"Actor: Virginia McKenna"

• Miss Marple - A Murder Is Announced | DVD | (20/03/2006) from £7.55   |  Saving you £2.44 (32.32%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Geraldine McEwan takes over the coveted mantle of the titular super sleuth in one of a series of all-star cast adaptations of Agatha Christie's Miss Marple novels. The villagers of Chipping Cleghorn including Jane Marple are agog with curiosity over an advertisement in the local gazette which reads: ""A murder is announced and will take place on Friday October 29th at Little Paddocks at 6.30 p.m."" A childish practical joke? Or a hoax intended to scare poor Letitia Blacklock? Unab

• The Smallest Show on Earth | DVD | (11/03/2019) from £11.59   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  NOTICE: Polish Release, cover may contain Polish text/markings. The disk DOES NOT have English audio and subtitles.

• The Camomile Lawn | DVD | (14/04/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Adapted from the novel by Mary Wesley, The Camomile Lawn proved one of Channel Four's most successful dramas, telling an intricate story set during World War II and over two days in 1984. In this portrait of the Home Front in Cornwall and London in the Blitz, the titular lawn becomes a symbol for halcyon pre-war days, and also for a lost innocence on a personal level. For this is very much about growing up and sex, including rape and child abuse (both handled tactfully, mainly in dialogue), adulatory, ménage á trois, bisexuality and rampant promiscuity. The attitudes, from the war-damaged, nihilistic Oliver, (a powerfully charismatic Toby Stephens) to the mercenary Calypso (an incendiary Jennifer Ehle), and some individual scenes, shock in their very matter-of-factness. What could be salacious soap is leavened by a comic touch, intensified by tragedy and elevated to intensely moving drama during its final half hour set around a funeral in 1984. Generally excellent production values make the best of the television budget, and there are outstanding performances by a large cast including Felicity Kendal and Paul Eddington (reunited from The Good Life), Tara Fitzgerald in her first starring role, and especially Rebecca Hall as Sophy. On the DVD: The four episodes are presented on two discs, with a total running time of approximately four hours 22 minutes. There are no special features of any sort. The picture is standard television 4:3, and while marginally better than VHS has a slight softness, with occasional after-images to shots with moving lights betraying that the series was made on video rather than film. Some scenes are rather grainy and there is the occasion brief instance of MPEG artifacting. The sound is stereo and appears to have been remixed from mono, some elements such as the music remaining in mono, while some sound effects are stereo. --Gary S Dalkin

• Swallows And Amazons | DVD | (04/08/2014) from £9.79   |  Saving you £8.20 (83.76%)   |  RRP £17.99

  SWALLOWS & AMAZONS was the first novel in Arthur Ransome's much-loved series following the adventures of four children and their sailing boat Swallow. In this film of the first installment, Roger, Titty, Susan and John are taken on holiday by their mother to the Norfolk Broads, where they are allowed to sail their boat to a nearby island and set up camp. However they soon discover another boat: the Amazon, manned by potential rivals for dominion of the island. Evoking an England and way of li.

• A Town Like Alice | DVD | (12/11/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  One of the all-time great wartime love stories shot on location in Malaya.

• Swallows And Amazons | Blu Ray | (04/08/2014) from £6.99   |  Saving you £16.00 (228.90%)   |  RRP £22.99

  Swallows and Amazons was the first novel in Arthur Ransome's much-loved series following the adventures of four children and their sailing boat Swallow. In this film of the first instalment Roger Titty Susan and John are taken on holiday by their mother to the Norfolk Broads where they are allowed to sail their boat to a nearby island and set up camp. However they soon discover another boat: the Amazon manned by potential rivals for dominion of the island. Evoking an England and way of life long forgotten Swallows and Amazons turns an enduring model of idyllic and innocent childhood into a lyrical and beautifully realized film. Special Features: Interviews with Sophie Neville Suzanna Hamilton and Virginia McKenna Locations Featurette Behind the Scenes Footage with Commentary from sophie neville Stills Gallery Trailer

• The Ship That Died of Shame | DVD | (10/01/2011) from £10.35   |  Saving you £5.64 (54.49%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Based on a short story by Nicholas Monsarrat (author of 'The Cruel Sea') and directed by Basil Dearden (The Blue Lamp The League Of Gentleman) The Ship That Died Of Shame takes place during the bleak aftermath of the Second World War a crew of navy veterans played by screen legend Richard Attenborough George Baker (The Dam Busters) and Bill Owen (Last Of The Summer Wine) are forced into smuggling black market goods across the English Channel to make ends meet. But it isn't long before wine and cigarettes are replaced by the more lucrative cargo of automatic weapons and counterfeit money. A crisis of conscience lies upon the horizon when one of the crew refuses to turn a blind eye after discovering that the mysterious stranger they've been asked to smuggle into England hides a dark and harrowing secret.

