"Director: Ken Loach"

• Hidden Agenda | Blu Ray | (16/10/2015) from £18.75   |  Saving you £1.24 (6.61%)   |  RRP £19.99

  American activists Paul Sullivan (Brad Dourif) and his fiancée Ingrid Jessner (Frances McDormand) journey to Belfast to probe allegations of human rights abuses by the British military in Northern Ireland. But when Paul is killed in mysterious circumstances and denounced as an IRA accomplice, Jessner teams up with Peter Kerrigan (Brian Cox), a British investigator acting against the will of his own government, to uncover a high-level conspiracy with far-reaching consequences. This daring political thriller, from one of Britain's most celebrated filmmakers, features unforgettable performances from McDormand and Cox, and ranks as a true classic of modern cinema.

• Black Jack | DVD | (21/06/2010) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Based on the novel by celebrated children's author Leon Garfield this children's adventure film set in 1750s York was Ken Loach's fourth feature. Shot on location by cinematographer Chris Menges - who had collaborated with Loach on developing the gentle observational style also seen in his earlier feature Kes (1969) - the film's witty dialogue and enchanting performances from its charismatic young cast led to the film being presented with the Critics Award at the 1979 Cannes Film Festival.

• Ken Loach: My Name Is Joe, Raining Stones, Riff Raff | DVD | (01/01/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £17.99

  My Name Is JoeKen Loach's My Name Is Joe is a slice of life so raw that you can see the blood dripping off it and as in real life it mixes humour passion tragedy and violence in equal measure. Joe (Peter Mullan) is a recovering alcoholic and has done a few things in his past which he'd rather forget. Like most people he knows he's out of work but he keeps sane by coaching the self-styled worst football team in Glasgow. When one of Joe's players Liam gets involved with some local gangsters a chain of events is set in motion which not only threatens the lives of those concerned but also comes between Joe's budding love affair with social worker Sarah (Louise Goodall). Raining StonesBob Williams is a survivor. He supplements his dole by becoming embroiled in whatever scam is on offer from rustling sheep to rotting drains. But now life has dealt him a bitter blow. His van has been stolen and his daughter Colleen is approaching her first communion. She needs the traditional white dress shoes veil and gloves. Where on earth is the money going to come from? Raining Stones is a funny and essentially human story of survival in the nineties and people's aspirations for a better way of life. Riff RaffStevie a young Glaswegian just out of Barlinnie prison comes down to London and gets a job on a building site - a melting pot of itinerant laborers from all over the country. Here he has to contend with Mick the bossy ganger trying - but usually failing to control his workers Shem Mo and Larry and the other lads as they duck and dive the rules and regulations of the building trade. Stevie has other problems to contend: the wages are low the site teems with rats he has nowhere to sleep and life in London isn't that easy. One day on his way to work Stevie finds a handbag in a skip. He takes it back to it owner and meets Susan. As Stevie and Susan learn to live with the ups and downs of life in London Riff-Raff builds a portrait - sometimes gritty often funny of life as it is lived in the margins.

• Route Irish | Blu Ray | (23/05/2011) from £15.99   |  Saving you £4.00 (25.02%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Fergus (Mark Womack) returns to his native Liverpool for the funeral of his childhood friend Frankie, a fellow private security contractor who has been killed on Route Irish, the deadly and now infamous stretch of road between Baghdad airport and the Green Zone. Route Irish is a fast-paced conspiracy thriller that delivers a fresh insight into the moral and political corruption at play in Iraq.

• Bread And Roses | DVD | (13/01/2003) from £19.99   |  Saving you £-10.00 (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  A powerful film, "Bread and Roses" sees acclaimed UK director Ken Loach take on the City of Angels in his first US-set effort, based around the true-life janitors strike that hit the city in 1999.

