"Actor: Gene Ray"

• Columbo - Series 1 | DVD | (13/09/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £34.99

  TV detective fans rejoice: Peter Falk's rumpled and infallible Lt. Columbo joins the DVD precinct with a five-disc set that features the detective's first nine appearances for NBC. Though Falk as Columbo (no first name) made his TV debut in 1967, the detective had actually first appeared on an episode of the 1960-61 Chevy Mystery Show (Bert Freed played the role) written by veteran TV scribes Richard Levinson and William Link (The Fugitive, Alfred Hitchcock Presents). The pair turned the episode into a stage play titled Prescription: Murder, which was adapted into a TV movie in 1967 with Falk in the lead. NBC greenlit a two-hour Columbo pilot (Ransom for a Dead Man) in 1971, and the series was launched that fall as part of the NBC Sunday Mystery Movie, a rotating 90-minute program that alternated Columbo with episodes of MacMillan and Wife and McCloud (another Levinson/Link creation). Viewers were quickly won over by Falk's shrewd performance as he matched wits with a host of exceptional guest stars (including Gene Barry, Patrick McGoohan, and others), all of whom assumed that the disheveled detective would never figure out their "perfect crimes"; the popularity and quality of the original series allows Falk to continue to don the trenchcoat some 30 years later for occasional Columbo TV movies. All seven 90-minute episodes of the 1971-72 debut season are included here, along with Prescription: Murder and Ransom for a Dead Man; unfortunately, as the lieutenant himself would say, "Oh, just one more thing"--no extras are included in the set, but having these fine TV mysteries in one set should be reward enough for armchair sleuths. --Paul Gaita

• Target | DVD | (05/07/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  From acclaimed director Arthur Penn Target is an intense spy-thriller starring Gene Hackman and Matt Dillon as a father and son who attempt to rescue their estranged wife/mother who has been kidnapped in Paris. Chris Lloyd does not get along with his father. He is too cautious and never tries anything new and Chris had to live by the same standards when he was growing up. But when his mother is kidnapped Walter turns into a man of action. Suddenly Chris discovers something he nev

• Leave Her To Heaven | DVD | (18/04/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Leave Her to Heaven is one of the most unblinkingly perverse movies ever offered up as a prestige picture by a major studio in the golden age of Hollywood. Gene Tierney, whose lambent eyes, porcelain features, and sweep of healthy-American-girl hair customarily made her a 20th Century Fox icon of purity, scored an Oscar nomination playing a demonically obsessive daughter of privilege with her own monstrous notion of love. By the time she crosses eyebeams with popular novelist Cornel Wilde on a New Mexico-bound train, her jealous manipulations have driven her parents apart and her father to his grave. Well, no, not grave: Wilde soon gets to watch her gallop a glorious palomino across a red-rock horizon as she metronomically sows Dad's ashes to the winds. Mere screen moments later, she's jettisoned rising-politico fiancé Vincent Price and accepted a marriage proposal the besotted/bewildered Wilde hasn't quite made. Can the wrecking of his and several other lives be far behind? Not to mention a murder or two. Fox gave Ben Ames Williams's bestselling novel (probably just the sort of book Wilde's character writes) the Class-A treatment. Alfred Newman's tympani-heavy music score signals both grandeur and pervasive psychosis, while spectacular, dust-jacket-worthy locations and Oscar-destined Technicolor cinematography by Leon Shamroy ensure our fixed gaze. Impeccably directed by the veteran John M. Stahl (who'd made the original Back Street, Imitation of Life, and Magnificent Obsession a decade earlier), the result is at once cuckoo and hieratic, and weirdly mesmerizing. Bet Luis Buñuel loved it. --Richard T. Jameson

• Silver Streak | DVD | (04/09/2006) from £8.25   |  Saving you £4.74 (57.45%)   |  RRP £12.99

  It's the most hilarious suspense ride of your life! In this wild comedy adventure rail passenger George Caldwell (Gene Wilder) finds that a romantic escapade with a sultry secretary (Jill Clayburgh) puts him in the middle of a Hitchcockian murder plot. Leaping on and off the train in and out of roomettes bars and dining cars George teams up with an amiable small-time crook (Richard Pryor) to defy the murderer's henchmen FBI agents and a host of other outrageous characters!