• Sliding Doors | DVD | (13/03/2006) from £8.99   |  Saving you £7.00 (77.86%)   |  RRP £15.99

  There are two sides to every story. Helen is about to live both of them... at the same time. Romance was never this much fun. The split-second moments that can take a life down one path instead of another form the tantalising 'what if?' in this delightful romantic comedy starring Gwyneth Paltrow. Paltrow plays London publicist Helen effortlessly sliding between parallel storylines that show what happens if she does or does not catch a morning train back to her apartment. Lo

• Films at War 2 | DVD | (12/11/2018) from £12.33   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  CARVE HER NAME WITH PRIDE Following her recruitment by the SOE, Violette Szabo volunteers to be parachuted into occupied France to re-organise a shattered resistance group. She knows only too well that the life expectancy of an undercover operative can usually be measured in weeks and months... OLD BILL AND SON Old Bill has grumbled his way through the trenches of the First World War. Now it is the Second and he decides to enlist! When Young Bill goes missing during a raid, Old Bill shows that there's still life in the old dog yet! A TOWN LIKE ALICE Jean Paget, an English woman taken prisoner by the Japanese, is among a group of women and children forced to trek through Malaya during the Occupation. During her ordeal she meets captive Australian Joe Harman and there is an instant magnetism between them. THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY With the Battle of Britain at its height, a German fighter pilot is shot down over England. Though confined to a POW camp, captivity cannot deter him from the single aim of escaping back to his homeland. After several months, he sees his chance and takes it...

• A Town Like Alice | DVD | (24/07/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  One of the all-time great wartime love stories shot on location in Malaya.

• Staggered | DVD | (26/11/2001) from £13.52   |  Saving you £-0.53 (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Neil's stag night turns into a nightmare when he is flown drugged to a remote Scottish island and left naked and penniless. Now he has only three days to get to London for his wedding...

• 3 Classic Wartime Dramas - A Town Like Alice / Carve Her Name With Pride / This Happy Breed | DVD | (20/10/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  A Town Like Alice - Virginia McKenna and Peter Finch star in this moving story about a party of women compelled to trek through the Malayan jungle during World War II as no Japanese office will take responsibility for their care. Based on Nevil Shute's best selling novel the film tells how the women come to terms with their hardships and how they are befriended by a tough Australian prisoner of war who dreams of returning to his home town of Alice Springs... Carve Her Name With Pride - The moving and dramatic story of Violette Szabo (McKenna) a courageous WW2 secret agent who was captured in northern France... Carve Her Name With Pride is the inspiring true life story of Violette Szabo. During World War II Violette (Virgina McKenna) volunteers to parachute into France as a secret agent to aid a Resistance group. Her mission successful she joins the Resistance where she stays until captured by the Germans. Tortured by the Gestapo for information she refuses to betray her comrades... Directed by Lewis Gilbert Carve Her Name With Pride is a moving tale about the endurance of the human spirit in even the most adverse circumstances. This Happy Breed - 'This Happy Breed' is a splendidly acted classic portraying how an ordinary British family lived between the wars. Just after WWI the Gibbons family moves to a nice house in the suburbs. The inhabitants of 17 Sycamore Road are ordinary people with their irritable in-laws their just-plain-folks camaraderie and their unshakeable belief that no matter how hard the times are Mother England is forged of good stock and common sense will somehow prevail. This is a wonderful adaptation of Noel Coward's play written by Anthony Havelock-Allan and directed by David Lean who brought us the critically acclaimed classic 'Brief Encounter'.

• The Smallest Show On Earth | DVD | (08/07/2002) from £20.37   |  Saving you £-7.38 (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  An amiable knock-off of the Ealing comedy style, The Smallest Show on Earth starts with aspiring novelist Bill Travers and his "nice gel" wife Virginia McKenna inheriting a cinema from a hitherto unknown uncle and discovering that it isn't the sumptuous modern Grand, which specialises in those "smash 'em in the face, knock 'em over the waterfront" pictures, but the decrepit Bijou, known locally as "the fleapit". The initial plan, set up by lawyer Leslie Phillips, is to sell off the cinema to the owner of the Grand so he can knock it down to make a car park, but our heroes are put off by the arrogant bullying of the rival manager (Francis De Wolff) and succumb to the inept charms of the crazed, aged staff--drunken projectionist Peter Sellers, doddery commissionaire Bernard Miles and dotty ticket lady Margaret Rutherford (who joined the team as a piano accompanist). In the 1950s, there was a run of gentle British comedies in which outmoded and broken-down local institutions (steam trains, tugboats, vintage cars) were saved by collections of committed eccentrics who despised the new-fangled bus services or soulless council bureaucracies and were willing to resort to a little larceny (in this case, arson). The Smallest Show slots in perfectly with the cycle, getting laughs from the Bijou's already outmoded programme of scratchy Westerns and desert dramas (which increase ice cream sales) and sentiment over the staff's midnight screenings of silent movies that remind them of better days. It's likeable rather than hilarious, with Sellers and Miles buried under crepe hair and fake wrinkles competing to out-dodder each other and losing the picture to the inimitable Rutherford, who doesn't have to fake her eccentricity. Pin-up, June Cunningham, is the glamorous usherette and Sid James plays her annoyed Dad. On the DVD: The Smallest Show on Earth is presented in a decent print, but with no extras. The film is also available as part of the four-disc Peter Sellers Collection. --Kim Newman

• Swallows And Amazons | DVD | (21/08/2006) from £6.10   |  Saving you £6.89 (112.95%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Six young children experience a holiday in the Lake District during the peaceful summer of 1929.... Based on the novel by Arthur Ransome.

