"Actor: Susan Brady"

• Gremlins | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £7.19   |  Saving you £6.80 (94.58%)   |  RRP £13.99

  When his absent-minded father gives young Billy Pelzer (Zach Galligan) a new pet, he warns him to abide by three rules. The rules get broken, of course, and the pet--a cute Mogwai named Gizmo--unwittingly gives birth to the vicious Gremlins who proceed to terrorise the town. Although the long shadow of Producer Steven Spielberg hangs over Joe Dante's 1984 comedy Gremlins almost as much as it did over Tobe Hooper's Poltergeist (1982), Dante doesn't allow it to overwhelm his own quirky style too much. Glimpses of Robbie the Robot and The Time Machine (which promptly disappears) at an inventors' convention reveal his passion for old-movie references (which culminated with Matinee, 1993). Aided and abetted by Spielberg's guidance and a script by Chris Columbus (who would go on to direct and produce the Home Alone franchise) and a music score by Jerry Goldsmith, Dante had all the help he needed to make the biggest hit of his career. Much of the humour derives from Dante's playful handling of the setting in Smallsville, USA, whose inhabitants are as much the target of his satire as they are of the Gremlins' unwanted solicitations. The xenophobic neighbour who warns prophetically of "gremlins" in foreign cars and machinery provides a subtext for the attack on homely American values, as does showing Invasion of the Body Snatchers on TV while the wicked Gremlins hatch. The sight of the little tykes cavorting in a bar, getting drunk and even dancing in pink leggings looks suspiciously like a satirical dig at the whole 1980's culture of selfishness: with their destructive impulses and overindulgences the Gremlins are the ultimate egotistical yuppies. As with many Spielberg projects, the bland hero saves the day for nostalgic, old-fashioned values, but there are plenty of laughs along the way--for example in the now-classic scene when the hero's mother fights off Gremlins in the kitchen by stuffing them in the blender and microwave. Dante's 1990 sequel is even more satirically pointed, and he effectively remade the original with Small Soldiers (1998), replacing Gremlins with toys. On the DVD: Disappointingly, there are no extra features at all here, aside from subtitles and "interactive menus"--which simply means there is an onscreen menu and it works. --Mark Walker

• Magpie | DVD | (29/06/2009) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Magpie (2 Disc)

• Boy Meets Girl | DVD | (27/05/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  'Boy Meets Girl' is a scary thought provoking and excrucuatingly relevant. It's bleak tone chills you to the bone and sketches a portrait of a serial killer in the fine 'Henry' tradition. A man meets a woman in a bar the two go back to her flat and begin watching porno films the man passes out and wakes to find himself strapped in a dentist chair. The woman along with her accomplice begin to torture the man eventually killing him. What in effect becomes a movie monologue for

• Fatal Contact - Bird Flu In America | DVD | (21/05/2007) from £6.73   |  Saving you £13.26 (66.30%)   |  RRP £19.99

  It Began With One Man. A virus with no cure. A threat with no borders. A nation with no chance of escaping H5N1 the Avian Flu. When a mutation of the virus is discovered in a local marketplace China sends an emergency summons to Dr. Iris Varnack (Joely Richardson) of the Epidemic Intelligence Service. When she arrives she discovers her efforts may be too late - an American businessman has become the first victim of a strain that is passed from human to human. As the flu begins its insidious spread Secretary of Health and Human Services Collin Reed (Stacy Keach) races to combat the ensuing chaos. The victim's wife Denise Connelly (Ann Cusack) does what she can to help other infected people. It wasn't supposed to happen this way - until it did.

• Killing Of America | DVD | (11/02/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £17.99

  The Killing Of America is a hard hitting shock-u-mentary about the rise of violence in the home of the brave. From the assassinations of J.F.K. Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy to the violent protests against the Vietnam war. From the ritual murders of Charles Manson's family to the rise of serial killers like Ted Bundy Son of Sam and John Wayne Gacy. From random sniper attacks on innocent civilians to the mass suicide of the cult of Jim Jones The Killing Of America shows the