Drama

• The Notebook | DVD | (07/02/2005) from £3.99  |  Saving you £16.00 (80.00%)  |  RRP £19.99

  When you consider that old-fashioned tearjerkers are an endangered species in Hollywood, a movie like The Notebook can be embraced without apology. Yes, it's syrupy sweet and clogged with clichés, and one can only marvel at the irony of Nick Cassavetes directing a weeper that his late father John--whose own films were devoid of saccharine sentiment--would have sneered at. Still, this touchingly impassioned and great-looking adaptation of the popular Nicholas Sparks novel has much to recommend, including appealing young costars (Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams) and appealing old costars (James Garner and Gena Rowlands, the director's mother) playing the same loving couple in (respectively) early 1940s and present-day North Carolina. He was poor, she was rich, and you can guess the rest; decades later, he's unabashedly devoted, and she's drifting into the memory-loss of senile dementia. How their love endured is the story preserved in the titular notebook that he reads to her in their twilight years. The movie's open to ridicule, but as a delicate tearjerker it works just fine. Message in a Bottle and A Walk to Remember were also based on Sparks novels, suggesting a triple-feature that hopeless romantics will cherish. --Jeff Shannon

• Jonathan Creek - Complete Series 1-4 Boxset | DVD | (29/11/2004) from £14.99  |  Saving you £60.00 (80.00%)  |  RRP £74.99

  This box set contains all four series of Jonathan Creek to date. Alan Davies and Caroline Quentin star in this highly successful murder mystery drama series. Jonathan magic expert and amateur sleuth extraordinaire turns out to be less successful in his relationship with investigative crimewriter Maddy Magellen.... All the episodes from Series 1 and 2: 'The Wrestler's Tomb' 'Jack In The Box' 'The Reconstituted Corpse' 'No Trace of Tracey' and 'The House Of Monkeys'

• The Time Traveller's Wife | DVD | (08/02/2010) from £5.00  |  Saving you £14.99 (75.00%)  |  RRP £19.99

  The Time Traveler's Wife is based on the best-selling book about a love that transcends time. Clare (Rachel McAdams) has been in love with Henry (Eric Bana) her entire life. She believes they are destined to be together even though she never knows when they will be separated. Henry is a time traveler - cursed with a rare genetic anomaly that causes him to live his life on a shifting timeline skipping back and forth through his lifespan with no control. Despite the fact that Henry's travels force them apart with no warning Clare desperately tries to biuld a life with her one true love.

• The Wire - Season 1 | DVD | (18/04/2005) from £13.99  |  Saving you £37.00 (72.60%)  |  RRP £50.99

  From David Simon creator and co-writer of HBO's triple Emmy-winning mini-series 'The Corner' this unvarnished highly realistic HBO series follows a single sprawling drug and murder investigation in Baltimore. Told from the point of view of both the police and their targets the series captures a universe of subterfuge and surveillance where easy distinctions between good and evil and crime and punishment are challenged at every turn. Episodes comprise: 1. The Target 2.

• North And South | DVD | (11/04/2005) from £3.99  |  Saving you £16.00 (80.00%)  |  RRP £19.99

  A powerful adaptation of Elizabeth Gaskell's feisty and passionate love story set across the social divides in the changing world of Victorian industrial society. Margaret Hale is one of literature's most original heroines: a southerner from a country vicarage newly settled in the industrial northern town of Milton. In the shock of her move she misjudges charismatic cotton mill-owner John Thornton whose strength of purpose and passion are a match for her own pride and wilfulness. W

• Band Of Brothers | DVD | (05/11/2002) from £13.99  |  Saving you £45.26 (75.40%)  |  RRP £59.99

