"Actor: Howland Chamberlain"

• Kramer vs Kramer | DVD | (16/04/2007) from £5.70   |  Saving you £0.29 (5.09%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Winner of five Academy Awards including Best Picture, Actor, and Screenplay, Kramer vs. Kramer remains as powerfully moving today as it was when released in 1979, simply because its drama will remain relevant for couples of any generation. Adapted by director Robert Benton from the novel by Avery Corman, this is perhaps the finest, most evenly balanced film ever made about the failure of marriage and the tumultuous shift of parental roles. It begins when Joanna Kramer (Meryl Streep) bluntly informs her husband Ted (Dustin Hoffman) that she's leaving him, just as his advertising career is advancing and demanding most of his waking hours. Self-involvement is just one of the film's underlying themes, along with the search for identity that prompts Joanna to leave Ted with their first-grade son (Justin Henry), who now finds himself living with a workaholic parent he barely knows. Juggling his domestic challenge with professional deadlines, Ted is further pressured when his wife files for custody of their son. This legal battle forms the dramatic spine of the film, but its power is derived from Benton's flawlessly observant script and the superlative performances of his entire cast. Because Benton refuses to assign blame and deals fairly with both sides of a devastating dilemma, the film arrives at equal levels of pain, growth, and integrity under emotionally stressful circumstances. That gives virtually every scene the unmistakable ring of truth--a quality of dramatic honestly that makes Kramer vs. Kramer not merely a classic tearjerker, but one of the finest American dramas of its decade. --Jeff Shannon, Amazon.com

• Kramer vs Kramer | DVD | (02/05/2011) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  It might have started out as a small, rather arty divorce drama but Kramer vs Kramer was the biggest cinema hit of 1979. It confirmed Dustin Hoffman's status as a major star in a performance that combined his trademark twitchy intensity with deep sensitivity. And it provided Meryl Streep with a pivotal role in her rise to big-screen greatness. Both won Oscars, as did director Robert Benton and the film itself scooped the Best Picture award. Kramer vs Kramer has worn well into the 21st century. Although clearly of its time--by the late 1970s, microscopic relationship analysis had become the theme of commercial cinema--it stands on the strength of its central performances. Hoffman's Ted Kramer is a vision of the Graduate grown up: serious, focused and thrown by anything that threatens his upwardly mobile professional trajectory. The news that his wife, who he has failed to notice teetering on the edge of a breakdown, is leaving him and their son sends him into a tailspin. The film is as much about his resilience and fulfilment as it is the story of a divorce and custody battle. Justin Henry is extraordinary as Billy, the boy caught in the middle, and turns in a remarkably complex, thoughtful performance, which is light years from the archetypal all-American kid you might anticipate. And in just a handful of scenes, Streep is mesmerising as Joanna, the deserting wife and mother who you just can't bring yourself to hate. Yes, this is soap opera. But it belongs up there with all the finest cinematic human dramas. On the DVD: The widescreen presentation ensures a theatrically authentic experience, with some fantastic shots of New York city coming into their own. The mono sound is adequate for the relative intimacy of most of the dialogue. But the real bonus is the retrospective documentary in which director and writer Benton, producer Stanley Jaffe and the cast look back with touching satisfaction at a piece which clearly meant a great deal to them all. Hoffman's initial reluctance (he was going through a real-life divorce) to get involved, the process of working with a gifted child actor and Streep's desire to make Joanna understood are all recalled in fascinating detail. --Piers Ford

• Force Of Evil | DVD | (30/01/2006) from £21.58   |  Saving you £-5.59 (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Joe Morse (Garfield) has never had it so good. The smart young Wall Street lawyer joins a get-rich-quick scheme of a mob boss who plans on bankrupting the city's small-time numbers racketeers and consolidating their businesses . However when Morse discovers he must choose between his loyalty to the ruthless racket kingpin or his family the true force of evil is revealed... Based on the novel by Ira Wolfert.