Classic Films

• Laurence Olivier Presents | DVD | (21/05/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £24.99

  The greatest actor of the 20th century presents five works by great 20th-century playwrights. Stars include Olivier Natalie Wood Robert Wagner Maureen Stapleton Alan Bates Malcolm McDowell Helen Mirren Joanne Woodward Carrie Fisher Greta Scacchi and Joan Plowright.. The Plays: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (by Tennessee Williams): A rich plantation owner and his family come to grips with their greed envy and self-delusion. The Collection (by Harold Pinter): What did or did not take place in a Leeds Hotel ruffles the lives of four habitus of fashionable London. Hindle Wakes (by Stanley Houghton): An independent young mill worker refuses to bow to convention after an indiscretion with the boss's son. Come Back Little Sheba (by William Inge): Loss and regret bubble to the surface of a troubled marriage after a young boarder moves in. Saturday Sunday Monday (by Eduardo de Filippo): A monumental argument erupts smolders and subsides over a weekend in the life of a boisterous Italian family. The Ebony Towers (by John Fowles): Laurence Olivier portrays an elderly painter who has locked himself away from the world in a crumbling French chateau. Olivier is not quite a hermit; he enjoys the attentions of two nubile admirers played by Greta Scacchi and Toyah Willcox. This situation is disturbed by the arrival of young transient Roger Rees.

• El Cid | DVD | (30/10/2000) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Sumptuous in every way, visually magnificent, with grandiose sets, panoramic Spanish vistas and intricately detailed costumes, possessor of one of cinema's greatest music scores, boasting vast and astonishingly kinetic battles, and breathing heroic virtue in every scene, El Cid is the very epitome of epic. For this reworking of the medieval legend of the Cid (Arabic for "Lord") who united warring factions and saved 11th-century Spain from invasion, producer Samuel Bronston and director Anthony Mann insisted every set had to be created from scratch, every costume specially made for this movie alone; they also shot entirely on location in La Mancha and along the Mediterranean coast of Spain to enhance the film's authenticity. The cinematography is saturated with the burnished hues of the Spanish landscape, as are the palatial sets and rich costumes; Miklos Rozsa's resplendent score is also the result of painstaking research into medieval Spanish sources. The screenplay is imbued with knightly gravitas and more than a little salvation imagery, from the opening scene of the young Rodrigo rescuing a cross from a burning church, to the movie's indelible finale as The Cid rides "out of the gates of history into legend".Charlton Heston is at his most indomitable as Rodrigo, "The Cid", a natural leader of men and the embodiment of every manly virtue (note that he fathers twins--a sure token of his virility); Sophie Loren is ravishing as Chimene, the woman whose love for Rodrigo conflicts with her filial instincts after he kills her father, the king's champion, over a point of honour. Their scenes together create a humane warmth at the heart of this vast movie: the moment when Chimene finally declares her love (beneath a shrine of three crosses--more symbolism) to the exiled Rodrigo forms a pivotal and very intimate centrepiece. Shortly thereafter he must rise from their rural marriage bed to lead his followers into battle, and the tension between his public and private lives adds a piquancy to the film's stunning battle sequences. The international supporting cast sometimes look like makeweights, especially when chewing on the occasionally stilted dialogue, but any such faults are easily forgiven as the scale and spectacle of El Cid carries the viewer away on a tide of chivalry.On the DVD: This disc is a sadly missed opportunity to present a classic epic in its original form. Although formatted for 16:9 widescreen TVs, which initially gives hope that this might be an anamorphic widescreen presentation, only the opening and closing titles appear in the correct cinematic ratio. Otherwise this is essentially the same picture as the pan & scan VHS version with the same poor print quality. Since a restored 35mm print of El Cid has been shown at cinemas and on TV in recent years there seems to be no excuse for this cut-down presentation. Add some decidedly minimal extras and the result is a disappointing disc. --Mark Walker