  A genuinely epic achievement, the 10-part World War II drama Band of Brothers is a television series that makes big-screen Hollywood war movies look small in comparison. Based on the book by historian Stephen Ambrose, the series follows the US 101st Airborne Division's "Easy" E-Company from initial training through D-Day and across Holland, Belgium, Germany and Austria until the end of the war. Coproduced by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks, the series take its initial inspiration from Saving Private Ryan and borrows that film's visceral visual approach to combat scenes using hand-held camerawork and de-saturated photography. But where Band of Brothers excels is in its scrupulous attention to the realities of military life (retired US Marine Captain Dale Dye, who also co-stars, is the man to credit). After the high drama of the parachute drop on D-Day, Easy's greatest trial comes during the Battle of the Bulge, when they are besieged at Bastogne in the depths of winter. In one of the most harrowing and credible depictions of war ever committed to film we see the men enduring the repeated artillery attacks of the German forces and experience, if only vicariously, some of the sheer terror of the assault, while being humbled by the soldiers' courage and determination. Such feelings are enhanced by the series' masterstroke--bookend interviews with the surviving members of Easy Company, who talk with barely suppressed emotion of the experiences we see recreated. The endorsement of these veterans elevates Band of Brothers beyond any mere "war film"--its extraordinary achievement is that it shows the horror and savagery of war without gloss or jingoism, and yet celebrates the fraternal bonds and dogged heroism of the men who fought. On the DVD: Band of Brothers arrives handsomely packaged in a six-disc box set with two episodes on each of the first five discs. Sound (Dolby 5.1) and picture (1.78:1 widescreen) only enhance the series' epic credentials. Disc 6 contains all the extras, the meatiest of which is the marvellous 80-minute documentary "We Stand Alone Together" about the real men of Easy Company. There's also a first-rate, genuinely interesting 30-minute "making of" feature about actor boot camp, visual effects and blowing up fake trees among many other things. This is complemented by actor Ron Livingston's revealing Video Diaries of boot camp. Additionally there's a "Who's Who" section and footage of the HBO premiere at Utah Beach, plus a TV spot for car company Jeep. --Mark Walker

• Sweet Home Alabama | DVD | (06/10/2003) from £3.99  |  Saving you £14.00 (77.80%)  |  RRP £17.99

  Melanie Carmicheal (Reese Witherspoon) is a New York fashion designer with the ideal glamourous life; beautiful successful and newly engaged to perfect-on-paper bachelor Andrew (Patrick Dempsey). All would be perfect if not for her past life with Jake (Josh Lucas) the redneck husband she married in high school who refuses to give her a divorce. When the too-good-to-be-true Andrew son of Mayor Kate Hennings (Candice Bergen) sweeps her off her feet by proposing Melanie goes back

• The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas | DVD | (09/03/2009) from £4.49  |  Saving you £13.24 (73.60%)  |  RRP £17.99

  Based on the best selling novel by John Boyne. Berlin 1942 - Eight-year-old Bruno knows nothing of the Final Solution and the Holocaust. He is oblivious to the appalling cruelties being inflicted on the people of Europe by his country. All he knows is that his father was promoted and he has been moved from a comfortable home in Berlin to a house in a desolate area where there is nothing to do and no-one to play with. Until he meets Shmuel a boy who lives a strange parallel existence on the other side of the adjoining wire fence and who like the other people there wears a uniform of striped pajamas. Bruno's friendship with Shmuel will take him from innocence to revelation as their secret meetings result in a friendship that has startling and devastating consequences.

• Into the Wild | DVD | (10/03/2008) from £2.99  |  Saving you £17.00 (85.00%)  |  RRP £19.99

  Freshley graduated from college with a promising future ahead 22-year-old Christopher McCandless (Emile Hirsch) instead walked out on his privileged life and into the wild in search of adventure. What happened to him on the way transformed this young wanderer into an emerging symbol for countless people. Was Christopher a heroic adventurer or a naive idealist a rebelious 1990's Thoreau or another lost American son a fearless risk-taker or a tragic figure who wrestled with the precious balance between man and nature? McCandless' quest took him from the wheat fields of South Dakota to a renegade trip down the Colorado River to the non-conformists' refuge of Slab City California and beyond. Along the way he encountered a series of colorful characters at the very edges of American society who shaped his understanding of life and whose lives he in turn changed. In the end he tested himself by heading alone into the wilds of the great North where everything he had seen and learned and felt came to a head in ways he never could have expected. Adapted by Jon Krakauer's acclaimed bestseller Into The Wild.

