"Actor: Chris Langham"

• My Family And Other Animals | DVD | (23/04/2007) from £6.65   |  Saving you £-0.65 (N/A%)   |  RRP £6.00

  Adapted from Gerald Durrell's bestselling autobiography this much-loved classic tells the story of the naturalist's childhood years spent on the island of Corfu. A new world of freedom and adventure opens up to young Gerald when his somewhat eccentric family decide to leave the grey skies of England behind and start a new life. He soon discovers the wonder of nature in this sun-drenched environment and into the lives of the family come a succession of colourful characters including larger-than-life taxi-driver Spiro who helps them move from one villa to the next.

• Not The Nine O'Clock News - The Best Of Not The Nine O'Clock News - Vol. 1 | DVD | (18/08/2003) from £23.99   |  Saving you £-8.00 (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Volume One of Not the Nine O'Clock News comprises 98 minutes of early material from the sketch show that ran between 1979 and 1982. Starring Rowan Atkinson, Griff Rhys-Jones, Mel Smith and Pamela Stephenson and coscripted by Richard (Blackadder) Curtis among others, it wasn't especially ground-breaking by the standards of Monty Python or contemporary series such as The Young Ones, but it did provide some pretty blunt belly-laughs at the major social and political concerns of the era: Thatcher, Reagan, police brutality, the prospect of nuclear war. The latter makes for an excellent Question Time spoof, in which, with the four-minute warning having sounded, a panel of politicians continue bleating on their own agenda ("Three million people are going to die unemployed!"). Atkinson's stuff is among the best here, be it as a hideous young Tory, or as Gerald the Gorilla, now civilised to a fault by the captor who caught him in the wild. ("Wild? I was livid!") The much-repeated bit of him walking into a tree, however, doesn't work as he clearly anticipates the collision. While the musical elements look inevitably dated and a lengthy sketch on darts players boozing reaches the "Yeah, we get the point" mark long before it reaches its end, it's surprising how topical much of this material remains decades on--a sketch involving an agonising gay vicar springs to mind--while time hasn't eroded the quality of much of the writing. On the DVD: Not the Nine O'Clock News on disc comes with no extra features. --David Stubbs

• Not The Nine O'Clock News - The Best Of Not The Nine O'Clock News - Vol. 2 | DVD | (30/08/2004) from £9.89   |  Saving you £6.10 (61.68%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Between 1979 and 1982 the Not the Nine O'Clock News team produced the sharpest comedy to be found on British television and launched the careers of the stars production team and writers and was the most talked-about comedy series of the 1980s with an enormous following worldwide. Sketches flow with the sharpest wit. News clippings and archive material are mixed with monologues and music. This selection of their quick-fire blend of satire pastiche pop and witty sketches includ

• People Like Us | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  BBC interviewer Roy Mallard (Chris Langham The Thick Of It) travels the country to talk to ordinary folk. Mallard has little or no skill as an interviewer: he is over-earnest and after most of his voice-overs you realize there's something slightly odd about what he's said. He's apt to talk nonsense and is so obviously unattractive there's a running joke that nobody can believe he's married. But we never catch a glimpse of him: in a TV first the central character of this programme is always out of shot.

• The Thick Of It | DVD | (02/04/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  The Secretary of State for Social Affairs is having a meeting with Number Ten's Chief Political Advisor. There have been press rumours that the Minister is to be sacked. The Minister is told that none of these stories have come from Number Ten. However now they're out there Number Ten would look weak not to sack him. So he's sacked. His replacement as Minister for Social Affairs takes office. And so starts The Thick Of It featuring an ensemble of the best British comic actors improvising scripts from the sharpest British comedy writers.

• People Like Us | DVD | (16/09/2002) from £7.46   |  Saving you £12.53 (167.96%)   |  RRP £19.99

  The spoof documentary has long been a source of television comedy, but few series can claim to have hit the target as accurately as the BBC's People Like Us. The six episodes of the first series offer moment after moment of well observed, thoughtful and hilarious humour. Taking the fly-on-the-wall documentary genre as its inspiration, it focuses on the everyday lives of a range of different people: businessman, teacher, policeman, photographer, estate agent and solicitor. The comedy walks the line between the observational and the absurd (much of the dialogue is similar to that used in The Day Today) but mixes the two to perfection. The man behind the camera is the hapless Roy Mallard, played by Chris Langham, but he is seldom seen. It was the type of role that Langham was to reprise in the film The Big Tease but for now, People Like Us remains his finest hour. Have fun also spotting the number of actors who would go onto greater things in the likes of Smack the Pony and Rescue Me. --Phil Udell

• Monty Python's Life Of Brian (Special Edition) | DVD | (05/11/2007) from £17.87   |  Saving you £-0.88 (N/A%)   |  RRP £16.99

  You could say this is one of the greatest comedies ever but the Monty Python team said it first! 'Life Of Brian' is all about (and here's the big surprise) the life of Brian who was born in a Bethlehem manger next door to Jesus. Three wise men believe he is the messiah but it becomes apparent that he is only Brian. It's written and performed by the Monty Python lads so you know what you're in for; if you don't put this disc down and go out while it's safe!