• Il Bidone | DVD | (22/03/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Some people don't give a damn about your daughter's welfare.... Broderick Crawford takes the role of Augusto in this finely sculpted drama about an ageing con man and his two young sidekicks Roberto and Picasso who swindle the local's out of their money. But Augusto's young accomplices have dreams dreams that are far removed from the lives they lead now. Augusto however still sees his future as a petty theif swindling enough to pay for his nightlife and a better lifestyle. Little could he know though that his own existance would take an unexpected twist as he accidentally bumps into his daughter someone he hasn't seen for some time and who he discovers is having a tough time trying to make ends meet to finish her studies. Surprisingly he finds his attitude changing as it becomes apparent that for the first time in his life his daughter needs his help and maybe he can do something for someone else! In the absence of his partners in crime he joins another group of swindlers but events turn sour and his new partners prove less than charitable toward Augusto when their money goes missing and in retribution leave him a broken and beaten man....

• A Bridge Too Far Steelbook | Blu Ray | (02/06/2014) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £22.99

  Painstakingly recreated on actual World War II battlefield locations and boasting a remarkable cast that includes Sean Connery Anthony Hopkins Robert Redford and Laurence Olivier A Bridge Too Far accurately recaptures the monumental scope excitement and danger behind Operation Market Garden - one of the biggest military gambles in history.

• A Farewell To Arms (1932) (Dual Format Edition) | DVD | (22/09/2014) from £16.99   |  Saving you £3.00 (17.66%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Beautifully restored to High Definition the original Oscar-winning version of A Farewell to Arms is released to mark the centenary of the outbreak of World War I. A forgotten masterpiece Frank Borzage's film of Ernest Hemingway's novel published just two years earlier is both a persuasive picture of the nightmare that was World War One and a deeply affecting tribute to the transcendent power of love. Starring Gary Cooper as Frederic Henry an American serving in the Italian ambulance brigade who meets through his cynical womanising doctor friend (Adolphe Menjou) Catherine (Helen Hayes) an English nurse whose fiancé died at the Somme. A hugely popular film when it was first released in 1932 A Farewell to Arms was nominated for four Oscars and won for Best Cinematography and Best Sound. Special Features: Newly restored Presented in High Definition and Standard Definition Alternative ending Original trailer

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

  Magpie (2 Disc)

• Four in the Morning | DVD | (23/06/2008) from £11.49   |  Saving you £1.50 (13.05%)   |  RRP £12.99

  It is a moment before dawn and the river traffic on the Thames begins to ease its way through the fog. The River police find the body of a young girl left dry by the ebb tide. Her body is brought ashore and her possessions examined. Who is she? And what drove her to take her own life? For the young married couple (Judi Dench and Norman Rodway) love brought them together but now marriage and a child have driven them apart. Judi Dench's outstanding performance as the young mother gained her the British Film Academy's 1966 Award as the Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Roles.

• The Exterminating Angel | DVD | (28/08/2006) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Through a classic Surrealist conceit an elegant gathering of high society folk find that they are unable to leave the dinner party they are attending. Their impeccable bourgeois manners turn bestial as the servants disappear and the days pass... With savage wit and unfailing precision Bunuel shows the skill of a master filmmaker who has reached the peak of his maturity.

• Hannibal Brooks | Blu Ray | (02/12/2021) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Magnificent Obsession | DVD | (05/05/2008) from £15.34   |  Saving you £-5.35 (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  When churlish spoiled rich man Bob Merrick foolishly wrecks his speed boat the rescue team resuscitates him with equipment that's therefore unavailable to aid a local hero Dr. Wayne Phillips who dies as a result. Phillips had helped many people and when Merrick learns Phillips' secret to give selflessly and in secret he tries it in a ham-handed way. The result further alienates Phillips' widow Helen with whom Merrick has fallen in love. Merrick's persistence causes another tragedy and he must remake his life including going back to medical school in an attempt to make amends and win her love.

