"Director: Woody Allen"

• Scoop | DVD | (09/02/2015) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £5.94

  Woody Allen writes, directs and stars in this comedy crime thriller alongside Scarlett Johansson and Hugh Jackman. The film follows American journalism student Sondra Pransky (Johansson), who, while taking part in a show presented by magician Sidney Waterman (Allen) in London, is visited by the ghostly apparition of the recently deceased journalist Joe Strombel (Ian McShane) and told the identity of an alleged serial killer. As Sondra and Sidney try to uncover whether there is any truth to these claims, Sondra begins to fall in love with the suspect, British aristocrat Peter Lyman (Jackman)...

• Woody Allen: Seven Films - 1986-1991 | Blu Ray | (20/02/2017) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £39.49

  Arrow Academy's third Woody Allen collection spans 1986-91 and the bulk of his work with Mia Farrow, who is featured in all seven of these films. They start with the much-loved family saga Hannah and Her Sisters, a warm and witty return to Allen's beloved Manhattan, and the nostalgic Radio Days, a collection of stories from the time of Allen's own 1930s/40s childhood. More sombre fare comes with the Chekhov-influenced ensemble piece September and Another Woman, with a tour de force role for Gena Rowlands as a middle-aged philosophy professor whose accidental eavesdropping makes her reassess her life. And with Crimes and Misdemeanors, Allen made one of his greatest films, a multi-layered and almost Dostoyevskian reflection on guilt that also finds room for some of his funniest one-liners. The box concludes with two of his more fantastical films, the romantic comedy Alice, in which relationships are guided with the aid of mysterious ˜invisibility herbs', and the black-and-white, star-studded Shadows and Fog, an homage to Kafka and German Expressionism that was based on Allen's own one-act play Death. Collection includes: Hannah and Her Sisters (1986) Radio Days (1987) September (1987) Another Woman (1988) Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989) Alice (1990) Shadows and Fog (1991) Exclusive to this collection: a hardback book featuring new and archive writing on all the films by Woody Allen, Richard Ayoade, Frank Collins, Glenn Kenny, Guy Lodge, Sheila O'Malley, Leanne Weston and Craig Williams

• Zelig | Blu Ray | (12/12/2016) from £14.55   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Mockumentaries are ten a penny these days, but in 1983 Zelig offered something startlingly new, as heavyweight talking heads such as Saul Bellow and Susan Sontag discuss an entirely fictional character who is nonetheless strangely convincing. Leonard Zelig (Woody Allen) is a man so introverted and insecure that he has developed the ability to blend perfectly into the background of any given situation, regardless of the personality or even ethnicity of the people around him. But when he inadvertently becomes famous as the human chameleon after the media takes too keen an interest in his therapy sessions with Dr Eudora Fletcher (Mia Farrow), Zelig is faced with an unprecedented challenge: how do you fade into the background when the spotlight is firmly upon you? Zelig isn't just hilarious but also an incredible technical accomplishment. Without any recourse to CGI techniques that had yet to be invented, Oscar-nominated cinematographer Gordon Willis inserts Zelig into actual 1920s and 30s footage so seamlessly that you're convinced that he's really interacting with the likes of Babe Ruth and Adolf Hitler.

• Café Society | Blu Ray | (26/12/2016) from £6.33   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Set in the 1930s, Woody Allen's bittersweet romance CAFÉ SOCIETY follows Bronx-born Bobby Dorfman (Jesse Eisenberg) to Hollywood, where he falls in love, and back to New York, where he is swept up in the vibrant world of high society nightclub life. With CAFÉ SOCIETY, Woody Allen conjures up a 1930s world that has passed to tell a deeply romantic tale of dreams that never die. Click Images to Enlarge

• Mighty Aphrodite | DVD | (07/07/2014) from £9.43   |  Saving you £5.56 (58.96%)   |  RRP £14.99

