"Actor: James Joseph"

• Holocaust | DVD | (01/09/2008) from £15.15   |  Saving you £9.84 (64.95%)   |  RRP £24.99

  An original TV dramatisation of one of the most monstrous crimes in world history - the slaughter of 6 million Jews by the Nazis. Dramatically and definitively the story covers an entire decade the eventful years from 1935 to 1945. Holocaust focuses on the tragedy and triumph of a single family - the Weiss family. Their story is told in counter-poise to that of another fictional family that of Erik Dorf who portrays a Nazi aide to Germany''s infamous Heydrich. Starring a brilliant international cast and filmed on location in Berlin and Vienna.

• Blade Runner | 4K UHD | (04/09/2017) from £19.05   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  When Ridley Scott's cut of Blade Runner was finally released in 1993, one had to wonder why the studio hadn't done it right the first time--11 years earlier. This version is so much better, mostly because of what's been eliminated (the ludicrous and redundant voice-over narration and the phoney happy ending) rather than what's been added (a bit more character development and a brief unicorn dream). Star Harrison Ford originally recorded the narration under duress at the insistence of Warner Bros. executives who thought the story needed further "explanation"; he later confessed that he thought if he did it badly they wouldn't use it. (Moral: Never overestimate the taste of movie executives.) The movie's spectacular futuristic vision of Los Angeles--a perpetually dark and rainy metropolis that's the nightmare antithesis of "Sunny Southern California"--is still its most seductive feature, another worldly atmosphere in which you can immerse yourself. The movie's shadowy visual style, along with its classic private-detective/murder-mystery plot line (with Ford on the trail of a murderous android, or "replicant"), makes Blade Runner one of the few science fiction pictures to legitimately claim a place in the film noir tradition. And, as in the best noir, the sleuth discovers a whole lot more (about himself and the people he encounters) than he anticipates. The cast also includes Sean Young, Edward James Olmos, Daryl Hannah Rutger Hauer and M. Emmet Walsh. --Jim Emerson

• The Sopranos: Complete Series 2 | DVD | (24/11/2003) from £69.99   |  Saving you £-8.00 (N/A%)   |  RRP £61.99

  The second series of The Sopranos, David Chase's ultra-cool and ultra-modern take on New Jersey gangster life, matches the brilliance of the first, although it's marginally less violent, with more emphasis given to the stories and obsessions of supporting characters. Sadly, the programme-makers were forced to throttle back on the appalling struggle between gang boss Tony Soprano and his Gorgon-like Mother Livia, the very stuff of Greek theatre, following actress Nancy Marchand's unsuccessful battle against cancer. Taking up her slack, however, is Tony's big sister Janice, a New Age victim and arrant schemer and sponger, who takes up with the twitchy, Scarface-wannabe Richie Aprile, brother of former boss Jackie, out of prison and a minor pain in Tony's ass. Other running sub-plots include the hapless efforts by Chris (Michael Imperioli) to sell his real-life Mafia story to Hollywood, the return and treachery of Big Pussy and Tony's wife Carmela's ruthlessness in placing daughter Meadow in the right college. Even with the action so dispersed, however, James Gandofini is still toweringly dominant as Tony. The genius of his performance, and of the programme-makers, is that, despite Tony being a whoring, unscrupulous, sexist boor, a crime boss and a murderer, we somehow end up feeling and rooting for him, because he's also a family man with a bratty brood to feed, who's getting his balls busted on all sides, to say nothing of keeping the government off his back. He's the kind of crime boss we'd like to feel we would be. Tony's decent Italian-American therapist Dr Melfi's (Loraine Bracco) perverse attraction with her gangster-patient reflects our own and, in her case, causes her to lose her first series cool and turn to drink this time around. Effortlessly multi-dimensional, funny and frightening, and devoid of the sentimentality that afflicts even great American TV like The West Wing, The Sopranos is boss of bosses in its televisual era. --David Stubbs

• North By Northwest | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £6.99   |  Saving you £7.00 (100.14%)   |  RRP £13.99

  A hapless New York advertising executive is mistaken for a government agent by a group of foreign spies, and is pursued across the country while he looks for a way to survive

• Harvey | DVD | (04/06/2007) from £9.18   |  Saving you £0.81 (8.82%)   |  RRP £9.99

  This classic stage production gets a Hollywood make-over. James Stewart plays the title role as Elwood P. Dowd who befriends a human-sized rabbit by the name of Harvey: the trouble is only he can see him.

• The Wild | DVD | (18/09/2006) from £9.15   |  Saving you £8.84 (96.61%)   |  RRP £17.99

  Animals from the New York Zoo head into the city to rescue a friend in this CGI comedy-adventure.