• 11/09/01 - September 11 | DVD | (28/04/2003) from £10.10   |  Saving you £9.89 (97.92%)   |  RRP £19.99

  This film is a unique and extraordinary response to the catastrophic events in New York City that shook the world on September 11 2001. producer Alain Brigand invited 11 renowned international directors to look towards their own cultures their own memories their own stories and their own language and create a film lasting eleven minutes nine seconds and one frame - 11'09''O1 - around September 11 and its consequences. The thought-provoking results - made with complete freedom of

• The Navigators | DVD | (22/04/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Ken Loach does for the railways in The Navigators what he did for the construction industry in Riff-Raff (1990). As ever, his sympathies lie firmly with the ordinary working blokes, not above of bit of banter and skiving, but essentially trying to do a decent job and stay loyal to their mates in the face of managerial double-talk and corporate devotion to the bottom line. It's 1995, and the Tories have just carried out their disastrous, pea-brained scheme to break up the railways. We follow the fortunes of a gang of track workers in South Yorkshire as they find themselves confronted with all the fallout of privatisation--redundancies, cost-cutting, corner-cutting and the wholesale junking of any concern with safety or quality of work. Accidental deaths, one hapless time-server explains, "have got to be kept to an acceptable level". Two scenes encapsulate the tragic-comic tone of the film. At one point the disbelieving workers are ordered by managers to smash up a load of new equipment; it's surplus to requirements, but can't possibly be sold to "the competition", their former British Rail workmates at the depot down the line. Later, called to a derailment, the track workers pass a whole series of hard-hat wearing managers, each paying no attention to what needs doing but muttering fiercely into a mobile phone trying to pass the buck for the accident to another company. Loach cast the film using local actors and comics, and there's a strong sense of authenticity in the flat accents and dry Yorkshire humour. But ultimately this is a lament for the destruction, not only of what was once a great rail network, but of the pride and camaraderie of those who worked on it. The film's ending is fittingly bleak. --Philip Kemp

• Tickets | DVD | (24/04/2006) from £20.00   |  Saving you £-0.01 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Three highly acclaimed directors join together to direct three interwoven stories that take place during a journey from Central Europe to Rome. The characters connect through casual encounters and set forth a story of love chance and sacrifice. One older businessman finds solace and a new insight into life when he is forced to wait at the train station due to bad weather. A young man is reminded of life's obligations but is also introduced to love. And three Scottish youths on their

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

  Although not of a genre readily associated with Ken Loach, Riff Raff is basically a romantic comedy--albeit one set against the backdrop of political and social injustice. Robert Carlyle is young Glaswegian Stevie, newly relocated to London and sleeping rough. He finds a job on a building site and embarks on a relationship with Irish singer Susan (McCourt). The struggle that both the couple and their friends and workmates (the film is very much an ensemble piece) have to endure just to survive life on the margins of society paints a grim picture of early 1990s Britain, but also one that is shot through with resilient humour. Much of this comes from from Ricky Tomlinson's sublime performance, one that pre-dates his Royle Family role but bears all the hallmarks of his comic genius. Some of the political interjections are understandably a little dated and a touch heavy-handed, but Riff Raff is a film that successfully combines a sense of righteous indignation with a warm heart. --Phil Udell

• The Ken Loach Collection Volume 2 | DVD | (03/09/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £59.99

  Available together in a box set for the first time experience the drama and intensity from some truly ground-breaking and memorable British Cinema. Cathy Come Home (1965): Cathy Come Home is probably the most famous British television play ever - watched by a quarter of the population both on its first broadcast in 1966 and on its repeat in 1967. Its impact was enormous provoking questions in the Houses of Parliament and helping launch the new housing charity 'Shelter'. K

• Looks And Smiles | DVD | (18/03/2013) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Loach was awarded the 1981 Young Cinema Award at Cannes for this naturalistic study of one young man’s struggle to find his way in the world set against a backdrop of Thatcherism and the Irish troubles. Based on Barry Hines' acclaimed novel, and made at a time when British unemployment was already reaching record levels, Looks and Smiles follows Mick, a teenager looking for work in recession-hit Sheffield. Featuring a cast of unknown leads, with hauntingly lyrical black and white cinematography of bleak industrial scenes, this gritty portrait is as important a film to watch today as it was on first release.

