"Actor: Tom Brennan"

• Double Jeopardy | DVD | (05/02/2001) from £6.26   |  Saving you £9.73 (155.43%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Framed for the murder of her husband, Libby Parsons (Ashley Judd) survives the long years in prison with two burning desires sustaining her.

• Fatal Attraction | DVD | (02/09/2002) from £6.19   |  Saving you £9.80 (158.32%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Fatal Attraction was the most controversial hit of 1987, a film nominated for six Oscars that launched a whole up-market psycho sub-genre. In an elaboration of Play Misty for Me (1971), Michael Douglas plays a married middle-class everyman who has an opportunistic weekend affair with New York publishing executive, Glenn Close. The twist is that Close's Alex is a borderline psychotic. She won't let go, and the film moves from a study of modern sexual mores to an increasingly tense thriller about neurotic obsession. The performances are exceptional and two set-pieces, one which gave us the term "Bunny Boiler" and another in a fairground, provide metaphorical and literal rollercoaster rides. Only a laughable sex scene--in a sink, anyone?--and a melodramatic finale shamelessly ripping-off the 1955 French classic Les Diaboliques and Psycho (1960) prevent a good thriller being a great one. Even so, Fatal Attraction is still a film worth seeing again, even if it's hard to wonder what all the fuss was about in 1987. On the DVD: Fatal Attraction on disc has a new 28-minute documentary featuring the principal players explaining how wonderful each other are. More substantial is a 19-minute feature on creating the visual look, with sections on cinematography, costume and make-up design. A worthwhile 10-minute piece examines the social impact of the movie and the controversy it generated. Seven minutes of the three stars in rehearsal is intriguing, but more interesting is the opportunity to see the original, low-key ending, rejected after test screenings. Much of the best documentary material focuses on how the finally released ending came about, while Lyne's commentary is thoughtful and illuminating. The original trailer is included and there are 16 sets of subtitles, including English for the hard of hearing, as well as an alternative German dub. The sound has been remixed from stereo into a subtly involving Dolby Digital 5.1, and the 1.78:1 anamorphic transfer looks fine, though there is some very minor print damage. --Gary S Dalkin

• The Last Picture Show | DVD | (26/11/2001) from £19.19   |  Saving you £-6.20 (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Based on the novel by Larry McMurty The Last Picture Show is a more bitter than bittersweet drama about growing up and winding down in the dusty nowhere town of Anarene, Texas, during 1951-52. Unusually shot in black and white while the rest of Hollywood was going psychedelic in 1971, it's an interesting contrast with the rock 'n' roll nostalgia of American Graffiti (the films share a key moment in which the boy who is leaving town gives a precious car to his stay-at-home friend and both make oblique references to Vietnam). It visits a recent past already nostalgic for a heroic Western era and discovers that whatever was wonderful has already gone by the time of these teenagers. Introspective Timothy Bottoms and outgoing Jeff Bridges are best friends and stalwarts of the school's losing football team. Cybill Shepherd is the blonde teen queen who innocently spreads chaos, ditching long-time boyfriend Bridges to run with a richer, faster set. She steals Bottoms away from an older married woman (Cloris Leachman) which prompts a vicious falling-out between Bottoms and Bridges. As the kids run around heedless, the town's older generation remember their own wilder days and wonder how they came to be so unhappy. Ben Johnson, in Academy Award-winning form, is "Sam the Lion", the wise old cowboy who runs the movie house and pool hall. He muses about his long-ago affair with Shepherd's feisty mother (Ellen Burstyn), who is currently throwing herself at a callous oilman stud (Clu Gulager). A soap in essence but director Peter Bogdanovich plays it as a John Ford-style "closing of the frontier" Western, with ugly-beautiful images of a West that has swapped cattle for oil but failed to strike it rich. He layers in evocative snatches of Hank Williams among the whistling winds and the whining locals. It perhaps has a tragedy too many in its last act and can't quite work up the tears with an actual martyrdom, but it does deliver a signature line of wistful regret, "nothing's been right since Sam the Lion died".On the DVD: this is an anamorphic widescreen 1.85:1 version of the 121-minute 1974 re-release, with one additional scene for Eileen Brennan's waitress, now labelled "the director's cut". It boasts a great sounding mono track, with alternate soundtracks and subtitles in a bunch of languages; a tiny promo piece from 1974 with a Bogdanovich interview; a solid hour-long retrospective documentary with interviews from a lot of the cast and crew (including future director Frank Marshall, an assistant and bit-player) and some trailers. Oddly, Bogdanovich has done a full-length commentary for Orson Welles' Citizen Kane but not for his own best film. --Kim Newman

• Shakespeare: The Animated Tales | DVD | (28/03/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £39.99

  This Animated Shakespeare Box Set winner of 2 Emmy awards contains 12 of the bard's plays that were originally broadcast on BBC2 in 1994. The scripts for the 'Animated Tales' have been adapted from the original Shakespeare by Leon Garfield. A reknowed Shakespearean scholar Garfield worked closely with a panel of academic experts to create plays that are masterfully abridged to only 30 minutes yet are faithful to Shakespeare's language and plots. The 12 episodes are : 1.

