Drama

• Amistad | DVD | (29/01/2001) from £6.77   |  Saving you £13.22 (195.27%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Steven Spielberg's most simplistic, sanitised history lesson, Amistad, explores the symbolic 1840s trials of 53 West Africans following their bloody rebellion aboard a slave ship. For most of Schindler's List (and, later, Saving Private Ryan) Spielberg restrains himself from the sweeping narrative and technical flourishes that make him one of our most entertaining and manipulative directors. Here, he doesn't even bother trying, succumbing to his driving need to entertain with beautiful images and contrived emotion. He cheapens his grandiose motives and simplifies slavery, treating it as cut- and-dry genre piece. Characters are easy Hollywood stereotypes--"villains" like the Spanish sailors or zealous abolitionists are drawn one-dimensionally and sneered upon. And Spielberg can't suppress his gifted eye, undercutting normally ugly sequences, such as the terrifying slave passage, which is shot as a gorgeous, well-lit composition. At its core, Amistad is a traditional courtroom drama, centred by a tired, clichéd narrative: a struggling, idealistic young lawyer (Matthew McConaughey) fighting the crooked political system and saving helpless victims. Worse yet, Spielberg actually takes the underlying premise of his childhood fantasy, E.T. and repackages it for slavery. Cinque (Djimon Hounsou), the leader of the West African rebellion, is presented much like the adorable alien: lost, lacking a common language, and trying to find his way home. McConaughey is a grown-up Elliot who tries communicating complicated ideas such as geography by drawing pictures in the sand or language by having Cinque mimic his facial expressions. Such stuff was effective for a sci-fi fantasy about the communication barriers between a boy and a lost alien; here, it seems like a naive view of real, complex history. --Dave McCoy, Amazon.com

• The Brave One | DVD | (11/02/2008) from £4.52   |  Saving you £17.73 (543.86%)   |  RRP £20.99

  Jodie Foster stars as a grieving woman determined to track down the men behind her fiance's murder, whatever the cost.

• Brick | DVD | (01/01/2007) from £5.56   |  Saving you £10.43 (187.59%)   |  RRP £15.99

  A teenage loner pushes his way into the underworld of a high school crime ring to investigate the disappearance of his ex-girlfriend.

• Dexter: Original Sin - Season One | Blu Ray | (09/06/2025) from £24.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Miami, 1991. When his bloodthirsty urges can't be ignored any longer, young Dexter Morgan must learn to channel his inner darkness as he transitions from student to avenging serial killer with the guidance of his father, Harry.

• Charlie Bubbles - Limited Edition | Blu Ray | (26/11/2018) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  After achieving international renown as one of the finest actors of his generation in films such as Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1960) and Tom Jones (1963), Albert Finney turned director for this surreal comic twist on the 'kitchen sink' dramas in which he'd made his name. Finney plays Charlie Bubbles, a successful writer suffering a mid-life crisis, who attempts to re-connect with his northern working-class roots and estranged family. Based on a screenplay by Shelagh Delaney (A Taste of Honey), the script clearly references both her and Finney's personal experience of their shared working-class origins (both were Salford natives), and the consequences of achieving great success. INDICATOR LIMITED EDITION SPECIAL FEATURES: High Definition remaster Original mono audio New and exclusive audio commentary with film historians Thirza Wakefield and Melanie Williams Danny Leigh on ˜Charlie Bubbles (2018): the journalist and broadcaster discusses one of his favourite films Interview with producer Michael Medwin (2018) Interview with Director of Photography Peter Suschitzky (2018) John Harding on Shelagh Delaney (2018): the author of Sweetly Sings Delaney: A Study of Shelagh Delaney's Work 1958-68 discusses the author's work on the film Original theatrical trailer Image gallery: promotional photography and publicity material New and improved English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing Limited edition exclusive booklet with a new essay by Thirza Wakefield, an overview of contemporary critical responses and historic articles on the film. World premiere on Blu-ray Limited Edition of 3,000 copies