• Birth | DVD | (02/05/2005) from £1.50  |  Saving you £16.00 (80.00%)  |  RRP £19.99

  Academy Award winner Nicole Kidman stars in 'Birth' as Anna a young widow who is finally getting on with her life after the death of her husband Sean. Now engaged to be married Anna meets a ten year-old boy (Cameron Bright) who tells her he is Sean reincarnated. Though his story is both unsettling and absurd Anna can't get the boy out of her mind. And much to the concern of her fiance (Danny Huston) her increased contact with him leads her to question the choices she has made

• One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest | DVD | (01/01/2008) from £3.99  |  Saving you £10.00 (71.50%)  |  RRP £13.99

  One of the key movies of the 1970s, when exciting, groundbreaking, personal films were still being made in Hollywood, Milos Forman's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest emphasised the humanistic story at the heart of Ken Kesey's more hallucinogenic novel. Jack Nicholson was born to play the part of Randle Patrick McMurphy, the rebellious inmate of a psychiatric hospital who fights back against the authorities' cold attitudes of institutional superiority, as personified by Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher). It's the classic antiestablishment tale of one man asserting his individuality in the face of a repressive, conformist system--and it works on every level. Forman populates his film with memorably eccentric faces, and gets such freshly detailed and spontaneous work from his ensemble that the picture sometimes feels like a documentary. Unlike a lot of films pitched at the "youth culture" of the 1970s, One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest really hasn't dated a bit, because the qualities of human nature that Forman captures--playfulness, courage, inspiration, pride, stubbornness--are universal and timeless. The film swept the Academy Awards for 1976, winning in all the major categories (picture, director, actor, actress, screenplay) for the first time since Frank Capra's It Happened One Night in 1931. --Jim Emerson

• Coco Before Chanel | DVD | (23/11/2009) from £4.97  |  Saving you £15.02 (75.10%)  |  RRP £19.99

• My Sister's Keeper | DVD | (23/11/2009) from £5.00  |  Saving you £14.99 (75.00%)  |  RRP £19.99

• Of Mice And Men | DVD | (20/01/2003) from £3.00  |  Saving you £9.99 (76.90%)  |  RRP £12.99

  We have a dream. Someday we'll have a little house and a couple of acres. A place to call home. John Steinbeck's timeless classic comes magnificently to life in this beautiful and stirring film starring Oscar nominees John Malkovich (Being John Malkovich) and Gary Sinise (The Green Mile). Directed by Sinise from an adaptation by two-time Oscar winner Horton Foote this ""flawless miracle of movie-making"" (Susan Granger ""American Movie Classics"") is a must-see for all audiences.

• Schindler's List | DVD | (20/02/2006) from £6.99  |  Saving you £18.00 (72.00%)  |  RRP £24.99

  A cinematic masterpiece that has become one of the most honoured films of all time (seven Academy Awards among them) the film presents the indelible true story of the enigmatic Oskar Schindler a member of the Nazi party womaniser and war profiteer who saved the lives of more than 1 100 Jews during the Holocaust. It is the triumph of one man who made a difference and the drama of those who survived one of the darkest chapters in human history because of what he did. Please note:

• To Kill A Mockingbird (2 Disc Special Edition) | DVD | (28/11/2005) from £4.41  |  Saving you £15.58 (77.90%)  |  RRP £19.99