• Timeslip | DVD | (13/10/2014) from £12.98   |  Saving you £-1.00 (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  A taut thriller interweaving sci-fi fantasy and a story of deadly industrial intrigue Timeslip is a 1955 feature from Emmy Award-winning British writer and director Ken Hughes. Showcasing strong performances from American leads Gene Nelson and Faith Domergue this rare feature (also known as The Atomic Man) is presented here in a brand-new transfer from the original film elements in its as-exhibited theatrical aspect ratio. A near-lifeless body is recovered from the Thames shot twice in the back and science reporter Delaney identifies the victim as Stephen Rayner a nuclear physicist who works at a nearby research institute. Delaney goes to the institute and is introduced to a man everyone believes to be Rayner; the likeness is uncanny. Delaney returns to the hospital and questions the now conscious man who mumbles the name ‘VASQUO’ and initials ‘U.T.C.’… a revelation that unfolds into a drama of international espionage. Special Features: Image Gallery Promotional Material PDF

• Welcome To Mooseport | DVD | (06/09/2004) from £2.19   |  Saving you £13.80 (86.30%)   |  RRP £15.99

  A local plumber (Romano) is plunged into the national spotlight when in a local election he takes on the former President of the United States (Hackman) who can't believe he's running against the man installing his toilet! To make matters worse the former premier is trying to steal the election and the affection of the handyman's girlfriend (Maura Tierney)... Whoever wins one thing's for sure: this town isn't small enough for the both of them!

• The Chamber | DVD | (06/06/2005) from £7.14   |  Saving you £-1.15 (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  With just 28 days until before his impending execution young attorney Adam Hall sets out to trace the events of a grisly event in an effort to prevent his grandfather from going to the gas chamber for a racist murder... Chris O'Donnell and Gene Hackman star in this electrifying thriller based on the novel by John Grisham with a screenplay from Oscar winner William Goldman.

• The Man From U.N.C.L.E. | DVD | (08/09/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £30.99

  Fans of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. felt doubly blessed in 1965. Not only did its second series debut in colour, but there was also the first of several spin-off movies. The Spy with My Face thrilled audiences with "The August Affair", a plot to replace Napoleon Solo (Robert Vaughn) with a look-alike. The movie's only disappointment in this golden year for the show was the inexplicable absence of its catchy theme tune. By the third series the show had strayed too far into the campness of Batman, which also started in 1966. One Spy Too Many demonstrated the rush to cash-in on success before the bubble burst. This second theatrical release actually consists of two TV episodes, and played on US small screens first. This then became the pattern for the later movies, although what played where on international TV in episodic fashion becomes extremely complicated. The Karate Killers features Joan Crawford, Herbert Lom and Telly Savalas in a search for a secret formula (from Series 3). The Helicopter Spies pits Solo and Kuryakin (David McCallum) against two criminal masterminds (culled from Series 4). How to Steal the World is very much a finale, in that it comes from the very last episode. It rather shows, too, with only Leslie Nielsen looking serious about his art. It's no top secret that The Man from U.N.C.L.E.'s finest hours came early; the same certainly goes for these movies. Nevertheless, the gadgets are always great, the girls easy on the eye and the two leads superb in their chemistry together. On the DVD: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. has survived pretty well for its DVD incarnation. Although there's some grain and artefacts evident in the print, colours are bright and the image is generally sharp. Some work has gone into providing fun fan material, but unfortunately it's all via DVD-ROM and in PDF format. The eight text documents cover series origins, merchandise, the fans themselves and, of course, the movies featured in this box set. --Paul Tonks

• Heartbreakers | DVD | (11/02/2002) from £6.15   |  Saving you £9.10 (186.09%)   |  RRP £13.99

  In this comedy, Sigourney Weaver and Jennifer Love Hewitt play Max and Page, a mother and daughter who operate as con artists, using their good looks to lure a succession of rich men.