• Harvey | DVD | (18/08/2003) from £6.59   |  Saving you £3.40 (51.59%)   |  RRP £9.99

  It's always a small surprise to revisit this movie and realise what a subtly dark performance James Stewart gives as an alcoholic who claims he keeps company with a six-foot-tall, invisible rabbit. As Elwood P. Dowd, the actor emits a faint whiff of decay and spirits, yet Stewart also embraces Dowd's romanticism and grace with splendid ease. Based on a hit play and directed by Henry Koster, the film is terribly funny at times, especially whenever Elwood decides it is only polite to introduce Harvey to complete strangers. The supporting cast can't be beat. --Tom Keogh

• Arsenic and Old Lace | DVD | (27/01/2020) from £6.49   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Iron Will | DVD | (14/10/2002) from £2.99   |  Saving you £12.00 (401.34%)   |  RRP £14.99

  The Uplifting True-Life Story of Courage Determination and Triumph! Hang on for the ride of your life as Walt Disney Pictures presents the action-packed adventure that delivers thrilling heroics and rugged scenery! Based on an incredible true-life story a brave young man is thrust into adulthood as he and his courageous team of sled dogs embark on a grueling and treacherous cross-country marathon. Together they race through the frozen wilderness carrying hopes of capturing the $

• The Sopranos: Complete Series 1 | DVD | (24/11/2003) from £13.89   |  Saving you £48.10 (346.29%)   |  RRP £61.99

  Writer-producer-director David Chase's extraordinary television seriesThe Sopranos is nominally an urban gangster drama, but its true impact strikes closer to home. This ambitious TV series chronicles a dysfunctional, suburban American family in bold relief. And for protagonist Tony Soprano, there's the added complexity posed by heading twin families, his collegiate mob clan and his own nouveau-riche brood. The brilliant first series is built around what Tony learns when, whipsawed between those two worlds, he finds himself plunged into depression and seeks psychotherapy--a gesture at odds with his midlevel capo's machismo, yet instantly recognisable as a modern emotional test. With analysis built into the very spine of the show's elaborate episodic structure, creator Chase and his formidable corps of directors, writers and actors weave an unpredictable series of parallel and intersecting plot arcs that twist from tragedy to farce to social realism. While creating for a smaller screen, they enjoy a far larger canvas than a single movie would afford and the results, like the very best episodic television, attain a richness and scope far closer to a novel than movies normally get. Unlike Francis Coppola's operatic dramatisation of Mario Puzo's Godfather epic, The Sopranos sustains a poignant, even mundane intimacy in its focus on Tony, brought to vivid life by James Gandolfini's mercurial performance. Alternately seductive, exasperated, fearful and murderous, Gandolfini is utterly convincing even when executing brutal shifts between domestic comedy and dramatic violence. Both he and the superb team of Italian-American actors recruited as his loyal (and, sometimes, not-so-loyal) henchman and their various "associates" make this mob as credible as the evocative Bronx and New Jersey locations where the episodes were filmed. The first year's other life force is Livia Soprano, Tony's monstrous, meddlesome mother. As Livia, the late Nancy Marchand eclipses her long career of patrician performances to create an indelibly earthy, calculating matriarch who shakes up both families; Livia also serves as foil and rival to Tony's loyal, usually level-headed wife, Carmela (Edie Falco). Lorraine Bracco makes Tony's therapist, Dr Melfi, a convincing confidante, by turns "professional", perceptive and sexy; the duo's therapeutic relationship is also depicted with uncommon accuracy. Such grace notes only enrich what's not merely an aesthetic high point for commercial television, but an absorbing film masterwork that deepens with subsequent screenings. --Sam Sutherland

• Arsenic And Old Lace | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £13.99

  A drama critic learns on his wedding day that his beloved maiden aunts are homicidal maniacs, and that insanity runs in his family.

• Sam | DVD | (30/01/2017) from £3.39   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Comedy directed by Nicholas Brooks starring Natalie Knepp and Sean Kleier. Sam (Brock Harris) is an insufferable misogynist, but he has a shock in store as he is suddenly transformed permanently into a beautiful young woman, Samantha (Knepp), the sort he'd normally have laid his unwarranted advances upon. So now that he has been thrown into the world of womanhood, with all of its pros and cons, how will Samantha react to being treated the way Sam used to treat women? And how will Samantha feel when she starts falling for Sam's best friend?

• 9/11 | DVD | (12/09/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  French filmmakers Jules and Gedeon Naudet were filming a documentary about a 'typical' New York firefighter on the fateful day September 11th 2001 when two planes hit the World Trade Centre. The brothers were able to film the courageous actions of the firefighters as they went about their business in the lobby of Tower One.

