"Actor: Malcolm Atterbury"

• The Birds | DVD | (17/10/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Vacationing in northern California, Alfred Hitchcock was struck by a story in a Santa Cruz newspaper: "Seabird Invasion Hits Coastal Homes". From this peculiar incident, and his memory of a short story by Daphne du Maurier, the master of suspense created one of his strangest and most terrifying films. The Birds follows a chic blonde, Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren), as she travels to the coastal town of Bodega Bay to hook up with a rugged fellow (Rod Taylor) she's only just met. Before long the town is attacked by marauding birds, and Hitchcock's skill at staging action is brought to the fore. Beyond the superb effects, however, The Birds is also one of Hitchcock's most psychologically complicated scenarios, a tense study of violence, loneliness, and complacency. What really gets under your skin are not the bird skirmishes but the anxiety and the eerie quiet between attacks. The director elevated an unknown model, Tippi Hedren (mother of Melanie Griffith), to being his latest cool, blond leading lady, an experience that was not always easy on the much-pecked Ms. Hedren. Still, she returned for the next Hitchcock picture, the underrated Marnie. Treated with scant attention by serious critics in 1963, The Birds has grown into a classic and--despite the sci-fi trappings--one of Hitchcock's most serious films. --Robert Horton

• Rio Bravo | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £6.58   |  Saving you £7.41 (112.61%)   |  RRP £13.99

  When it comes down to naming the best Western of all time, the list usually narrows to three completely different pictures: Howard Hawks' Rio Bravo, Hawks' Red River and John Ford's The Searchers. About the only thing they all have in common is that they all star John Wayne. But while The Searchers is an epic quest for revenge and Red River, a sweeping cattle-drive drama, Rio Bravo is a much calmer film. Basically, it comes down to Sheriff John T Chance (Wayne), his alcoholic friend Dude (Dean Martin), the hotshot new kid Colorado (Ricky Nelson), and deputy-sidekick Stumpy (Walter Brennan), sittin' around in the town jail, drinkin' black coffee, shootin' the breeze, and occasionally singin' a song. Hawks--who, like his pal Ernest Hemingway, lived by the code of "grace under pressure"--said he made Rio Bravo as a rebuke to High Noon, in which sheriff Gary Cooper begged for townspeople to help him. So, Hawks made Wayne's Sheriff Chance a consummate professional--he may be getting old and fat, but he knows how to do his job, and he doesn't want amateurs getting mixed up in his business; they could get hurt. If the configuration of characters sounds familiar, it should: Hawks remade Rio Bravo two more times--as El Dorado in 1967, with Wayne, Robert Mitchum, and James Caan; and as Rio Lobo in 1970, with Wayne, Jack Elam, and Christopher Mitchum. The film achieved additional notoriety in the 90s when Quentin Tarantino revealed that he uses it as a litmus test for prospective girlfriends. --Jim Emerson, Amazon.com

• Wild River | DVD | (23/08/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  An outstanding but obscure film from classic director Elia Kazan detailing the difficulties in building a dam on the Tennessee river with opposition from locals across the colour divide...

• How To Make A Monster | DVD | (26/05/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Peter Drummond has been chief of make up at a Hollywood studio for 25 years. When his services are abruptly dispensed with Drummond takes his revenge on the callous heads of the studio by hypnotising a couple of actors and bringing his murderous creations Teenage Frankenstein and Teenage Werewolf to life!

• The Twilight Zone - Season 4 | DVD | (18/09/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £59.99

  ""There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow between science and superstition and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area we call... The Twilight Zone!"" All the episodes from Season 4! Episodes Comprise: 1. In His Image 2. The Thirty Fathom Grave 3. Vall

• The Blood Of Dracula | DVD | (17/11/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Six weeks after her mother dies Nancy Perkins' father remarries. The stepmother then sends Nancy off to a school for girls where the innocent girl falls under the spell of evil chemistry teacher Miss Branding. Putting Nancy under hypnosis Miss Branding converts the poor damsel to vampirism causing her to commit murders and then forget about them. The villainess recieves her comeuppance when Nancy refuses to snap out of her spell transforming into a slavering vampiric beast.