• Hugh's Three Good Things | DVD | (12/05/2014) from £16.16   |  Saving you £-1.17 (-7.80%)   |  RRP £14.99

  Hugh reveals his theory that three-ingredient dishes are ideal for simple but delicious cooking... and tests it by competing against other chefs

• …And Justice for All (Limited Edition) | Unknown | (18/08/2025) from £17.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Al Pacino (The Godfather), Jack Warden (Shampoo), and John Forsythe (The Trouble with Harry) lead the ensemble cast of ...And Justice for All, a brutal indictment of the American legal system from director Norman Jewison (A Soldier's Story).Firebrand defence attorney Arthur Kirkland (Pacino) finds that the demands of his job are at odds with his conscience. When he is forced to defend a judge (Forsythe) who is accused of a terrible crime, he plunges into a moral crisis.Written by Barry Levinson (Rain Man) and Valerie Curtin, and with acting support from Lee Strasberg (The Godfather Part II) and Jeffrey Tambor (The Larry Sanders Show), ...And Justice for All is a riveting and powerful exploration of hypocrisy and injustice.INDICATOR LIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY SPECIAL FEATURESHigh Definition remasterOriginal mono audioAudio commentary with director Norman Jewison (2001)Audio commentary with film historians Alexandra Heller-Nicholas and Josh Nelson (2025)Norman Jewison: The Testimony of the Director (2008): archival interviewBarry Levinson: Cross-Examining the Screenwriter (2008): archival interviewBarry Levinson at the BFI (2000): archival audio recording of the writer-turned-director in conversation at BFI Southbank, LondonOriginal theatrical trailerImage gallery: promotional and publicity materialNew and improved English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing Limited edition exclusive booklet with a new essay by Sergio Angelini, archival interviews with Al Pacino, Barry Levinson, and Norman Jewison, and full film creditsUK premiere on Blu-rayLimited edition of 3,000 copies for the UKAll features subject to change

• Rosamunde Pilcher's Coming Home / Rosamunde Pilcher's Nancherrow | DVD | (10/07/2006) from £20.99   |  Saving you £9.00 (42.88%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Rosamunde Pilcher's Coming Home: When Judith Dunbar is sent to boarding school she makes friends with the wild and carefree Loveday Carey-Lewis. Loveday introduces Judith to her wealthy and glamorous family and their glorious ancestral home of Nancherrow. The next few years are glorious joyful halcyon days of passion fun and romance as the friends remain blissfully unaware of the spectre of war which is about to overshadow their lives... Nancherrow: Joanna Lumley

• Flowers Of Shanghai (1998) (Criterion Collection) UK Only - Hai Shang Hua (Original Title) | Blu Ray | (14/06/2021) from £21.39   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  An intoxicating, time-bending experience bathed in the golden glow of oil lamps and wreathed in an opium haze, this gorgeous period reverie by HOU HSIAO-HSIEN (The Assassin) traces the romantic intrigue, jealousies, and tensions swirling around four late-nineteenth-century Shanghai flower houses, where the courtesans live confined to a gilded cage, ensconced in opulent splendour but forced to work to buy back their freedom. Among the regular clients is the taciturn Master Wang (In the Mood for Love's TONY LEUNG CHIU-WAI), whose relationship with his long time mistress (The Mystery of Rampo's MICHIKO HADA) is roiled by a perceived act of betrayal. Composed in a languorous procession of entrancing long takes, Flowers of Shanghai evokes a vanished world of decadence and cruelty, an insular universe where much of the dramatic action remains tantalizingly offscreeneven as its emotional fallout registers with quiet devastation. Special Features: New, restored 4K digital transfer, supervised by director Hou Hsiao-hsien and director of photography Mark Lee Ping-bing, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack New introduction by critic Tony Rayns Beautified Realism, a new documentary by Daniel Raim and Eugene Suen on the making of the film, featuring behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with Lee, producer and editor Liao Ching-sung, production designer Huang Wen-ying, and sound recordist Tu Duu-chih Excerpts from a 2015 interview with Hou, recorded for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Oral History Project Trailer English subtitle translation by Rayns PLUS: An essay by film scholar Jean Ma and a 2009 interview with Hou conducted by scholar Michael Berry