  Released in 1995, Mighty Aphrodite was arguably Woody Allen's most successful film since Hannah and Her Sisters almost a decade earlier. The story follows Allen's neurotic New York sports writer Lenny, who becomes obsessed with tracking down his adopted son's birth mother, Linda. His odyssey is narrated and commented upon with coruscating wit by a Greek chorus led by F Murray Abraham. Despite their dire warnings at his rather ham-fisted attempts at hubris, there is nothing tragic in the ultimately uplifting tale. Lenny eventually locates Linda (an Oscar-winning performance from the enchanting Mira Sorvino) and discovers that she's caught up in just about every aspect of the sex trade. Without revealing his reasons, he sets about improving her life with hilarious results. Sorvino is a wonder as the tall, alluring and vulnerable Linda, who talks with candid innocence of her adventures in vice (she offers a blow job as if it was a pound of apples) and clearly deserves a better hand than she has been dealt. Helena Bonham Carter, not entirely convincing as a driven Manahattanite, plays Allen's ambitious art dealer wife whom Lenny ultimately realises is the love of his life. And a host of stars including Claire Bloom, Gwenn Verdon and Olympia Dukakis (Jocasta) contribute shining moments to this intelligent and touching comedy. When the chorus bursts into "When You're Smiling" at the end, it's like the sun coming out. On the DVD: The widescreen (1.85:1) presentation gives the location-shot chorus scenes marvellous resonance, although the Dolby Digital mono soundtrack is occasionally rather flat. Both picture and sound quality, however, preserve the intimacy which is the trademark of Allen's finest work. There are no extras beyond a choice of subtitles and the usual scene selection menu.--Piers Ford

• Anything Else | DVD | (14/02/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £12.99

  "American Pie" star Jason Biggs stars as a love-lorn comedy writer in the latest movie from the legendary Woody Allen.

• Another Woman | DVD | (19/08/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  ""Two Thumbs Up! I Was Mesmerized From Beginning To End!"" -Roger Ebert ""Siskel and Ebert"" Writer/director Woody Allen delivers a powerful ""searing adult drama"" (Leonard Maltin) examining the life of an accomplished philosophy professor teetering on the brink of self-understanding. Boasting a superb cast led by Gena Rowlands Mia Farrow Ian Holm and Gene Hackman Another Woman is Allen's 17th triumphant film. Stylistically rich and technically expert the film layers past and pres

• Everyone Says I Love You | DVD | (07/07/2014) from £9.43   |  Saving you £5.56 (58.96%)   |  RRP £14.99

  Writer-director Woody Allen has produced yet another challenging and funny film with Everyone Says I Love You, this time taking on the musical genre and bending it to his own unique vision. The result is one of his most charming films in recent years, as Allen assembles a typically sterling ensemble cast to evoke the romanticism of years past. This time, the large cast (including Alan Alda, Drew Barrymore, Goldie Hawn, Edward Norton and Tim Roth) not only turn in funny and touching performances, but they sing the classic songs of the 1930s and 1940s themselves, and sing them very well. The plot centres on an extended family in New York and their various romantic entanglements, including Allen's pursuit of Julia Roberts through the streets of Paris and the canals of Venice. The musical numbers are the film's high points, displaying wonderful choreography ranging from a room full of dancing Groucho Marxes to a dancing couple in flight at the banks of the Seine. Everyone Says I Love You is a witty and entertaining fantasy, and truly romantic escapism.--Robert Lane, Amazon.com

• A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy | DVD | (19/08/2002) from £11.98   |  Saving you £7.00 (77.86%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Woody Allen's 1982 homage to Bergman and Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy is a delight from start to finish and must rate as one of his most joyous films. The period setting--Edwardian up state New York--gives the whole thing a misty, elegiac quality. Part Midsummer Night's Dream (the magic supplied by visions through a spirit glass) and part Smiles of a Summer Night (Bergman's source material provides the basic plot and ensuing couplings), it's a gentle satire on male sexuality and frustration. Allen handles the angst with the lightest of touches. He plays a Wall Street broker who spends his holidays inventing flying machines (they work, with telling consequences). He and his wife (Mary Steenburgen) are increasingly depressed by their ailing sex life. Cue the arrival of weekend guests: crusty academic (Jose Ferrer) and beautiful blue-stocking fiancée previously in love with Allen (Mia Farrow, of course); and insatiable doctor (Tony Roberts) with his latest squeeze, a nurse (the excellent Julie Hagerty). Eighty minutes of unravelling, discovery and renewal follow, accompanied by a Mendelssohn sound track. This is one of Allen's most treasurable pictures. On the DVD: A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy is presented in widescreen that recaptures the pleasure which greeted the setting of this most pastoral of Allen's films on its first release; it really does glow with summery light. The standard stereo soundtrack is perfectly acceptable. Extras include the original theatrical trailer and multiple language soundtracks.--Piers Ford