  Ranked 34 on the American Film Institute's list of the 100 Greatest American Films, To Kill a Mockingbird is quite simply one of the finest family-oriented dramas ever made. A beautiful and deeply affecting adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Harper Lee, the film retains a timeless quality that transcends its historically dated subject matter (racism in the Depression-era South) and remains powerfully resonant in present-day America with its advocacy of tolerance, justice, integrity and loving, responsible parenthood. It's tempting to call this an important "message" movie that should be required viewing for children and adults alike, but this riveting courtroom drama is anything but stodgy or pedantic. As Atticus Finch, the small-town Alabama lawyer and widower father of two, Gregory Peck gives one of his finest performances with his impassioned defence of a black man (Brock Peters) wrongfully accused of the rape and assault of a young white woman. While his children, Scout (Mary Badham) and Jem (Philip Alford), learn the realities of racial prejudice and irrational hatred, they also learn to overcome their fear of the unknown as personified by their mysterious, mostly unseen neighbour Boo Radley (Robert Duvall, in his brilliant, almost completely nonverbal screen debut). What emerges from this evocative, exquisitely filmed drama is a pure distillation of the themes of Harper Lee's enduring novel, a showcase for some of the finest American acting ever assembled in one film, and a rare quality of humanitarian artistry (including Horton Foote's splendid screenplay and Elmer Bernstein's outstanding score) that seems all but lost in the chaotic morass of modern cinema. --Jeff Shannon

• Gone With The Wind | DVD | (01/06/2006) from £3.85  |  Saving you £10.14 (72.50%)  |  RRP £13.99

  Gone with the Wind is a sprawling mosaic of a picture, one of the best-loved and most successful in movie history, but also one of the most frustrating. Wonderfully epic in scope, the decline and fall of the antebellum South as seen through the eyes of feisty, independent and wilful heroine Scarlett O'Hara makes the first half of the picture an absolutely riveting spectacle. From the aristocratic old world of Tara to the horrors of Atlanta under siege, Gone with the Wind features any number of indelible scenes and images: the genteel girls taking an enforced siesta during the Twelve Oaks barbecue, a horrified Scarlett walking through the wounded, the flight from burning Atlanta, and Scarlett's moving pledge against a burnished sunset set to Max Steiner's glorious music score. But the second half shifts gear, the melodramatic quotient is upped yet further as tragedy piles upon tragedy, and despite its unwieldy length everything feels rushed. Add to that the central problem that the audience never really understands, why Scarlett could ever fall for weak-chinned Ashley in the first place, and the picture begins to unravel unsatisfactorily. Behind the scenes problems doubtless contributed, with directors coming and going, Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable apparently barely able to stand the sight of each other, and producer David O Selznick's endless rewrites and interference. Nonetheless, this 1939 box-office smash remains one of Hollywood's finest achievements, an irresistible spectacle chock-full of the finest stars in the filmic firmament striking sparks off one another. They really don't make 'em like this anymore. On the DVD: No extra features on this DVD, which is a pity given the amount of material that must be available, but it has to be admitted this disc is worth the asking price simply to drink in the astonishing quality of the picture, sumptuously presented in its original 1.33:1 "Academy" ratio. The mono sound is vivid, too, showcasing Max Steiner's headily romantic score. --Mark Walker

• Edge Of Darkness - The Complete Series | DVD | (26/05/2003) from £3.97  |  Saving you £12.02 (75.20%)  |  RRP £15.99