• Monty Python Movies Box Set | DVD | (10/04/2017) from £29.99   |  Saving you £-14.00 (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Monty Python goes to the movies in this DVD boxset packed with three of their classic cinematic adventures. Enjoy ˜And Now For Something Completely Different', ˜Monty Python and the Holy Grail' and ˜Life of Brian'. And Now For Something Completely Different Monty Python's Flying Circus is regarded as a milestone In British Comedy, This, their first feature film, is an anthology of the funniest sketches from the legendary BBC television series. Pick one of your favourites from among many, including the famous Say No More, Nudge, Nudge sequence, the Hell's Grannies and The Dead Parrot. Monty Python and the Holy Grail After a chance meeting with a rather irate God, King Arthur and his Knights of The Round Table are set the sacred task of retrieving the all powerful Holy Grail. On their long quest they encounter a number of terrifying hazards the taunts of the abusive French Knight, disgruntled peasants, the Knights who say ˜Ni' and the deadly rabbit with the big pointy teeth. (Double Disc Set) Life of Brian The Pythons deliver a scathing, anarchic satire of both religion and Hollywood's depiction of all things biblical with their third film. The setting is Judea 33 A.D., a time of poverty and chaos, with no shortage of messiahs, followers willing to believe in them, and exasperated Romans trying to impose some order. (Double Disc Set)

• The Legend Of The Tamworth Two | DVD | (13/04/2004) from £10.29   |  Saving you £2.70 (20.80%)   |  RRP £12.99

  In 1998 two piglets escaped from an abattoir. This is their story as they hit the headlines as 'Butch and Sundance'. Evading capture for some time they finally earn their freedom and take up residence at an animal sanctuary in Kent.

• Black Pond | DVD | (16/04/2012) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £14.99

  An ordinary family are accused of murder when a stranger dies at their dinner table. Two-time BAFTA winner Chris Langham (Help, The Thick of It) stars as bumbling father Tom Thompson and inimitable British comedian Simon Amstell (Never Mind the Buzzcocks) makes his film debut as a sinister psychotherapist. Combining the quietly surreal with the beautifully mundane, this award-winning comedy tells the hilarious and heart breaking story of how The Thompsons became known as the 'Family of Killers'.Black Pond was nominated for Outstanding Debut at BAFTA.

• The Big Tease | DVD | (12/03/2001) from £21.25   |  Saving you £-7.26 (N/A%)   |  RRP £13.99

  Anyone who's suffered the misfortune of stumbling upon Kevin Allen's nauseous debut Twin Town--a ramshackle Trainspotting transposed to the cinematic slag heap of Swansea--will be pleasantly surprised by this gentle sophomore effort. The Big Tease follows gay Glaswegian hairdresser Crawford Mackenzie (Craig Ferguson), a flamboyant character who stays just the right side of caricature, as he heads to LA to represent bonny Scotland in the World Freestyle Hairdressing Championship. Only there's a hitch: once in Hollywood, Crawford discovers he's only been invited to be a spectator at the event, which means the huge hotel bill he's racked up will have to come out of his own pocket. Undeterred, the stubborn stylist sets about gaining a union card and, ultimately, entry to the competition, frantically trying to establish Beverly Hills contacts with a mind to pulling a few much-needed strings. Allen's movie is an interesting hybrid, half Hollywood satire (the greed, the self-importance, the insincerity) and half sports-movie with a twist (events inevitably lead to a climactic showdown, as Crawford goes blade-to-blade with the wonderfully pompous Norwegian champ). And yet, by and large, it works, the loquacious Ferguson giving us someone to hold onto in a slippery world populated by disdainful creeps, his probity alone ensuring our heartfelt support come competition night. The filmmakers' decision to opt for a "mockumentary" format à la The Blair Witch Project and Drop Dead Gorgeous also pays dividends, for it is Crawford's candid confessions to camera that allow us to navigate beyond his carefully constructed plumage and discover the person beneath.--Jamie Graham

• The Emperor's New Clothes | DVD | (02/08/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  On the remote Atlantic island of St. Helena the residence in exile for the past six years of the great Napoleaon Bonaparte that exile is about to end. A secret network of loyal Bonapartists is poised to return the Emperor to Paris while a double will play his part on the island. When the Emperor arrives in Paris the double on St. Helena will reveal himself as an imposter and Napoleon will reclaim his throne. Disguised as able-bodied seaman Eugene Lenormand Napoleon sets off for Paris while his doppelganger the real Eugene Lenormand wakes up in his Emperor's bed. But things don't work out as planned. Napoleon's ship changes course and he misses a crucial link in his network of supporters. Arriving eventually in Paris alone and friendless he meets a widowed melon seller and the two forge an unlikely but life changing relationship while Napoleon waits impatiently for his moment. When his return to glory is thwarted by an unexpected turn of events on St. Helena Napoleon has to find another way to confirm his true identity while finally letting go of imperial dreams.

• Help - Series 1 | DVD | (26/09/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

• The Emperor's New Clothes | DVD | (05/06/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A