• Last Night | DVD | (20/09/2010) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  What if there was no tomorrow? What if you knew the world was coming to an end? How - and with whom - would you spend your last hours on earth? These are the questions facing a number of very different individuals ahead of the millennium in this beautifully shot drama. Don McKellar plays an architect who plans to meet his maker alone while others party or pray in groups. A recently married couple (Sandra Oh David Cronenberg) make a suicide pact but are caught apart and struggle to get back together. One man pursues final sexual conquests and a weak woman strives to gain courage. As the end of the world approaches these strangers' lives end up interacting.

• Piccadilly | Blu Ray | (21/06/2021) from £17.54   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Valentine Wilmot, the owner of the popular Piccadilly Club finds his lead male attraction, Victor Smiles (Cyril Ritchard) has quit and that the public has judged Victor's partner Mabel as over the hill. Though they are lovers, Valentine must find another dancer to replace Mabel or face an uncertain future. When a customer (Charles Laughton in his first feature film) complains of a dirty dish, Valentine discovers the answer to all his problems down in the club's scullery After many years of supporting roles in Hollywood, Anna May Wong left for Europe in search of better roles. And did she find one. Her electric, sexuallycharged performance in Piccadilly is a revelation. The camera adores her, and against Alfred Junge's astonishing set design, her beauty glows in every frame. Piccadilly was the brilliant apex to Dupont's trilogy of backstage life (Varieté and Moulin Rouge), showcasing the director's signature mix of great acting, amazing imagery and astonishing camera movements. Special Features Remastered by the BFI National Archive and presented in High Definition Talk of the Town (2021): an in-depth interview with film critic, author and filmmaker Jasper Sharp on the life and career of Anna May Wong Piccadilly: A Video Essay (2021): a newly recorded video essay by BFI curator and silent film expert Bryony Dixon Cosmopolitan London (1924, 10 mins) Neil Brand on composing for Piccadilly (2004, 20 mins): the composer discusses his score for the film Prologue from the sound version of the film (5 mins) Newly commissioned sleeve art by David Downton **FIRST PRESSING ONLY** Fully illustrated booklet with new writing on the film by BFI curator Bryony Dixon and an essay on the score by Neil Brand

• High Heels | DVD | (17/08/2009) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  High Heels (aka: Tacones Lejanos)

• The Sopranos: Complete Series 1 (Six Disc Set) | DVD | (29/10/2000) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £61.99

  The Sopranos, writer-producer-director David Chase's extraordinary television series, is nominally an urban gangster drama, but its true impact strikes closer to home: This ambitious TV series chronicles a dysfunctional, suburban American family in bold relief. And for protagonist Tony Soprano, there's the added complexity posed by heading twin families, his collegial mob clan and his own nouveau riche brood. The series' brilliant first season is built around what Tony learns when, whipsawed between those two worlds, he finds himself plunged into depression and seeks psychotherapy--a gesture at odds with his midlevel capo's machismo, yet instantly recognisable as a modern emotional test. With analysis built into the very spine of the show's elaborate episodic structure, creator Chase and his formidable corps of directors, writers, and actors weave an unpredictable series of parallel and intersecting plot arcs that twist from tragedy to farce to social realism. While creating for a smaller screen, they enjoy a far larger canvas than a single movie would afford, and the results, like the very best episodic television, attain a richness and scope far closer to a novel than movies normally get. Unlike Francis Coppola's operatic dramatisation of Mario Puzo's Godfather epic, The Sopranos sustains a poignant, even mundane intimacy in its focus on Tony, brought to vivid life by James Gandolfini's mercurial performance. Alternately seductive, exasperated, fearful, and murderous, Gandolfini is utterly convincing even when executing brutal shifts between domestic comedy and dramatic violence. Both he and the superb team of Italian-American actors recruited as his loyal (and, sometimes, not-so-loyal) henchman and their various "associates" make this mob as credible as the evocative Bronx and New Jersey locations where the episodes were filmed. The first season's other life force is Livia Soprano, Tony's monstrous, meddlesome mother. As Livia, the late Nancy Marchand eclipses her long career of patrician performances to create an indelibly earthy, calculating matriarch who shakes up both families; Livia also serves as foil and rival to Tony's loyal, usually level-headed wife, Carmela (Edie Falco). Lorraine Bracco makes Tony's therapist, Dr Melfi, a convincing confidante, by turns "professional", perceptive, and sexy; the duo's therapeutic relationship is also depicted with uncommon accuracy. Such grace notes only enrich what's not merely an aesthetic high point for commercial television, but an absorbing film masterwork that deepens with subsequent screenings. --Sam Sutherland, Amazon.com

