"Actor: Beale"

• Operation Mincemeat | DVD | (04/07/2022) from £6.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  It's 1943.¯The Allies are determined to break Hitler's grip on occupied Europe, and plan to launch an all-out assault on Sicily; but they face an impossible challenge - how to protect the invasion force from potential annihilation. It falls to two remarkable intelligence officers, Ewen Montagu (Colin Firth) and Charles Cholmondeley (Matthew Macfadyen) to dream the most inspired and improbable disinformation strategy of the war - centred on the most unlikely of secret agents: a dead man. Operation Mincemeat is the extraordinary and true story of an idea that hoped to turn the tide for the Allies - taking impossibly high risks, defying logic, and testing the nerves of its creators to breaking point.

• The Death of Stalin | DVD | (26/02/2018) from £6.99   |  Saving you £-2.00 (N/A%)   |  RRP £4.99

  The internal political landscape of 1950's Soviet Russia takes on darkly comic form in a new film by Emmy award-winning and Oscar-nominated writer/director Armando Iannucci. In the days following Stalin's collapse, his core team of ministers tussle for control; some want positive change in the Soviet Union, others have more sinister motives. Their one common trait? They're all just desperately trying to remain alive. A film that combines comedy, drama, pathos and political manoeuvring, The Death of Stalin is a Quad and Main Journey production, directed by Armando Iannucci, and produced by Yann Zenou, Kevin Loader, Nicolas Duval Assakovsky, and Laurent Zeitoun. The script is written by Iannucci, David Schneider and Ian Martin, with additional material by Peter Fellows.

• My Cousin Rachel | DVD | (30/10/2017) from £3.81   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  A young Englishman plots revenge against his mysterious, beautiful cousin, believing that she murdered his guardian. But his feelings become complicated as he finds himself falling under the beguiling spell of her charms.

• The Death of Stalin | Blu Ray | (26/02/2018) from £8.95   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  'The Death Of Stalin' follows the Soviet dictator's last days and depicts the chaos of the regime after his death.

• A Handful Of Dust | DVD | (19/09/2005) from £10.97   |  Saving you £-5.99 (N/A%)   |  RRP £1.99

  Adapted from Evelyn Waugh's Jazz Age satire, A Handful of Dust is a brutal story of a failed marriage with shattering consquences. James Wilby stars as a country gentleman, Tony Last, who loves rattling around his expansive estate, Hetton Abbey. Tony's wife, Brenda (Kristin Scott Thomas), however, pines for London's excitement and commences an affair in the city with penniless aristocrat John Beaver (Rupert Graves). The fallout of Brenda's betrayal includes a family tragedy and creative divorce settlement ultimately undone when fed-up Tony goes on a naturalist trek through Brazil and becomes the hostage of a mad, illiterate explorer (Alec Guinness). One might wonder whether it's more appropriate to laugh or tremble at these events, and director Charles Sturridge's handsome, graceful production ingeniously accommodates the story's streaks of dark comedy and horror. With brief, memorable supporting roles for Anjelica Huston and Stephen Fry.----Tom Keogh

• Operation Mincemeat | Blu Ray | (04/07/2022) from £11.89   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  It's 1943.¯The Allies are determined to break Hitler's grip on occupied Europe, and plan to launch an all-out assault on Sicily; but they face an impossible challenge - how to protect the invasion force from potential annihilation. It falls to two remarkable intelligence officers, Ewen Montagu (Colin Firth) and Charles Cholmondeley (Matthew Macfadyen) to dream the most inspired and improbable disinformation strategy of the war - centred on the most unlikely of secret agents: a dead man. Operation Mincemeat is the extraordinary and true story of an idea that hoped to turn the tide for the Allies - taking impossibly high risks, defying logic, and testing the nerves of its creators to breaking point.