• Rosamunde Pilcher's September | DVD | (18/04/2011) from £11.99   |  Saving you £6.00 (50.04%)   |  RRP £17.99

  Whose lifeless body has been found in the loch and how did it get there? We all have secrets, and the aristocratic families living in the Scottish village of Strathcoy are no exception.The beautiful, carefree Pandora disappeared from the village twenty years ago under a cloud of suspicion. She is returning at the invitation of Verena Steynton who is having a dance and wants everyone to be there… whatever the priceWhat past history is Edmund hiding from his wife Virginia? What does Mad Lottie know and how much more will she discover? Why did the down at heel Lord of the Manor Archie drive his sister away? And what price will they all pay for the secrets and lies that must have their consequences? The questions arrive with Pandora. The answers may prove more challenging.

• The Complete War Collection (12 Discs) | DVD | (06/11/2006) from £59.99   |  Saving you £20.00 (33.34%)   |  RRP £79.99

  A complete collection of the best of British war movies! Films comprise: 1. The Colditz Story (Dir. Guy Hamilton 1955) 2. The Cruel Sea (Dir. Charles Frend 1953) 3. The Dam Busters (Dir. Michael Anderson 1954) 4. I Was Monty's Double (Dir. John Guillermin 1958) 5. Ice Cold In Alex (Dir. J. Lee Thompson 1958) 6. Went The Day Well? (Dir. Alberto Cavalcanti 1942) 7. The Wooden Horse (Dir. Jack Lee 1950) 8. They Who Dare (Dir. Lewis Milestone 1954) 9. Cross Of Iron (Dir. Sam Peckinpah 1977) 10. The Way Ahead (Dir. Carol Reed 1944) 11. In Which We Serve (Dir. Noel Coward/David Lean 1942) 12. The Battle Of The River Plate (Dir. Michael Powell/Emeric Pressburger 1956)

• Peter Sellers - Hoffman / The Smallest Show On Earth / Carlton-Browne Of The F.O./ Two Way Stretch | DVD | (15/10/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Featuring the films: 'Hoffman' 'The Smallest Show On Earth' 'Carlton-Browne Of The F.O.' and 'Two Way Stretch'. Hoffman *(WS 1.85:1 Anamorphic 1970 1 hour and 47 Minutes Colour): Peter Sellers is Hoffman a middle aged misfit who blackmails his young attractive secretary into spending a week with him. Although he behaves like a creep throughout the weekend he actually emerges as a sympathetic character in the end. Two Way Stretch *(FS 1960 1 hour and 23 minutes B&W):

• A Town Like Alice | DVD | (11/10/1999) from £20.00   |  Saving you £-10.01 (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  One of the all-time great wartime love stories shot on location in Malaya.

• Christian - The Lion At World's End | DVD | (04/08/2008) from £3.99   |  Saving you £9.00 (225.56%)   |  RRP £12.99

  The emotional true story of a zoo-born lion cub rescued from a London shop by Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna for a new life in Africa. Christian began his life in the pet department of Harrods where he was discovered by the man synonymous with passion for animals Bill Travers. Bill and his wife Virginia McKenna were determined to give Christian a new start. This complete story of the lions rescue development and gradual return to his ancestral home was superbly captured forever on film by Bill Travers. First seen as a cinema release this feature length documentary remains one of the greatest wildlife films ever produced.

• September | DVD | (22/09/2003) from £9.47   |  Saving you £-7.48 (N/A%)   |  RRP £1.99

  Verena Steynton (Judy Parfitt) is holding a party for her daughter. All the aristocratic families of Strathcroy in the Scottish Highlands are attending with all their guilty secrets. Lord Archie Balmerino (Edward Fox) a crippled war veteran and his long suffering wife will be there. Edmund Aird (Michael York) a wealthy entrepreneur and his beautiful American wife have been invited. And Pandora (Jacqueline Bisset) Archie's exotic and mysterious sister who disappeared from the village twenty years ago is returning under a cloud of suspicion. Only Edmund and her brother know the secret of her flight from home. But the rumours are flying and the local families feel that Pandora's return can only bring bad luck. When a lifeless body is found in the loch the tension rises. Why has Pandora come back after so long? What are her motives? And has her return already had deadly consequences?