• Fatherland | DVD | (18/03/2013) from £16.18   |  Saving you £-0.19 (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Dark secrets are revealed and sinister alliances uncovered in acclaimed director Ken Loach’s complex tale of betrayal and life on either side of the Berlin Wall. East Berlin-based protest singer Klaus Ditteman is forced to abandon his wife and child and relocate to West Berlin where representatives from an American record label approach him to try to exploit his music for financial and political gain. Never one to comply with authority, Klaus leaves the contract unsigned and with the help of Emma, a French journalist, he leaves for England to search for his father. Featuring an original soundtrack and the only screen appearance by highly influential German singer-songwriter and lyricist, Gerulf Pannach, Fatherland is an accomplished depiction of 80s Berlin that lives up to Loach’s reputation as a master of social politics.

• Ae Fond Kiss | DVD | (11/07/2005) from £8.75   |  Saving you £-1.76 (-25.20%)   |  RRP £6.99

  When a second generation Pakistani falls in love with a Catholic girl in his home town of Glasgow, sparks fly as cultures clash in the new movie from "Sweet Sixteen" director Ken Loach.

• My Name Is Joe | DVD | (03/02/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £17.99

  My Name Is Joe: A former alcoholic who is currently out of work keeps himself busy by coaching a football team in Glasgow. When one of his players becomes involved with local gangsters their lives are changed forever... Bread And Roses: Maya and Rosa are Mexican sisters living and working in downtown Los Angeles working for a pittence and in very hostile conditions. When they happen upon a young activist there seems to be hope as he vows to help them both get the justice they deserve.

• Fatherland | DVD | (09/05/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Banned from playing his music in East Berlin Klaus Dittemann is forced to move to West Berlin or face a jail sentence. His music is a platform for his political beliefs where he sings of the injustice prejudice lack of freedom and corruption of the government within East Berlin. Leaving his wife and child behind he finds that even though the location has changed the affairs of the state are just the same and just as corrupt. Unwilling to play the political games of the West Klaus begins a journey that will change his life forever. Befriended by a journalist who has news of his missing father Klaus leaves for England to search for him. Klaus is unprepared for what he is about to uncover about his father's history. A past that reveals a hidden life and hidden memories a past that tells of an awful involvement wit the Nazi's in wartime Germany.

• Carla's Song | DVD | (30/03/1999) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.54

• Poor Cow | DVD | (25/06/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  I fell in the family way when I was 18 and I got married to a right bastard". Ken Loach's debut feature tells the story of Joy, a young mother (Carol White) whose chauvinistic thug of a husband is thrown into prison. She takes up with one of his friends, lovable, kind-hearted burglar Terence Stamp, but he too ends up in jail.It's intriguing to compare Poor Cow with Cathy Come Home, which Loach made for TV with the same actress at around the same time. Both are about mums trying to make a go of their lives in adverse circumstances. Cathy Come Home, shot in black and white, is an altogether tougher film. Poor Cow, with its Donovan music, gaudy colour photography, star names, and incongruously bawdy humour, seems lightweight by comparison. Certain sequences--Joy making love in the hay or posing half-naked for lecherous amateur photographers--must surely make Loach grimace now. There are some powerful moments--Joy desperately looking for her son who has wandered off, unattended, onto a building site, or trying to escape from her abusive husband--which anticipate such later Loach films as Ladybird, Ladybird or Raining Stones. The scenes between Joy and Stamp are played with real tenderness and humour. Don't be surprised if you think you've seen them before--some of the footage of Stamp was used in Steven Soderbergh's recent thriller, The Limey. --Geoffrey Macnab