"Actor: Johnny Rocco"

• Donnie Brasco | DVD | (01/10/1999) from £5.94   |  Saving you £6.05 (101.85%)   |  RRP £11.99

  Based on a memoir by former undercover cop Joe Pistone (whose daring and unprecedented infiltration of the New York Mob scene earned him a place in the federal witness protection program), Donnie Brasco is like a de-romanticised, de-mythologised version of The Godfather. It offers an uncommonly detailed, privileged glimpse inside the world of organised crime from the perspective of the little guys at the bottom of Mafia hierarchy rather than from the kingpins at the top. Donnie Brasco is not only one of the great modern-day gangster movies to put in the company of The Godfather films and GoodFellas, but it is also one of the great undercover police movies--arguably surpassing Serpico and Prince of the City in richness of character, detail and moral complexity. Donnie (Johnny Depp, a splendid actor) is practically adopted by Lefty Ruggiero (Al Pacino), a gregarious, low-level "made" man who grows to love his young protégé like a son. (Pacino really sinks into this guy's skin and polyester slacks and creates his freshest, most fully realised character since his 1970s heyday.) As Donnie acclimates himself to Lefty's world, he distances himself from his wife (a terrific Anne Heche) and family for their own protection. Almost imperceptibly his sense of identity slips away from him. Questioning his own confused loyalties, unable to trust anybody else because he himself is an imposter, Donnie loses his way in a murky and treacherous no-man's land. The film is directed by Mike Newell, who also headed up Four Weddings and a Funeral and the gritty, true crime melodrama Dance with a Stranger. --Jim Emerson

• The Harry Novak Collection - Volume 2 (The Notorious Cleopatra, Wilbur And The Baby Factory, The Toy Box) | DVD | (09/07/2012) from £22.93   |  Saving you £-2.94 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  The King of psychedelic swing(ing) is back! Legendary film maker Harry Novak returns with three more slices of outrageous smut, propelling us on a journey down the pits of bad taste and sleaze. Little is left to the imagination as Harry serves up a cocktail of orgy madness and grindhouse mayhem that will bring instant gratification to the most educated of perverse minds!The Notorious Cleopatra:Historical accuracy is flushed down the aqueduct in Novak's bawdy parody of Shakespeare's early tragedy. Dispensing with the play's poetry for nudity and sexual frolics, Caesar is portrayed as a grotesque slob lamenting the lack of beauty amongst his daily orgies. The arrival of the stunning Cleopatra (played by Afro-American actress Sonora) adds a touch of exotica, however proves more than a handful for the infatuated Mark Anthony. Events take a sinister turn as jealousy overcomes both men in their passion for the Queen of the Nile, leading to a bloodbath of murder and mayhem. Cleopatra or not, you sure are a stacked bitch!Wilbur And The Baby Factory:Just as activist stud Wilbur Steele (Peter Ford) is about to be drafted off to Vietnam, two strange men step in and persuade him to take part in a bizarre experiment involving impregnating 2000 women! Saved from the draft, Wilbur is happy to lend his services, only to soon realise he's a human guinea pig for birth control and part of a mad plot to sterilise the whole of the United States. Stuart Lancaster (Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!) plays the benefactor behind the experiment, a deranged billionaire whose manhood is the size of a peanut.The Toy Box:Possibly cinema's first mix of sex, sci-fi, horror and drugs! Widely considered Novak's finest sexploitation movie, The Toy Box revolves around a swingers party, where the guests act out sexually perverse scenarios for a man called Uncle to obtain gifts from a mysterious toy box. Starring the lush, buxom goddess Uschi Digard, this is a hallucinatory, delirious and widely erotic spectacle that is a must-have for every fan of cult, horror or sleaze.