• Celebrity | DVD | (07/07/2014) from £7.99   |  Saving you £7.00 (87.61%)   |  RRP £14.99

  Woody Allen's Celebrity--a portrait of the celebrity life as seen through the eyes of a newly divorced couple--is a black-and-white, New York-style La Dolce Vita that's a chillier flip side to Allen's earlier New York valentine, Manhattan. Despite a few missteps, though, it's an admirable (if dark) and worthy addition to the Allen pantheon. Kenneth Branagh and Judy Davis (both boasting American accents) star as the ex-couple, each struggling to build new, separate lives in a media-saturated, celebrity-driven world. Branagh tries his hand at celebrity profiles (while peddling a screenplay to any star that will listen) and falls into the lap of a bosomy starlet (Melanie Griffith), the first in a long line of briefly attainable women. Davis runs into a producer (Joe Mantegna) who offers her a job as a TV personality as well as a loving relationship. This seemingly simple double plot is punctuated with twists and turns in the form of flashbacks and innumerable side trips, all ravishingly photographed in black and white by the legendary Sven Nykvist, and populated by one of Allen's largest casts ever; if you blink you'll miss countless cameos by Isaac Mizrahi, Donald Trump, Hank Azaria, Leonardo DiCaprio and a host of others. While Davis is splendid as usual (aside from the requisite nervous breakdown scene she's done one too many times), somebody should have told Branagh to put a kibosh on his Woody Allen imitation. His failure in the role, however, isn't entirely his fault, as it's another in a long line of unlikable male protagonists which Allen has created, as if daring audiences to hate his main characters after loving them in such movies as Manhattan and Annie Hall. Far more enjoyable misadventures with Branagh include Charlise Theron in the film's best performance as a libidinous supermodel with a penchant for Echinacea; a stunning Famke Janssen as a successful book editor; and Winona Ryder, acting like an adult for the first time, as an aspiring actress. But they all manage to slip through Branagh's fingers by the end of the film. --Mark Englehart, Amazon.com

• Small Time Crooks | DVD | (07/07/2014) from £10.99   |  Saving you £4.00 (36.40%)   |  RRP £14.99

  Dishwasher and small-fry criminal Ray hits on a plan with his partners in crime to re-open a local pizza place and dig through to the bank down the street. As his wife can't cook pizza but does great cookies, that's what they sell. While the no-hope tunnellers get lost underground, the cookie operation really takes off and the team find themselves rich business people. But the other local money isn't quite ready to accept them.

• The Woody Allen Library | DVD | (07/07/2014) from £43.18   |  Saving you £6.81 (15.77%)   |  RRP £49.99

  A 7-disc boxset selection of Woody Allen's feature films. The boxset includes: Bullets Over Broadway, Celebrity, Sweet and Lowdown, Small Time Crooks, Mighty Aphrodite, Everyone Says I Love You and Deconstructing Harry.

• Manhattan Murder Mystery | DVD | (07/06/2010) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Carol Lipton is a bored housewife who becomes convinced that her next door neighbour has commited a murder. When her sceptical husband Larry rejects the idea Carol turns to a flirtatious friend to help her search for clues. And as their entusiasm for the case grows so does their interest in each other. Spurred on by jealousy - and by a seductive writer who's also excited by the mystery - Larry reluctantly joins the chase only to learn that much more than his marriage is at stake. A comic romp bursting with wry one-liners and inspired sight gags 'Manhattan Murder Mystery' finds Woody Allen at his breezy entertaining best.

