"Director: James Clavell"

• To Sir With Love | DVD | (28/02/2000) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Novelist James Clavell wrote, produced and directed this 1967 British film (based on the novel by E. R. Braithwaite) about a rookie teacher who throws out stock lesson plans and really takes command of his unruly, adolescent students in a London school. Sidney Poitier is very good as a man struggling with the extent of his commitment to the job, and even more as a teacher whose commitment is to proffering life lessons instead of just academic ones. The spirit of this movie can also be found in more recent films such as Dangerous Minds and Mr. Holland's Opus, but none are as moving as this. Besides, the others don't have a title song performed by Lulu, who also stars. --Tom Keogh

• The Last Valley | DVD | (02/04/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  James Clavell's The Last Valley is a heartfelt film of paradise found and lost in the midst of the bloody Thirty Years War, a senseless religious conflict long since degenerated into a rabble of looters preying on peasants. It's also a triumph of passion over style. Michael Caine stars as the Captain, a happily tolerant leader whose army of mercenaries--a mix of Protestants and Catholics--murders, pillages and rapes side by side for whichever faction is paying more at the time. Omar Sharif is Vogel, a lone refugee whose flight from the marauding band leads them all to a beautiful village in the mountains. The Captain and Vogel make an unlikely pair: the shrewd mercenary with the dream of peace, and the philosopher-peasant hanging on to his own life in the face of certain death--and their alliance to preserve this Eden and her people stands in contrast to the soldiers who soon become splintered by greed, lust and religious zealotry. Clavell isn't exactly subtle, but his sense of irony is biting: one Christian soldier is ready to lead a mob in righteous battle after a perceived blaspheme, and in the next scene attacks and rapes an innocent Christian maiden he's sworn to protect. The film falters in clumsy battle scenes and awkward dramatic staging, but Caine's complex characterisation of the guarded Captain and Sharif's haunted performance keep the story alive, and the beautiful photography fixes the film like a jewel into its setting. --Sean Axmaker, Amazon.com

• Columbia Classics Collection Vol. 3 UHD (14 Discs - UHD & BD) | Blu Ray | (24/10/2022) from £94.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Six classic films with unforgettable performances. Experience these landmark films from Columbia Pictures like never before, now fully remastered and debuting on 4K Ultra HD. With movies that fearlessly portray the scope of human emotion and actors that memorably embody iconic characters and with hours of special features and an exclusive 80-page book with unique insights and production detail about each of the included films this third volume of the Columbia Classics 4K Ultra HD Collection is truly the best way to watch these treasured cinematic favourites.

• The Last Valley | DVD | (01/01/2008) from £13.13   |  Saving you £-7.14 (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.99

  In his nomadic travels, Vogel (Omar Sharif) comes across a beautiful, peaceful village where the community lies unaffected by the war raging around it. Here, he is given the opportunity to lodge there for the winter in return for protection. When an army of ruthless mercenaries led by 'The Captain' (Michael Caine) also discover the oasis, the peace is shattered and the village descends into conflict and violence.

• Creepshow 3 | DVD | (20/10/2008) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Creepshow 3 consist of five vignettes of horror and humour. In ""Alice"" a teenage girl finds her family has changed... or maybe it's her? In 'The Radio' security guard Jerry has no ambition. That is until he buys a radio which starts dictating what he should and shouldn't do from eating to stealing to murder. ""Rachel The Call Girl"" tells the story of a young guy who hires a call girl Rachel who turns out to be a man-hating serial killer. It soon becomes apparent that he also keeps a deadly secret. In ""Professor Dayton's Wife"" prankster Prof. Dayton is finally getting married. But when two of his students meet his beautiful fiance they become suspicious that she's another one of his inventions. Finally in ""The Haunted Dog"" Dr. Farwell is a bad doctor with a bad attitude. He causes the death of a transient by giving him a tainted hot dog to eat and the dead guy starts following the Doc everywhere.