• Mr & Mrs Smith | DVD | (21/04/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Before Hollywood had entirely typecast Alfred Hitchcock as the master of suspense, with Mr & Mrs Smith he was allowed to fashion an elegant romantic trifle starring Robert Montgomery and Carole Lombard. It probably won't replace Rear Window or Psycho in your affections, but the film is more than a curious footnote to the director's career. The two leads play David and Ann Smith, a devoted but endlessly squabbling couple who discover their three-year marriage isn't legal. When he unexpectedly hesitates to arrange a second wedding, she storms out in a huff and soon begins dating his solid, dependable business partner Jeff (Gene Raymond). The rest follows the formula laid down by such previous screwball comedies as The Awful Truth (1937) and Bringing Up Baby (1938): David employs fair means or foul to win back Ann's heart, causes all sorts of complicated mischief, then... well, three guesses what happens in the end. The intriguing thing about the movie is how Hitchcock takes Norman Krasna's paper-thin script and adds sly undercurrents of menace. You may note, for instance, that the ostensibly happy Smiths treat each other with subtle sadism right from the start, and that David's tactical pursuit of his ex-wife (spying on her and deliberately offending Jeff's parents) involves them both in humiliations that are really quite sinister and ugly. Violence seems about to erupt in the recurring scenes where Ann shaves her husband (suggestively holding a razor up to his throat)--and make what you will of our hero's symbolic nosebleeds. There's a touch of Vertigo in one scary moment when a jammed amusement park ride leaves two characters dangling helplessly high above the ground--and a touch of shall we say relief for Hitchcock's well-known love of toilet humour in another oddball sequence. Montgomery and Lombard keep the mood acceptably frivolous, while indicating the flawed nature of the marital relationship. From the evidence of this one-off, Hitchcock might have been among the best comedy directors in the business, had he so wished. --Peter Matthews

• Hollywood Musicals Of The 40's | DVD | (01/09/2000) from £9.47   |  Saving you £-3.48 (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  In the 1940s America was just emerging from The Great Depression. War engulfed half the world and the future looked uncertain. The Hollywood musical had the recipe to make things better. With the Hollywood musical people still believed that dreams really do come true. Glamour spread across the screen. In glorious colour and even in black and white the screen glittered. Join the biggest stars as we celebrate the great musicals of the 1940s when Hollywood put its best feet forw

• 10 To Midnight | DVD | (03/05/2004) from £11.74   |  Saving you £4.24 (48.46%)   |  RRP £12.99

  The clock is ticking and time is running out as ace detectives Leo Kessler and Paul McAnn track down a psychotic killer who is brutally slaying young women. Caught in a web of red tape they seem unable to bring the murderer to justice until Kessler's daughter becomes the next victim and revenge becomes the most powerful of motives...

• Fred And Ginger | DVD | (06/02/2006) from £82.23   |  Saving you £-32.24 (N/A%)   |  RRP £49.99

  This mammoth of a box set contains eight discs and eight of the finest Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers features. Contains: 1. Top Hat 2. Shall We dance 3. Follow The Fleet 4. Carefree 5. The Gay Divorcee 6. Swing Time 7. Flying Down To Rio 8. The Story Of Vernon And Irene Castle For individual synopses please refer to the individual box sets.

• Hanky Panky | DVD | (07/02/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

• Death Of A Salesman | DVD | (07/10/2002) from £12.99   |  Saving you £6.00 (46.19%)   |  RRP £18.99

  A star-studded stage adaptation of Arthur Miller's classic play about hope failure family and ambition.

• The Locket | DVD | (07/02/2011) from £24.98   |  Saving you £-11.99 (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Men worshipped...cursed...hated...loved her!!! Nancy (Laraine Day) appears to be the perfect bride for her fianc''e John Willis (Gene Raymond) and everything is set for a perfect wedding ceremony...until her former husband Harry Blair (Brian Aherne) approaches Willis and explains how Nancy ruined his life eventually leaving him in a psychiatric ward. As Blair's story unfolds in flashbacks he recounts how Nancy's previous lover the renowned artist Norman Clyde (Robert Mitchum) warned him of Nancy's kleptomania incessant lying and involvement with murder; and at the time Blair refused to believe Clyde believing him to be the jilted lover. But is Blair's story also that of the jilted lover; or is he trying to save Willis from marrying a woman with a dark secret?