• Celebrity | DVD | (04/02/2002) from £5.74   |  Saving you £9.25 (161.15%)   |  RRP £14.99

  Woody Allen's Celebrity--a portrait of the celebrity life as seen through the eyes of a newly divorced couple--is a black-and-white, New York-style La Dolce Vita that's a chillier flip side to Allen's earlier New York valentine, Manhattan. Despite a few missteps, though, it's an admirable (if dark) and worthy addition to the Allen pantheon. Kenneth Branagh and Judy Davis (both boasting American accents) star as the ex-couple, each struggling to build new, separate lives in a media-saturated, celebrity-driven world. Branagh tries his hand at celebrity profiles (while peddling a screenplay to any star that will listen) and falls into the lap of a bosomy starlet (Melanie Griffith), the first in a long line of briefly attainable women. Davis runs into a producer (Joe Mantegna) who offers her a job as a TV personality as well as a loving relationship. This seemingly simple double plot is punctuated with twists and turns in the form of flashbacks and innumerable side trips, all ravishingly photographed in black and white by the legendary Sven Nykvist, and populated by one of Allen's largest casts ever; if you blink you'll miss countless cameos by Isaac Mizrahi, Donald Trump, Hank Azaria, Leonardo DiCaprio and a host of others. While Davis is splendid as usual (aside from the requisite nervous breakdown scene she's done one too many times), somebody should have told Branagh to put a kibosh on his Woody Allen imitation. His failure in the role, however, isn't entirely his fault, as it's another in a long line of unlikable male protagonists which Allen has created, as if daring audiences to hate his main characters after loving them in such movies as Manhattan and Annie Hall. Far more enjoyable misadventures with Branagh include Charlise Theron in the film's best performance as a libidinous supermodel with a penchant for Echinacea; a stunning Famke Janssen as a successful book editor; and Winona Ryder, acting like an adult for the first time, as an aspiring actress. But they all manage to slip through Branagh's fingers by the end of the film. --Mark Englehart, Amazon.com

• Crimes And Misdemeanours | DVD | (03/04/2017) from £16.05   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  If it bends, it's funny; if it breaks, it's not claims Alan Alda's hilariously pompous TV producer, and one of the miracles of Woody Allen's dark and Dostoevskian masterpiece is that it knows exactly how far to bend the comedy so that it doesn't undermine the far more serious moral dilemmas at its core. Two men wrestle with their consciences: idealistic documentary filmmaker Cliff Stern (Allen) is offered a lucrative fee to shoot a flattering profile of his loathsome but far more successful brother-in-law (Alda), while respected ophthalmologist Judah Rosenthal (an Oscar-nominated Martin Landau) is faced with exposure by his vengeful ex-mistress (Anjelica Huston), and has to choose between the spiritual advice of his rabbi (Sam Waterston) and more practical suggestions from his mobster brother (Jerry Orbach). Described by the Los Angeles Times as one of the watershed films of his career, Crimes and Misdemeanors remains one of Woody Allen's greatest films, not least for its scathingly clear-eyed view of how far people will to go to protect their apparent integrity, even at the price of losing the real thing.

• A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy | Blu Ray | (12/12/2016) from £11.92   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Woody Allen's 1982 homage to Bergman and Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy is a delight from start to finish and must rate as one of his most joyous films. The period setting--Edwardian up state New York--gives the whole thing a misty, elegiac quality. Part Midsummer Night's Dream (the magic supplied by visions through a spirit glass) and part Smiles of a Summer Night (Bergman's source material provides the basic plot and ensuing couplings), it's a gentle satire on male sexuality and frustration. Allen handles the angst with the lightest of touches. He plays a Wall Street broker who spends his holidays inventing flying machines (they work, with telling consequences). He and his wife (Mary Steenburgen) are increasingly depressed by their ailing sex life. Cue the arrival of weekend guests: crusty academic (Jose Ferrer) and beautiful blue-stocking fiancée previously in love with Allen (Mia Farrow, of course); and insatiable doctor (Tony Roberts) with his latest squeeze, a nurse (the excellent Julie Hagerty). Eighty minutes of unravelling, discovery and renewal follow, accompanied by a Mendelssohn sound track. This is one of Allen's most treasurable pictures. On the DVD: A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy is presented in widescreen that recaptures the pleasure which greeted the setting of this most pastoral of Allen's films on its first release; it really does glow with summery light. The standard stereo soundtrack is perfectly acceptable. Extras include the original theatrical trailer and multiple language soundtracks.--Piers Ford