• Persuasion | DVD | (01/11/1999) from £14.29   |  Saving you £5.70 (39.89%)   |  RRP £19.99

  After a slow beginning, in which the complex tangle of relationships is initially confusing, this BBC adaptation of Jane Austen's last novel, Persuasion, develops into an elegant romantic comedy. Austin combines a subtle dissection of the folly of class with a slow-burning, intensely passionate love story. Anne Elliot (Amanda Root) has loved Captain Wentworth (Ciaran Hinds) ever since she was persuaded to reject him years before. Now he has returned from the Napoleonic wars, but will love be allowed to blossom? Especially when Anne is surrounded by the selfish, petty-minded Mary, misguided by Lady Russell, and burdened by a father obsessed with fairness of countenance above all other considerations. Excepting a basic booklet, on-screen character biographies and a Dolby Digital soundtrack, there is nothing to distinguish this DVD from the video version. The picture is very good, but showing some grain, not exceptional, so unless you have a large television there is little advantage over tape. In any format, what makes this adaptation work is the sharp screenplay by Nick Dear and the naturalistic style of director Roger Mitchell (who joined the A-list with Notting Hill, 1999), together eliciting fine performances from the ensemble cast. Less flamboyant than Pride and Prejudice (1995), this is a civilised treat. --Gary S Dalkin

• The Deep Blue Sea | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £6.99   |  Saving you £9.00 (128.76%)   |  RRP £15.99

  The wife of a British Judge is caught in a self-destructive love affair with a Royal Air Force pilot.

• William Shakespeare: The Tempest | DVD | (28/07/2017) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Ancient Worlds | DVD | (06/12/2010) from £9.35   |  Saving you £15.64 (167.27%)   |  RRP £24.99

  Ancient Worlds is a six-part odyssey from the first cities of Mesopotamia to the Christianisation of the Roman Empire with archaeologist and historian Richard Miles at the helm. The series tells the story of what Richard argues is mankind's greatest achievement - civilisation. The series offers an epic sweep of history against a panorama of stunning locations and bold propositions about the origins of human society. In the 21st century we might fondly imagine that it is humankind's natural state to live together in communities that extend beyond blood ties. As Ancient Worlds sets out to show however no such assumptions were made by the first clan chiefs who decided to form communities in southern Iraq in 4500 BC. There is nothing natural about the city and its founders understood that its very survival relied on compromise ruthlessness sacrifice and toil. In the West we have consigned the term 'civilisation' to the museum display case. Embarrassed by its chauvinistic and elitist connotations we have increasingly taken refuge in more politically correct and soft-focused terms such as 'culture' to explain our origins. This series seeks to rescue civilisation from its enforced retirement and celebrate such a hard-fought invention.

• Dance to the Music of Time | DVD | (19/07/2010) from £26.98   |  Saving you £-6.99 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Anthony Powell's 12 volume novel sequence A Dance to the Music of Time dramatised for television.

• Sacred Music (The BBCs Groundbreaking TV Series) | DVD | (01/02/2010) from £21.35   |  Saving you £3.64 (17.05%)   |  RRP £24.99

  Actor and former chorister Simon Russell Beale explores the flowering of Western sacred music in this four-part BBC documentary series. Each episode features music performed by 'The Sixteen' choir conducted by Harry Christophers in sumptuous architectural settings. Episodes are: 'The Gothic Revolution', 'Palestrina and the Popes', 'Tallis, Byrd and the Tudors' and 'Bach and the Lutheran Legacy'. The release also includes a 90-minute concert performed by Harry Christophers and 'The Sixteen' at...

• Mozart: Die Zauberflote (The Magic Flute) -- Royal Opera House/Davis | DVD | (22/08/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £24.99

  A performance of the David McVicar production of Mozart's last opera. Colin Davis conducts the Royal Opera Chorus and Orchestra. Recorded at Covent Garden.

• The Hollow Crown: Series 1 | DVD | (13/06/2016) from £9.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Collection of four BBC adaptations of Shakespeare's history plays comprising 'Richard II', 'Henry IV: Part One', 'Henry IV: Part Two' and 'Henry V'. Beginning in the year 1399, the plays deal with events affecting the monarchy during a 16-year period, where the ruling orders of Richard II (Ben Whishaw), Henry IV (Jeremy Irons) and Henry V (Tom Hiddleston) find themselves beset by rebellion, greed and war. The cast also includes Rory Kinnear, Simon Russell Beale, Julie Walters and Lindsay Duncan.

