael meets the monstrous snuff movie maker McCarthy (Marlon Brando). He offers Raphael 000 to be the star of one of his movies. He accepts and has 000 in his hand 000 to go to his family and just one week to live the rest of his life. Determined to make something good out of his last seven days he builds a junkyard paradise for his family. He relishes his new friendship with his kids and falls in love with his wife all over again. Realising that he is worth more to his family alive than dead he tries to return the money and end the contract... but is it too late?

• The 33 | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £6.75   |  Saving you £13.24 (196.15%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Based on the miraculous event that gripped the world - and filmed with the cooperation of the real-life miners, their families and their rescuers - 'The 33' shows the never-before-seen personal journeys which became nothing less than a global phenomenon.

• 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

• Richard III (DVD + Blu-ray) | Blu Ray | (20/06/2016) from £14.11   |  Saving you £5.88 (41.67%)   |  RRP £19.99

  This film adaptation of a critically acclaimed stage production of Shakespeare's historical drama stars Ian McKellen in the title role. The setting is a comic-book vision of 1930s London: part art deco, part Third Reich, part industrial-age rust and rot. The play's force is turned into a synthetic high by art directors and storyboard sketchers, all of whom have a field day condensing the material into disposable pop imagery. Richard III is a fun film, more than anything, so infatuated with its own monstrous stitchery that even the most awkward casting (Annette Bening and Robert Downey Jr) seems a part of the ridiculous design. McKellen is the best thing about the movie, his mesmerising portrayal of freakish despotism and poisoned desire a thing to behold. --Tom Keogh

• The Pianist | Blu Ray | (02/10/2023) from £13.79   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Nominated for 7 Academy Awards, including Best Picture and winner of 3, The Pianist stars Oscar winner Adrien Brody in the true-life story of brilliant pianist and composer Wladyslaw Szpilman, the most acclaimed young musician of his time until his promising career was interrupted by the onset of World War II. This powerful, ultimately triumphant film follows Szpilman's heroic and inspirational journey of survival with the unlikely help from a sympathetic German officer (Thomas Kretschmann). A truly unforgettable epic, testifying to both the power of hope and the resiliency of the human spirit, The Pianist is a miraculous tale of survival. Product Features Interview with Michael Ciment Restoration Featurette Trailer 2023

• The Terminal / Catch Me If You Can / Cast Away | DVD | (03/10/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Includes the following films:The Terminal:Starring Tom Hanks and Catherine Zeta Jones. Viktor Navorski (Hanks) gets caught in bureaucratic glitches that make it impossible for him to return to his home country to enter the U.S. Now, caught up in the richly complex and amusing world inside J.F.K. airport, Viktor makes friends, gets a job, finds romance and ultimately discovers America itself.Catch Me If You Can:Inspired by the true story of a brilliant master of deception and the FBI agent, hot on his trail, Catch Me If You Can stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hanks in one of the year's most acclaimed hits! From director Steven Spielberg, Catch Me If You Can follows Frank W. Abagnale, Jr. as he successfully passes himself off as a pilot, a lawyer and a doctor - all before his 21st birthday!Cast Away:Tom Hanks stars as Chuck Noland, a FedEx systems engineer whose ruled-by-the-clock existence abruptly ends when a harrowing plane crash leaves him isolated on a remote island. As Chuck struggles to survive, he finds that his own personal journey has only just begun...

• The Acid House | DVD | (07/06/2004) from £8.52   |  Saving you £1.47 (17.25%)   |  RRP £9.99

  In The Acid House director Paul McGuigan adapts three Irvine Welsh short stories. These are set in an unflinchingly depicted world of grey, breeze block tenements, wiry psychos, short leather skirts, beer, fags and drugs, kinky sex in badly wallpapered lounges, random violence, hideous-looking babies, raves, footy, discarded crisp packets and barely intelligible dialogue featuring the occasional use of non-profanity."The Granton Star Clause" tells the unhappy tale of wee, pasty-faced Boab Doyle, who in one long, unhappy sequence loses his place in the football team, his girlfriend, his job and gets kicked out of the house by his parents, before an encounter with God (here, a hard-bitten, lager-quaffing Maurice Roeves) leads to a surreal, Kafka-esque conclusion. The second tale, "A Soft Touch", is gruellingly and well portrayed but pointlessly depressing. Kevin McKidd plays Johnny, a supermarket employee with an appalling slag-hag of a girlfriend who takes up with his new, violently psychotic and parasitical neighbour Larry. Will he stand up for himself? The answer will leave you thoroughly unsatisfied. Finally, there's "The Acid House", the funniest but silliest of the three tales in which Ewan Bremner plays an obnoxiously livewire Hibs fan who takes one too many tabs and ends up being transported into the mind of stereotypically middle-class couple's--Martin Clunes and Jemma Redgrave--baby. The Acid House is compulsive but bleak, exhilarating but ambivalent. The viewer is asked to bring their own moral compass to these stylised yet non-judgemental episodes. Fans of Trainspotting, however, will certainly find much of the scintillating same here.On the DVD: disappointingly, only the trailer is featured here. However, the DVD transfer in letterbox format is impeccable, used to its best advantage in the more surreal, fast-cut music video-style sequences, while the soundtrack, featuring The Verve and Primal Scream among others, also benefits. --David Stubbs

• The Squid and The Whale (Criterion Collection) Uk Only | Blu Ray | (05/12/2016) from £11.85   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  The Squid and the Whale follows the divorce of Joan (Laura Linney, You Can Count on Me) and Bernard Berkman (Jeff Daniels, The Purple Rose of Cairo) as it wreaks havoc on the emotional lives of their two sons, Walt (Jesse Eisenberg, Roger Dodger) and Frank (Owen Kline, The Anniversary Party). Though there's no plot in the usual sense, the movie progresses with growing emotional force from the separation into the bitter fighting between Joan and Bernard and the hapless, floundering behaviour of Walt and Frank, who act out through plagiarism, sexual acts and drinking. Some viewers may find the ending too diffuse; others will appreciate that writer/director Noah Baumbach (Mr. Jealousy) doesn't wrap up the messiness of life in a false cinematic package. Either way, viewers will appreciate how the specificity of the personalities makes The Squid and the Whale so compelling, as Baumbach has drawn the characters with such detail, both engaging and off-putting, that they leap off the screen. Naturally, he's greatly helped by the cast: Linney, Eisenberg, Kline and especially Daniels bite into these often unsympathetic portraits and give fearlessly honest performances, interlocked in both painful and funny ways--rarely have family dynamics been captured so vividly. If there was an ensemble Oscar, this cast would deserve it. --Bret Fetzer