• Poldark - Series 2 Complete (Vol 1 & 2) | DVD | (22/06/2015) from £16.53   |  Saving you £-2.07 (N/A%)   |  RRP £13.20

  First half of the second series of this period Cornish costume drama first screened in the '70s. Ross returns home from the army to find that George Warleggan has dispossesed his aunt and taken over her land. Warleggan is also expecting Elizabeth to give birth to his son. Ross also goes in search of his friend Doctor Dwight Enys who is missing in action in France. With the bloody French Revolution raging Ross returns home from the army with Doctor Enys and Hugh Armitage. Armitage makes overtures to Demelza while Elizabeth's cousin languishes in an unhappy arranged marriage to Reverend Osbourne.

• The Lion Has Wings | DVD | (08/02/2010) from £5.99   |  Saving you £4.00 (66.78%)   |  RRP £9.99

  This documentary style film starring Ralph Richardson and Merle Oberon was made to praise the RAF at the start of World War II. It focuses on the families who have connections with the RAF. The film was sponsored by the Ministry of Information and it fulfilled its aim of inspiring confidence in the hearts of its audience.

• That Touch Of Mink | DVD | (04/06/2007) from £6.41   |  Saving you £3.58 (55.85%)   |  RRP £9.99

  How much should a girl sacrifice to get the man of her dreams? That's the question facing an innocent country girl (Doris Day) who is swept into the whirlwind of the rich and famous when a Rolls Royce splashes her with mud. Profound apologies come courtesy of a romantic business tycoon (Cary Grant) who becomes enchanted with the girl's simple direct manner and open honest heart. But he's not interested in marriage...and she's never been interested in anything else. It's a delicious game of cat-and-mouse as working girl and wealthy bachelor pursue each other with hilarious results. 'That Touch Of Mink' is an enchanting romantic comedy featuring wonderful performances from Hollywood favourites Cary Grant and Doris Day. Bouncy dialogue and superb supporting performances from Gig Young and Audrey Meadows earned this dazzling comedy three Oscar nominations including Best Screenplay in 1962.

• My Brilliant Career | Blu Ray | (27/05/2019) from £11.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Judy Davis stars in Gillian Armstrong's breakthrough, a period romance as unconventional as its brash heroine. For her awardwinning breakthrough film, director Gillian Armstrong (Little Women) drew on teenage author Miles Franklin's novel, a celebrated turnofthetwentiethcentury Australian comingofage story, to brashly upend the conventions of period romance. Headstrong young Sybylla Melvyn (Judy Davis, in a starmaking performance), bemoans her stifling life in the backcountry, where her writerly ambitions receive little encouragement, and craves independence above all else. When a handsome landowner (Jurassic Park's Sam Neill), disarmed by her unruly charms, begins to court her, Sybylla must decide whether she can reconcile the prospect of marriage with the illustrious life's work she has imagined for herself. Suffused with generous humour and a youthful appetite for experience, My Brilliant Career is a luminous portrait of an ardently free spirit. Features: New, restored 4K digital transfer, approved by director Gillian Armstrong, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack Audio commentary from 2009 featuring Armstrong New interview with Armstrong Interview from 1980 with actor Judy Davis New interview with production designer Luciana Arrighi One Hundred a Day (1973), a student short film by Armstrong Trailer PLUS: An essay by critic Carrie Rickey

• The Jessie Matthews Revue Vol. 1 | DVD | (06/04/2015) from £12.98   |  Saving you £2.00 (18.20%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Throughout the 1930s Jessie Matthews was Britain's best-loved musical film star her dynamism and gamine charm beguiling audiences on both sides of the Atlantic. With a string of box-office hits spotlighting her unique talent and charisma it's easy to see how she became so popular – and why she remains so to this day. Showcasing some of the era's finest cinema talent – including director Victor Saville writer Sidney Gilliat and comedy star (and Matthews' husband) Sonnie Hale – the two films on this volume are presented as transfers from the original film elements in their as-exhibited theatrical aspect ratios. FRIDAY THE THIRTEENTH Six very different people are involved in a fatal omnibus accident; which two were killed on this unluckiest of days is eventually revealed in a compelling blend of humour and pathos. Black and White / 83 mins / 1.33:1 / Mono / English FIRST A GIRL A messenger girl and would-be entertainer's big break arrives when she stands in for a drag artiste stricken with laryngitis... and finds life can get very complicated for a girl impersonating a boy impersonating a girl! Black and White / 88 mins / 1.33:1 / Mono / English