• Halloween IV: The Return of Michael Myers | DVD | (27/10/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £3.99

  You can't kill the bogeyman", the children insist to a terrorised Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) in the original Halloween. How right they are. Laurie is gone, but guess who's back in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers? Acting as if the third entry never existed, this instalment picks up 10 years after the original, with mad maniac Myers in a coma and moved to a new facility. But wouldn't you know it that as soon as a loose-lipped orderly lets slip that Myers has a surviving niece he springs back into action, leaving a bloody trail of corpses on the road to Haddonfield. Donald Pleasance returns as Dr Loomis, scarred and crippled from his last encounter with Myers and seething with a fanatical zeal to stop the freak from repeating his previous rampage. Pleasance is the best thing about the film as an ageing hero seemingly on the verge of madness who drags a bum leg in his manic rush to save little orphan Jamie (Danielle Harris), the 10-year-old waif terrorised by her homicidal uncle. Director Dwight Little has managed a generic if professional slasher picture, rife with improbabilities and dominated by a killer whose superhuman powers reach near-mystical dimensions, but he delivers the goods: shocks, stabs and cold, cruel killings. --Sean Axmaker, Amazon.com

• Trick Or Treat | DVD | (14/07/2008) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Eddie Weinbauer is a typical all-American teenager. At least he was until he fell under the evil spell of rock music. Now he's obsessed with his superstar idol Sammi Curr and as Halloween approaches Eddie begins to realise this isn't only rock n roll.. It's life or death!

• What Women Want / Miss Congeniality / Heartbreakers | DVD | (11/11/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  What Women Want: Meet Nick Marshall (Mel Gibson). A successful advertising executive Nick has the world and its women at his fingertips. Or so he thinks. The world of advertising is fast becoming a woman's world and slick-talking chauvinistic womanising Nick is out of touch. Miss Congeniality: Sandra Bullock stars as a bumbling female FBI agent assigned to go undercover as a participant in the Miss United States beauty pageant when it is discovered that one of the contestants is being targeted for murder. Benjamin Bratt leads the undercover team while also playing the reluctant love interest. Candice Bergen and William Shatner manage the pageant and hire Michael Caine to turn Bullock from rough and tumble agent to stunning beauty queen. The physical transformation is impressive although the klutzy personality remains. Everything seems to be fine once the killer is suddenly caught but Bullock suspects there is more to this story and the truth eventually unfolds with an unexpected twist. Heartbreakers: Max (Sigourney Weaver) and Page (Jennifer Love Hewitt) are a mother and daughter con team with a devious routine. Max targets wealthy men lures them into marriage and then the equally gorgeous Page seduces them leaving Max to discover their infidelity and reap huge divorce settlements which tide them over until they target their next victim.

• Halloween IV: The Return of Michael Myers | DVD | (05/09/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £3.99

  You can't kill the bogeyman", the children insist to a terrorised Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) in the original Halloween. How right they are. Laurie is gone, but guess who's back in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers? Acting as if the third entry never existed, this instalment picks up 10 years after the original, with mad maniac Myers in a coma and moved to a new facility. But wouldn't you know it that as soon as a loose-lipped orderly lets slip that Myers has a surviving niece he springs back into action, leaving a bloody trail of corpses on the road to Haddonfield. Donald Pleasance returns as Dr Loomis, scarred and crippled from his last encounter with Myers and seething with a fanatical zeal to stop the freak from repeating his previous rampage. Pleasance is the best thing about the film as an ageing hero seemingly on the verge of madness who drags a bum leg in his manic rush to save little orphan Jamie (Danielle Harris), the 10-year-old waif terrorised by her homicidal uncle. Director Dwight Little has managed a generic if professional slasher picture, rife with improbabilities and dominated by a killer whose superhuman powers reach near-mystical dimensions, but he delivers the goods: shocks, stabs and cold, cruel killings. --Sean Axmaker, Amazon.com