Made in 1989, Roger and Me is a loose, smart-alecky documentary directed and narrated by Michael Moore. Here for the first time, the man who won unexpected Oscar glory with Bowling for Columbine exposed audiences to his devastating wit and a working-class pose. When his hometown is devastated by the plant closure of an American corporate giant (making record profits, one should note), the hell-raising political commentator with a prankster streak tries to turn his camera on General Motors Chairman Roger B Smith, the elusive Roger of the title, and the film is loosely structured around Moore's odyssey to track down the bigwig for an interview. While Moore ambushes his corporate subjects like a blue-collar Geraldo Rivera, a guerrilla interviewer who treasures his comic rebuffs as much as his interviews, his portraits of the colourful characters he meets along the way can be patronising. The famous come off as absurdly out of touch (Anita Bryant appears for some can-do cheerleading, and hometown celebrity Bob Eubanks tells some boorish jokes), and the disenfranchised poor (notably an unemployed woman who sells rabbit meat to make ends meet) all too often appear as buffoons or hicks. But behind his loose play with the facts and snarky attitude is a devastating look at the victims of downsizing in the midst of the 1980s economic boom. This portrait of Reagan's America and the tarnish on the American dream comes down to a simple question: what is corporate America's responsibility to the country's citizens? That's a question no-one at GM wants to answer. --Sean Axmaker
Disney gives families a gift full of the spirit of the season as Ed Asner plays Horace McNickle a counterfeiter who escapes prison through his extraordinary likeness to St. Nick. The Police are closing in but Christmas is near so there are redsuited ones everywhere. McNickle is desperate to recover loot from an earlier caper and can't make a move until he takes advantage of two neighborhood kids who really believe he is Santa. After the kids come through it dawns on him that he has always missed the true meaning of the holidays. rather than make good on his escape he tries to make good on his promises.
A horror-comedy about a small town loser fresh out of the loony bin who seeks revenge on those he deems responsible for ruining his life.
Brand New Doctor! Exciting New Adventures! Episodes Comprise: 1. The Eleventh Hour 2. The Beast Below 3. Victory of the Daleks 4. The Time of Angels 5. Flesh and Stone 6. The Vampires of Venice 7. Amy's Choice 8. The Hungry Earth 9. Cold Blood 10. Vincent and the Doctor 11. The Lodger 12. The Pandorica Opens 13. The Big Bang
For the first time on DVD the lavish space drama that launched the careers of a galaxy of stars and whose demise is still mourned by fans nearly fourteen years later: episodes 1- 11 of the classic sci-fi series Jupiter Moon. It's New Year's Eve 2049. The University of Space spaceship Ilea is orbiting one of the moons of Jupiter. While the students prepare to party first-officer Finbow Lewis sees something very strange on the ship's deep-space scanners: something outside the Sol
Amy and Rory are trapped on a crashing space liner and the only way The Doctor can rescue them is to save the soul of a lonely old miser in a festive edition of the time-travelling adventure written by Steven Moffat. But is Kazran Sardick the richest man in Sardicktown beyond redemption? And what is lurking in the fogs of Christmas Eve?
Sleepaway Camp: Welcome to Camp Arawak where teenage boys and girls learn to experience the joys of nature as well as each other. But when these happy campers begin to die in a series of horrible 'accidents' they discover that someone - or something - has turned their summer of fun into a vacation to dismember. Has a dark secret returned from the camp's past...or will an unspeakable horror end the season forever? Sleepaway Camp 2: Unhappy Campers: Five years after
Raining Stones is classic Ken Loach--an overtly bleak piece of drama shot through with defiant humour, a story of life beyond the edge of society. Bob (Bruce Jones in a role that foreshadows his more ludicrous Coronation Street character) is unemployed and struggling to make ends meet, especially with the added pressure of his young daughter's first communion and the expense involved. And that's it really--one man's struggle to maintain his dignity and provide for his family. Despite the film's frequent moments of comedy (more often than not provided by Loach regular Ricky Tomlinson), Raining Stones is ultimately more than a little disheartening. The film is in many ways similar to Loach's previous film, Riff Raff (1991), but here the examples of a community pulling together are countered with backstabbing and exploitation. In the end, there are no winners or losers in Loach's world, only those who survive and those who don't. --Phil Udell
Pelle the Conqueror is a Scandinavian drama which won the 1988 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language film and a Best Actor nomination for Max (The Exorcist) Von Sydow. Set at the end of the 19th century, it tells of a widowed Swedish farmer who goes looking for a better life in Denmark with his young son, Pelle (a fine Pelle Hvenegaard). Much like Life is Beautiful (1998) the heart of the film is the bond between father and son and their dreams for a better world. Although the photography brings an austere beauty to the bleak coastlands of Denmark, the story, a 150-minute intimate epic, is intense and harrowing; the antithesis of the feel-good father-son relationship of a movie like Billy Elliot.On the DVD: Unfortunately, rather than the subtitles of the cinema release, this DVD is dubbed for the American market, which significantly diminishes the performances and undermines the emotional impact. This is particularly regrettable given that both subtitled and dubbed versions could exist on the same disc. The only feature is a Photo Library of full-frame screen-grabs. The stated ratio of 1:1.85 is incorrect, the film being cropped from the original cinema 1:1.66 to 4:3 TV ratio. The sound is unremarkable stereo. The picture, transferred from an already imperfect print, is crawling with grain and littered with compression artefacts, making it no better than many videos. Without even a booklet, this release does no justice to a landmark film. --Gary S. Dalkin
In this remake of the classic 50s SF tale, a boy tries to stop an invasion of his town by aliens who take over the the minds of his parents, his least-liked schoolteacher and other townspeople. With the aid of the school nurse the boy enlists the aid of the U.S. Marines.