• Grey Gardens | DVD | (30/04/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  From the filmmakers behind Salesman (1968) and The Rolling Stones' Gimme Shelter (1969) the Maysles Brothers present another of their 'non-fiction features' this time an offbeat voyeuristic and absorbing insight into the lives of two eccentric and reclusive women: Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter Edie. As aunt and cousin to the more famous Jackie Onassis 'Big Edie' and 'Little Edie' (as they became to be known) lived together in what had become a squalid mansion in the wealthy East Hampton area. What was once a grand summer residence had been reduced to a fortress of fleas feral cats and filth the gardens long gone to seed and Big Edie and Little Edie confined to just a few of the 28 rooms. For the previous twenty years they had perfected their mother/daughter act complete with song-and-dance routines. Her head mysteriously wrapped in scarves and towels Little Edie's modern dances punctuate her interpretations of life which primarily take the form of a litany of complaints against her mother. This routine seems to be old material lines well rehearsed through repeated use usually with Mrs. Beale as the foil together they invent a world with their house as a stage on which lifes disappointments and pleasures are recycled into riveting performances. This cult classic which has inspired a current Broadway show a centre page fashion spread in both Vogue and Harpers Bazaar and a forthcoming Hollywood 'remake' prompted the intervention of Jackie O. to save the couple from a hazardous health eviction order and any further `embarrassment for the family.

• Grey Gardens | Blu Ray | (18/04/2016) from £17.99   |  Saving you £10.00 (55.59%)   |  RRP £27.99

  Meet Big and Little Edie Beale: mother and daughter, high-society dropouts, and reclusive cousins of Jackie Onassis. The two manage to thrive together amid the decay and disorder of their East Hampton, New York mansion, making for an eerily ramshackle echo of the American Camelot. An impossibly intimate portrait, this 1976 documentary by Albert and David Maysles, codirected by Ellen Hovde and Muffie Meyer, quickly became a cult classic and established Little Edie as a fashion icon and philosopher queen. This special edition also features the 2006 follow-up to the film, The Beales of Grey Gardens, constructed from hours of extra footage in the filmmakers' vaults.

• That Summer | DVD | (16/07/2018) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Directed by acclaimed Swedish filmmaker Göran Hugo Olsson, That Summer centres on the film project artist Peter Beard initiated together with the incandescent Lee Radziwill about her relatives: the Beales of Grey Gardens. Lost for decades, this extraordinary footage re-emerges in Olsson s documentary, which focuses on Peter Beard and his family of friends, who formed a vibrant and profoundly influential creative community in Montauk (Long Island) in the 1970s. Featuring Peter Beard, Lee Radziwill, Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale, Edith Bouvier Beale (Little Edie and Big Edie) and Andy Warhol.

• The Dead Pool | DVD | (21/01/2002) from £10.71   |  Saving you £3.28 (30.63%)   |  RRP £13.99

  After the drudgery of Sudden Impact, the third and worst sequel to Dirty Harry, no one could have expected the fourth to have any signs of life. But The Dead Pool is fairly inspired, even playful--check out a "chase" scene between Clint Eastwood's Harry Callahan character and a remote-controlled toy car wielding a bomb--and it ended the long-running series on an unexpectedly positive note. This time, Callahan investigates a series of murders that appears to be on a "death list," while becoming romantically involved with a television reporter (Patricia Clarkson). Jim Carrey has a small but memorable part as a doped-up rock star, and Liam Neeson is on board, too. IT is directed by Eastwood-surrogate Buddy Van Horn (Any Which Way You Can). --Tom Keogh

• The Hollow Crown: Series 1 | Blu Ray | (17/11/2014) from £16.48   |  Saving you £16.50 (122.31%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Box Set of the 4 Part Television Mini Series; The Hollow Crown Richard II Henry IV Part 1 Henry IV Part 2 Henry V

• My Cousin Rachel (Includes Digital HD UV) | Blu Ray | (30/10/2017) from £9.77   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  A young Englishman plots revenge against his mysterious, beautiful cousin, believing that she murdered his guardian. But his feelings become complicated as he finds himself falling under the beguiling spell of her charms.