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

• Carlito's Way | DVD | (29/03/2004) from £2.99   |  Saving you £17.00 (568.56%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Al Pacino cuts a noble figure in this very enjoyable drama by director Brian De Palma (Scarface), based on a pair of books by Edwin Torres. Pacino plays a Puerto Rican ex-con trying hard to go straight, but his loyalty to his lowlife attorney (a virtually unrecognisable Sean Penn) and enemies on the street make that choice difficult. Penelope Ann Miller plays, somewhat unlikely, a stripper who has a romance with Pacino's character. The film finds De Palma tempering his more outlandish moves (think of Body Double or Snake Eyes) just as he did with the popular Untouchables and Mission: Impossible. But while Carlito's Way was not as commercially successful as those two movies, it is a genuinely compelling work graced with a fine performance by Pacino and a surprising one from Penn. --Tom Keogh

• The Sopranos: Complete Series 1 (Six Disc Set) | DVD | (29/10/2000) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £61.99

  The Sopranos, writer-producer-director David Chase's extraordinary television series, is nominally an urban gangster drama, but its true impact strikes closer to home: This ambitious TV series chronicles a dysfunctional, suburban American family in bold relief. And for protagonist Tony Soprano, there's the added complexity posed by heading twin families, his collegial mob clan and his own nouveau riche brood. The series' brilliant first season is built around what Tony learns when, whipsawed between those two worlds, he finds himself plunged into depression and seeks psychotherapy--a gesture at odds with his midlevel capo's machismo, yet instantly recognisable as a modern emotional test. With analysis built into the very spine of the show's elaborate episodic structure, creator Chase and his formidable corps of directors, writers, and actors weave an unpredictable series of parallel and intersecting plot arcs that twist from tragedy to farce to social realism. While creating for a smaller screen, they enjoy a far larger canvas than a single movie would afford, and the results, like the very best episodic television, attain a richness and scope far closer to a novel than movies normally get. Unlike Francis Coppola's operatic dramatisation of Mario Puzo's Godfather epic, The Sopranos sustains a poignant, even mundane intimacy in its focus on Tony, brought to vivid life by James Gandolfini's mercurial performance. Alternately seductive, exasperated, fearful, and murderous, Gandolfini is utterly convincing even when executing brutal shifts between domestic comedy and dramatic violence. Both he and the superb team of Italian-American actors recruited as his loyal (and, sometimes, not-so-loyal) henchman and their various "associates" make this mob as credible as the evocative Bronx and New Jersey locations where the episodes were filmed. The first season's other life force is Livia Soprano, Tony's monstrous, meddlesome mother. As Livia, the late Nancy Marchand eclipses her long career of patrician performances to create an indelibly earthy, calculating matriarch who shakes up both families; Livia also serves as foil and rival to Tony's loyal, usually level-headed wife, Carmela (Edie Falco). Lorraine Bracco makes Tony's therapist, Dr Melfi, a convincing confidante, by turns "professional", perceptive, and sexy; the duo's therapeutic relationship is also depicted with uncommon accuracy. Such grace notes only enrich what's not merely an aesthetic high point for commercial television, but an absorbing film masterwork that deepens with subsequent screenings. --Sam Sutherland, Amazon.com

• Harvey | Blu Ray | (10/09/2012) from £29.99   |  Saving you £-15.00 (N/A%)   |  RRP £14.99

  James Stewart gives one of his finest performances in this lighthearted film, based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning play. Stewart stars as the good-natured Elwood P. Dowd, whose constant companion is Harvey, a six-foot tall rabbit that only he can see.To his sister, Veta Louise, Elwood's obsession with harvey has been a thorn in the side of her plans to marry off her daughter. But when Veta Louise decides to put Elwood in a mental hospital, a hilarious mix-up occurs and she finds herself committed instead. It's up to Elwood to straighten out the mess with his kindly philosophy, and his imaginary friend, in this popular classic that features a Best Supporting Actress Academy Award winning performance by Joesphine Hull

• Minette Walters Collection | DVD | (20/06/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £44.99

  This boxset contains five dramatisations of Minette Walters stories featuring: The Ice House; The Scolds Bridle; The Echo; The Dark Room and The Sculptress. The Ice House (Dir. Tim Fywell 1997): Since the disappearance of her husband David ten years earlier Phoebe Maybury had been under suspicion and Inspector Jack Walsh had mounted an intensive investigation but in the absence of a corpse the case had remained unsolved. The discovery of a body in the ice house ten yea

• Z Cars | DVD | (02/09/2013) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Every decade has its own kind of cop show and in the 1960s and early 70s following years of national love and acclaim for Dixon of Dock Green it came time for a new breed of policeman to take to the screen. Set in Newtown a fictional setting to the North of Liverpool it captures a time when coppers were leaving the beat for fast-paced response vehicles - the Z-Cars of the title. These colour episodes from 1972 make up our first collection capturing some of the characters and crimes that shaped the long ago decade of old-school policing when the concept of a crime family was up to three generations of burglars shoplifters and smash-and-grabbers. Z-Cars was also innovative in reflecting a changing and challenging time for the police men and women themselves engaging with their own personal crises and their impact on the force. So sit back and buckle-up as we let the criminal underworld of Newtown know that Z-Cars on the way.

• King of Kings | DVD | (10/04/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  The King Of Kings is the Greatest Story Ever Told as only Cecil B. DeMille could tell it. In 1927 working with the biggest budget in the history of Hollywood DeMille spun the life and Passion of Christ into one of the highest-grossing films of all time. Featuring text drawn directly from the Bible a cast of thousands and a cinematic bag of tricks that could belong to none other than Hollywood's greatest showman The King Of Kings is at once spectacular and deeply reverent-part Gospel part Technicolor epic.