• The Adventures of Tom Sawyer | DVD | (01/01/2008) from £13.96   |  Saving you £-7.97 (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  The 1938 version of Adventures of Tom Sawyer appears to be producer David O. Selznick's dry run for Gone with the Wind what with its similarities in period costumes color scheme and production design (both films shared the services of the great Hollywood art director William Cameron Menzies). Selected from hundreds of applicants (a precursor to Selznick's upcoming search for Wind's Scarlet O'Hara) Tommy Kelly is visually perfect as Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer though his acting varies from scene to scene. Better cast is Jackie Moran as the laconic pipe-smoking Huck Finn (Moran would show up in Wind as Dr. Meade's son). Never forcing its pace the film manages to include most of Twain's classic sequences including the fence-whitewashing episode Tom's rescue of Becky Thatcher (Anne Gillis) from the wrath of their schoolmaster (Olin Howlin) Tom and Huck's death and resurrection after the boys briefly skipped town for an idyll on a remote island the murder trial of town drunk Muff Potter (Walter Brennan) and ultimately unmasking of the vicious Injun Joe (Victor Jory) as the real killer and of course the chilling climax in the cave wherein Tom protects Becky from the fugitive Injun Joe. Originally released at 93 minutes Adventures of Tom Sawyer was trimmed to 77 minutes for a 1959 reissue; it has since been restored to its full length on videotape. In 1960 Tom Sawyer was syndicated to television by Selznick with accompanying commentary by the film's now-grown-up Becky Thatcher Anne Gillis.

• Texasville | DVD | (07/02/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Director Peter Bogdanovich revisits small-town Texas life in the long-awaited sequel to his 1971 masterpiece 'The Last Picture Show'. It's been over 30 years since Duane Jackson Sonny Crawford and Jacy Farrow graduated from high school. Life is still bittersweet as the town prepares to host the county's centennial celebration. Duane struck it rich with oil but is saddled with $12 million in debt and a shopaholic wife Karla. To make matters worse his dysfunctional children are out

• Raining Stones | DVD | (29/04/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  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

• The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer | DVD | (13/09/2002) from £12.23   |  Saving you £-6.24 (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  Mark Twain's Beloved Story. Live Action.

• Parasomnia | DVD | (07/09/2009) from £9.97   |  Saving you £9.01 (129.08%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Parasomnia

• The Last Picture Show | Blu Ray | (18/03/2022) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Released in 1971 to critical acclaim and public controversy, THE LAST PICTURE SHOW garnered eight Academy Award nominations (including Best Picture) and was hailed as the most important work by a young American director since Citizen Kane.A surprisingly frank, bittersweet drama of social and sexual mores in small-town Texas, the film features a talent-laden cast led by Jeff Bridges (The Mirror Has Two Faces), Cybill Shepherd (Taxi Driver) and Timothy Bottoms (The Man in the Iron Mask). Cloris Leachman (TVs The Mary Tyler Moore Show) and Ben Johnson (Rio Grande) each won Oscars for their work in supporting roles.

• Cracker - Brotherly Love | DVD | (16/10/2006) from £10.98   |  Saving you £4.00 (44.49%)   |  RRP £12.99

  The police believe they have solved the brutal murder of a prostitute when they arrest father of four David Harvey on strong circumstantial evidence. However an identical murder while David is in custody means the team have to decide if they have the wrong man or whether they are dealing with a copycat killer. Meanwhile the death of Fitz's mother drives him into the arms of his wife while Jimmy Beck recently returned from sick leave finally breaks under the strain of work and his own guilt. When he takes the law to the limits he finds Penhaligon staring at him across an unbridgeable gap. Something has to give ...

• Cracker - Brotherly Love | DVD | (12/05/2003) from £6.54   |  Saving you £3.45 (34.50%)   |  RRP £9.99

  The police believe they have solved the brutal murder of a prostitute when they arrest father of four David Harvey on strong circumstantial evidence. However an identical murder while David is in custody means the team have to decide if they have the wrong man or whether they are dealing with a copycat killer. Meanwhile the death of Fitz's mother drives him into the arms of his wife while Jimmy Beck recently returned from sick leave finally breaks under the strain of work and his own guilt. When he takes the law to the limits he finds Penhaligon staring at him across an unbridgeable gap. Something has to give ...

• Fatal Attraction | Blu Ray | (13/09/2022) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A