• Hanna-Barbera Specials Collection: Five Classic TV Specials | DVD | (15/09/2015) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Bob Le Flambeur | DVD | (13/11/2006) from £10.35   |  Saving you £9.64 (93.14%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Once a renowned criminal Bob the Gambler now contents himself with gambling frequenting casinos in the shady districts of Paris. He is convinced his gangster days are over - until he meets up with an old accomplice who has news which interests him. The casino at Deauville has a safe which is loaded with several hundred million francs. Short of cash Bob decides to plan one last great robbery. He recruits a number of former fellow criminals and plans the theft to the greatest detail. Unfortunately on the day of the robbery things rapidly begin to go wrong. Bob's luck appears to have taken an unexpected turn - for the better.

• Classic Films Triple - A Night To Remember/Caesar And Cleopatra | DVD | (06/10/2008) from £5.99   |  Saving you £7.00 (116.86%)   |  RRP £12.99

  A Night To Remember: On April 10th 1912 RMS Titanic sailed from Southampton on her maiden voyage. On her fourth night at sea she struck and iceberg and sank with the loss of 1 500 passengers and crew. The film faithfully depicts the drama heroism and horror of the night the unsinkable sank. The Red Shoes: The tragic and romantic story of Vicky Page the brilliant young dancer who must give up everything if she is to become a great ballerina is one of Powell and Pressburger's most famous films. Creators of classics such as Black Narcissus A Matter of Life And Death and The Life And Death Of Colonel Blimp they were renowned for their use of brilliant colour and wonderful costumes and with the exhilarating cinematography of Jack Cardiff were among the most influential film makers of their time. The Red Shoes is one of the finest examples of their work and has become an inspiration to artists film makers and musicians all over the world. Caesar And Cleopatra: Vivien Leigh is the young Cleopatra and Claude Rains is Julius Caesar in the spectacular 1945 version of George Bernard Shaw's Caesar and Cleopatra. As Rome invades Egypt Julius Caesar (Rains) stumbles across the young and unrefined princess Cleopatra (Leigh) sheltering in the Sphinx. Impressed by her spirit and intelligence seduced by her charm he determines to make her Queen. Cleopatra learns about power and politics at the feet of a master but her downfall begins when she is seduced by Mark Antony. This witty brilliantly designed movie features a memorable cast including Stewart Granger Flora Robson Stanley Holloway and a very young Jean Simmons as a harpist. Caesar and Cleopatra was the most expensive movie made in Britain at the time with director Gabriel Pascal even using sand from Egypt to get the right cinematic colour.

• The Collector | DVD | (07/10/2013) from £17.53   |  Saving you £-4.54 (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Freddie, a socially withdrawn bank clerk and butterfly collector, decides to expand to collecting human specimens.

• Martin Scorsese Presents: World Cinema Foundation: Volume One - Dual Format (Blu-ray & DVD) | Blu Ray | (25/11/2013) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £44.99