• The Purple Rose Of Cairo | Blu Ray | (09/01/2017) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  "I've just met a wonderful new man. He's fictional but you can't have everything." So says Cecilia (Mia Farrow), the central figure in Woody Allen's lyrically humorous Purple Rose of Cairo. The era is the Great Depression, and she is the bullied wife who finds escape in romantic movies, falling in love with the explorer hero, Tom Baxter (Jeff Daniels), of the eponymous film. So far, nothing remarkable. But Allen has Baxter spot her in the audience, fall in love with her, and desert the picture, much to the irritation of the other characters. The surreal quality of the situation develops further when Gil Shepherd--the actor who played Baxter (Daniels again)--seeks out his fictional alter ego to persuade him back into the film and thus save both their reputations. Naturally Shepherd, too, falls in love with Cecilia, and she's left to choose between fiction and reality, chooses the latter and is then cruelly jilted. The message seems clear: fairytales are just that, make-believe. There's no such thing as a happy ending. Dating from 1985 (after Broadway Danny Rose and immediately before Hannah and her Sisters), this is one of the few movies in which Allen doesn't actually appear, though he's recognisable in every line of Farrow's character. It's also a nostalgic tribute to the era that defined movie glamour, the close-up of Cecilia's face at the end a moment of pure Hollywood. At 81 minutes, this is a small but brilliant gem. On the DVD: Aside from the technological improvement of DVD over video, the new format adds little by way of features: you can view the original trailer, scan the film scene by scene, and there's a choice of subtitles in eight languages.--Harriet Smith

• Small Time Crooks | DVD | (21/10/2002) from £20.00   |  Saving you £-10.01 (N/A%)   |  RRP £9.99

  Woody Allen's latest comedy follows the misadventures of a couple who plan a daring robbery in New York.

• Another Woman | Blu Ray | (06/03/2017) from £14.55   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Woody Allen's 17th film. Gena Rowland plays Marion, an academic who rents a flat in which to write a book on philosophy and becomes intrigued by conversations she overhears from a psychologist's office next door. One patient, Hope (Mia Farrow), has a particular effect on Marion forcing her to re-think many of her assumptions about her own life: her unhappy marriage; her feelings for another man (Gene Hackman); and her relationships with her best friend (Sandy Dennis) and brother (Harris Yulin).

• Broadway Danny Rose | Blu Ray | (09/01/2017) from £14.98   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Broadway Danny Rose is vintage Woody Allen. Danny (Allen) is a down-at-heel theatrical agent whose regular clients include talking bird acts and a man who twists balloons into animal shapes. His faith in these eccentrics never fails, despite the fact that everyone leaves him for another agent in the end. Complications ensue when one of his clients, an overweight crooner, starts a romance with a mafia widow (excellently played by Allen's partner of the time, Mia Farrow). The mob think Danny is her boyfriend, forcing the two of them to take evasive action, at one point dodging bullets among giant floats for a forthcoming Fourth of July parade. The script is witty, the acting superb, the situations inventive. The film is shot in black and white and looks superb for it. On the DVD: The DVD is widescreen, with extremely clear sound so you won't miss a single wisecrack. Dialogue is available in French, German, Italian and Spanish as well as English. It's a pity, however--since the film is so short (84 minutes)--that there are no extras apart from the theatrical trailer. --Ed Buscombe