After attackers inexplicably murder her sister and nephew psychologist Jenna (Rothrock) is in the dock as a defence witness by day and an avenging angel meteing out martial arts justice by night...
The complete fourth and final series of the revered Scottish sketch show. Episodes comprise: 1. We're Only Here For The Banter! 2. Brenda The Bossy Aunt 3. All Hail The Arrival Of Captain Nipple Whistle 4. The Big Man's Life Insurance Advert 5. Funeral For A Lonely Shopkeeper 6. The Last One
Mark Kendall just found out that his one-night stand has been around for centuries. Mark (Carrey) has just one thing on his mind: going all the way. But while his girlfriend keeps telling him he has to wait he meets a beautiful vampire countess (Hutton) who's ready for action! Mark's just happy to get past second base...but after a one-night stand with the sexy seductress Mark starts behaving more than a little odd and realizes he must find a way to break his lover's fiendis
An ambitious salesman seeks a better life for him and his young son in this inspirational drama.
Featuring Avid Merrion as the Scandinavian stalker/host and sketches in which he plays the parts of pop stars like Craig David and Britney Spears in lurid, latex masks, Bo' Selecta! is a brilliantly surreal take on celebrity culture. This first series (originally broadcast in 2002) features a number of cameos and guest appearances from minor celebs: Boyzone's Keith Duffy, Davina McCall, Vanessa Feltz and the hapless Christine Hamilton, one of numerous guests to be interviewed by a puppet bear played by Merrion whose feverish line of questioning invariably results in him sprouting a little erection. Another character is hauled up in a neckbrace (following an altercation with Lisa Tarbuck), but Merrion's innocent broken English can't conceal the fact that he's a psychotic sex maniac who explicitly lusts after celebs who "make me do a sex wee", keeps Craig from Big Brother locked in a cupboard and his dead mother in a wardrobe. Merrion's pop spoofs are also masterly: rather than mimic the stars, he reinvents them--Mel B and Britney Spears--as farting, hairy-chested Northerners, slobbing out on fry-up breakfasts washed down with lager and, most improbably, Michael Jackson as a cussing, jive-talking black dude à la Huggy Bear. Bo' Selecta! doesn't so much satirise celebrities as debase them, exposing their humiliating none-dimensionality by drawing them into a vortex of vulgar absurdity, not unlike Vic Reeves' Shooting Stars. Of course, they play along--they're on television. Although initially off-putting to some, once you get into Bo' Selecta! there is, as for Big Brother's Craig, no escape. On the DVD: Bo' Selecta! on disc features numerous extras, including a behind the scenes feature in which the production team discuss making the show ("like directing a squirrel on roller-skates"), deleted scenes including Gareth Gates as a Tourette's victim, which was deemed a little beyond the pale, some unfunny bloopers and a feature on the life story of "Craig David" with Kate Thornton, including an unmissable nativity scene in which the infant Craig plays Jesus. There's also a commentary, with Merrion as his stalker self watching himself with consternation (It's strange seeing yourself on TV"). It's a pity we don't get to hear from the "real" Merrion. --David Stubbs
Record breaking gold medal winning ice skating duo Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean returned to the rink for the first time in 8 years to oversee 10 sets of celebrity skaters each hoping to be crowned Britain's new ice sensation! Celebrity contestants include David Seaman Broadway and West End star John Barrowman Olympic gold medalist Kelly Holmes Andi Peters Coronation Street's Sean Wilson Bonnie Langford Tamara Beckwith GMTV'S Andrea Mclean Fat Friends star Gaynor Faye and The Bill's Stefan Booth.
Set around a London bus depot, On the Buses starred Reg Varney as Stan, an ageing bachelor and driver of the No.11 bus who still lives with his Mum (Cicely Courtneidge), his plain sister Olive (Anna Karen) and disgruntled brother-in-law Arthur (Michael Robbins). At work, he fraternises with the laddish and lecherous Jack (Bob Grant), with whom he pursues innumerable (and improbable) giggly, mini-skirted "clippies" (conductors) and cheeks the beady-eyed and punctilious bus inspector, Blakey (Steven Lewis) This first series was broadcast in black and white in 1969. Much of the comedy derives from gender role reversal--Stan and Arthur forced to do the household chores when Olive and Mum fall ill ("Family Flu"); "The Canteen", in which the busmen decide to run the canteen themselves; or "The Darts Match", in which Stan and Jack are bested at darts by--imagine--a pair of dollybird clippies. Despite its immense popularity, On the Buses hasn't dated well. Like the buses themselves, the jokes don't arrive very often and when they do, they're visible a long way off. The studio audience whoops cathartically at anything remotely alluding to sex, making you wonder at the repressed nature of British society in 1969. In later decades it would come to be treasured as somewhat creaky kitsch by audiences nostalgic for an age of politically incorrect innocence. On the DVD: On the Buses has no extra features here. The original black and white versions have scrubbed up reasonably well, although defects such as fading sound and poor dubbing have proven beyond amendment. --David Stubbs
The Doctor, Amy and Rory are back for the first five blockbuster episodes of series seven.The trio encounter the Daleks, Weeping Angels and even Dinosaurs on a Spaceship as the series builds to the departure of The Ponds in one of the most heartbreaking episodes in the history of Doctor Who.
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