  Dry Summer A brutal naturalist melodrama Metin Erksan's masterful Dry Summer [Susuz yaz] which won the Golden Bear at the 1964 Berlin Film Festival returns to the spotlight in a new restoration after decades of suppression by Turkish authorities: an arid fate for one of the most exciting films of the 1960s. Viscerally tactile unsparing and even on occasion outright lurid Dry Summer has been described by filmmaker Fatih Akin as one of the most important legacies of Turkish cinema. During a particularly dry rural Turkish summer a group of local workers enter into a dispute with a landowner when he decides the construction of new irrigation infrastructure must first and foremost service his own property. Wholly rapacious the landowner foments a private war with his own kin after the brother takes a bewitching young wife. The battle between the factions plays out in stunning set-pieces: a pursuit with pistols amidst grass-stalks and dam-water before the setting sun evokes elements of Renoir (Toni) Ford (The World Moves On) Bergman (The Virgin Spring) and Shindô (Onibaba) while a scene set in a brush thicket wherein the landowner and his aggressors fight it out hatchet-and-club provides drama at least as exciting and gasp-inducing as the climax of Seven Samurai. Dry Summer's sweat-dappled tone and baked images of promenade and labour recall Mexican-period Buñuel as much as aspects of mid-'50s Italian commercial melodrama and via the film's backdrop of agrarian agitation and its low angles - which effect a figural relief against blazing albeit greyish mid-contrast summer skies - post-montage Soviet agitprop. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present the World Cinema Foundation's restoration of Metin Erksan's classic on Blu-ray for the first time in the UK. Trances The inaugural film of the World Cinema Foundation's efforts Trances [Transes] is a picture unlike any other: a poetic roving documentary-portrait performance-film based around the Moroccan band Nass El Ghiwane. In this rare transformational work Nass El Ghiwane perform their music at concerts at once fervidly rally-like and suffused with the spontaneity of a mass happening; recount their time working alongside the great chaâbi musician Boudjemaâ El Ankis in the 1970s; and generally philosophise and reflect upon life. As Martin Scorsese expressed at the time of the film's re-presentation in 2007: I became passionate about this music that I heard and I saw also the way the film was made the concert that was photographed and the effect of the music on the audience at the concert. I tracked down the music and eventually it became my inspiration for many of the designs and construction of my film The Last Temptation of Christ. [...] And I think the group was singing damnation: their people their beliefs their sufferings and their prayers all came through their singing. And I think the film is beautifully made by Ahmed El Maanouni; it's been an obsession of mine since 1981. True to its title Trances is an hypnotic exhilarating masterwork. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Ahmed El Maanouni's film restored from the original 16mm camera and sound negatives on Blu-ray for the first time in the UK. Revenge Set largely in Korea and China and spanning the 1910s to 1940s Ermek Shinarbaev's epic masterpiece unites the resonant pictoriality of certain Far Eastern cinema with a mysticism rooted in the Russian tradition: a fitting and harmonic convergence for this collaboration (one of three) between the Kazakh director and Korean-Russian writer Anatoli Kim. A rural schoolteacher Jan murders a pupil the young daughter of a family under whom he had previously been a tenant. The father Caj [pronounced Tsaiya] tracks him to China to exact revenge - but at at the moment of vengeance Caj cannot act. He returns home only to take a concubine who in turn bears him a son: Sungu a prodigious composer of verse. At Caj's deathbed the boy is informed he has been brought into the world purely for the sake of vengeance; he takes an oath to annihilate Jan. Tonally Revenge exhibits an extraordinary use of natural light that lends the figures an almost ethereal incandescence in the picture's first half; the second half of the film shifts into a no-less-impressive palate that is ally to late-Tarkovskyan naturalism. A narrative broken into seven chapters and constructed in a full-circle that creates a visual and spoken summary of Sungu's poetic universe Revenge is to quote the critic Kent Jones a true odyssey geographically and psychologically. One of the greatest films to emerge from the Kazakh New Wave and also one of the toughest. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Revenge restored from the original camera negative with the involvement of Ermek Shinarbaev on Blu-ray for the first time in the UK. Special Features: Glorious new restorations of three neglected masterworks of world cinema all presented in 1080p HD Exclusive video introductions to each film by Martin Scorsese 80-page book featuring writing by Kent Jones on Revenge Bilge Ebiri on Trances archival documentation and imagery and more to be announced Optional English subtitles on each film More features to be announced closer to release date