  Groundbreaking environmental-espionage shocker Edge of Darkness (1985) begins routinely enough but then ratchets the suspense to levels that would have turned Hitchcock green with envy. Emma Craven (Joanne Whalley in her first starring role) is a young environmental activist killed in mysterious circumstances. Emma's father Ron Craven (Bob Peck in a star-making performance) will not be silenced and, as a police detective, is uniquely positioned to pursue his own unofficial investigation. He moves from grief to a determination to find the truth, all the while advised and comforted by Emma, but is she a ghost or a manifestation of his haunted psyche? Craven digs deeper, uncovering labyrinthine conspiracy in the nuclear industry and, as the body-count rises, encounters the garrulous CIA agent Darius Jedburgh (a superb Joe Don Baker) with a mysterious agenda of his own. Accompanied by a haunting musical score by Michael Kamen and Eric Clapton, Edge of Darkness builds on the legacy of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and Smiley's People to become quite simply the best television thriller ever. On the DVD: Edge of Darkness is presented on a two-disc set with the original six episodes complete and unedited (unlike the previous DVD release). The picture and sound has been improved, too, though the 4:3 image still suffers from the graininess of having been shot on 16 mm film and the sound is still unspectacular mono. The main extra is an excellent new 35-minute documentary, "Magnox: the Secrets of Edge of Darkness", with input from producer Michael Wearing, writer Troy Kennedy-Martin, composer Michael Kamen, stars John Woodvine, Charles Kay and Ian McNeice and archive footage with Bob Peck and Joe Don Baker. A notable bonus for fans of Eric Clapton and Kamen's highly atmospheric score is an isolated music track, unfortunately in mono. Less significant are a routine photo gallery, an alternative edit of the final end title and promotional segments from Breakfast Time and Pebble Mill. A BAFTA Award feature (the series won six) is more engaging, as is a roundtable review from Did You See?. --Gary S. Dalkin

• Seabiscuit | DVD | (23/02/2004) from £3.77  |  Saving you £13.52 (75.20%)  |  RRP £17.99

  Proving that truth is often greater than fiction, the handsome production of Seabiscuit offers a healthy alternative to Hollywood's staple diet of mayhem. With superior production values at his disposal, writer-director Gary Ross (Pleasantville) is a bit too reverent towards Laura Hillenbrand's captivating bestseller, unnecessarily using archival material--and David McCullough's narration--to pay Ken-Burns-like tribute to Hillenbrand's acclaimed history of the knobbly-kneed thoroughbred who "came from behind" in the late 1930s to win the hearts of Depression-weary Americans. That caveat aside, Ross's adaptation retains much of the horse-and-human heroism that Hillenbrand so effectively conveyed; this is a classically styled "legend" movie like The Natural, which was also heightened by a lushly sentimental Randy Newman score. Led by Tobey Maguire as Seabiscuit's hard-luck jockey, the film's first-rate cast is uniformly excellent, including William H Macy as a wacky trackside announcer who fills this earnest film with a much-needed spirit of fun. --Jeff Shannon

• Jane Eyre - 2006 (BBC) | DVD | (05/02/2007) from £4.85  |  Saving you £20.14 (80.60%)  |  RRP £24.99

  After a wretched childhood as an orphan and two years of being a teacher Jane Eyre yearns for new experiences. She accepts a governess position at Thornfield Manor where she tutors a lively French girl named Adele. She soon finds herself falling in love with the brooding owner of Thornfield; the dark and impassioned Mr Rochester. Jane gradually wins his heart but they must first overcome the dark secrets of his past before they can find happiness as man and wife. When Jane saves Rochester from a fire which he claims was started by a drunken servant she begins to suspect that she has not been told the whole story. Her fears are confirmed when Rochester;s secret past is revealed forcing Jane to flee Thornfield. Penniless and hungry she finds shelter and friendship in the shape of a kind clergyman and his family. But she is soon shocked to uncover the hidden truth of her own past... This brand new adaptation of Charlotte Bronte's much-adored classic Jane Eyre mines the novel for every ounce of passion drama colour madness and horror bringing to life Jane's inner world with beauty humour and at times great sadness. Newcomer Ruth Wilson (Jane Eyre) and Toby Stephens (Edward Rochester) head up an all-star cast in a passionate drama that also stars Francesca Annis Christina Cole Lorraine Ashbourne Pam Ferris Aidan McArdle and Tara Fitzgerald.