• Sidney Poitier - In The Frame Collection | DVD | (29/10/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £24.99

  This box set features the following films: To Sir With Love (Dir. James Clavell) (1967): A novice teacher faces a class of rowdy undisciplined working-class teenagers in this classic film that reflected some of the problems and fears that existed among young people in the 1960's. Sidney Poitier gives one of his finest performances as Mark Thackeray an out-of-work engineer who turns to teaching in London's tough East End. Guess Who's Coming To Dinner (Dir. Stanley Kramer) (1967): Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn are unforgettable as perplexed parents in this landmark movie about mixed marriage. Joanna (Katharine Houghton) the beautiful daughter of a crusading publisher Matthew Drayton (Tracy) and his patrician wife Christina (Hepburn) returns home with her new fiancee John Prentice (Sidney Poitier) a distinguished black doctor. Christina accepts her daughter's decision to marry John but Matthew is shocked by this interracial union; and the doctor's parents are equally dismayed. Raisin In The Sun (Dir. Daniel Petrie) (1961): The Younger family frustrated with living in their crowded Chicago apartment sees the arrival of a 000 insurance check as the answer to their prayers. Matriarch Lena Younger (Claudia McNeil) promptly puts a down payment on a house in an all-white suburban neighborhood. But the family is divided when Lena entrusts the balance of the money to her mercurial son Walter Lee (Poitier) against the wishes of her daughter (Diana Sands) and daughter-in-law (Ruby Dee). It takes the strength and integrity of this African-American family to battle against generations of prejudice to try to achieve their piece of the American Dream... Buck And The Preacher (Dir. Sidney Poitier) (1972): Buck (Poitier) an ex-Union Army Cavalry sergeant becomes a scout for freed slaves heading to the Colorado frontier. Tagging along with him are his wife (Ruby Dee) and a Bible-thumping con artist known as the Preacher (Belafonte). Attacked by racist bounty hunters determined to return the former slaves to a life of sharecropping in Louisiana Buck and his followers must summon all the courage they have in order to reach their destination and help settle the Wild West... Little Nikita (Dir. Richard Benjamin) (1988): Roy Parmenter is an FBI agent in San Diego; 20 years ago his partner was killed by a Soviet spy nicknamed Scuba still at large. Scuba is now trying to extort the Soviets; to prove he's serious he's killing their agents one by one including sleepers agents under deep cover awaiting orders. Roy interviews a high school lad Jeff Grant an applicant to the Air Force Academy. In a routine background check Roy discovers that Jeff's parents are sleepers. He must see if Jeff is also a spy confront the parents yet protect them and catch his nemesis. Bedford Incident (Dir. James B. Harris) (1965): Nerve-wracking suspense surrounds The Bedford Incident the tale of a U.S. naval vessel on a routine NATO patrol that ends up in a freakish showdown with a Russian submarine. Richard Widmark is Capt. Eric Finlander the maniacal commander who drives his tense crew to the brink of of nervous exhaustion. Sidney Poitier is Ben Munceford photojournalist aboard assigned to record a 'typical' mission. His moral indignation is put to the test by the captain's obsession with forcing the sub to the surface. Several crew members are at their breaking points as Finlander continues his prowl. Especially affected is a former German U-board commander now aboard the Bedford as a NATO observer portrayed by Eric Portman.

• To Sir, With Love | DVD | (03/09/2012) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  A novice teacher faces a class of rowdy, undisciplined working-class teenagers in this classic film that reflected some of the problems and fears that existed among young people in the 1960's. Sidney Poitier gives one of his finest performances as Mark Thackeray, an out-of-work engineer who turns to teaching in London's tough East End.The graduating class, led by Denham (Christian Roberts), Pamela (Judy Geeson) and Barbara (Lulu, who also sings the hit title song), sets out to destroy Thakceray as they did his predecessor, by breaking his spirit. But Thackeray, no stranger to hostility, meets the challenge by treating the students as young adults who will soon enter a work force where they must stand or fall on their own. When offered an engineering job, Thackeray must decide if he wants to stay...