• The Pianist | DVD | (18/08/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  A talented musician struggles to survive the destruction of the Warsaw ghetto and the concentration camps of World War II.

• Robot & Frank | DVD | (15/07/2013) from £7.98   |  Saving you £5.01 (62.78%)   |  RRP £12.99

  Frank, a retired cat burglar, has two grown children, who are concerned he can no longer live alone. Against the old man's wishes, his son buys Frank a walking, talking humanoid robot programmed to improve his physical and mental health.

• Lincoln | Blu Ray | (02/09/2013) from £7.99   |  Saving you £17.00 (212.77%)   |  RRP £24.99

  As with the great John Ford (Young Mr. Lincoln) before him, it would be out of character for Steven Spielberg to construct a conventional, cradle-to-grave portrait of a historical figure. In drawing from Doris Kearns Goodwin's Team of Rivals, the director instead depicts a career-defining moment in the career of Abraham Lincoln (an uncharacteristically restrained Daniel Day-Lewis). With the Civil War raging, and the death toll rising, the president focuses his energies on passage of the 13th Amendment. Even those sympathetic to the cause question his timing, but Lincoln doesn't see the two issues as separate, and the situation turns personal when his son, Robert (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), chooses to enlist rather than to study law. While still mourning the loss of one son, Mary (Sally Field) can't bear to lose another. Playwright Tony Kushner, who adapted the screenplay, takes a page from the procedural handbook in tracing Lincoln's steps to win over enough representatives to abolish slavery, while simultaneously bringing a larger-than-life leader down to a more manageable size. In his stooped-shoulder slouch and Columbo-like speech, Day-Lewis succeeds so admirably that the more outspoken characters, like congressman Thaddeus Stevens (Tommy Lee Jones) and lobbyist W.N. Bilbo (James Spader), threaten to steal the spotlight whenever they enter the scene, but the levity of their performances provides respite from the complicated strategising and carnage-strewn battlefields. If Lincoln doesn't thrill like the Kushner-penned Munich, there's never a dull moment--though it would take a second viewing to catch all the political nuances. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

• Vox Lux | Blu Ray | (01/07/2019) from £10.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Celeste is a 13-year-old music prodigy who survives a horrific school shooting in 1999. Her talent shines through during the memorial service when she sings a song that touches the hearts of the mourners. Guided by her sister and a talent manager, the young girl transforms into a rising pop star with a promising future. Eighteen years later, Celeste now finds herself on the comeback trail when a scandal, personal struggles and the pitfalls of fame threaten her career.

• True Blood Season 1 and 2 (HBO) | DVD | (17/05/2010) from £97.18   |  Saving you £-37.19 (-62.00%)   |  RRP £59.99

  Vampires have come out of the coffin and are now living among us. Surviving on synthetic blood they no longer need human blood to survive. Or so it seems... The small town of Bon Temps Louisiana boasts a wide array of colourful locals. Meet Sookie Stackhouse (Academy Award winner Anna Paquin a sweet and innocent waitress who hides her powerful ability to read minds; Bill Compton (British actor Stephen Moyer) a 173-year-old vampire who's just moved back to town; Sookie's brother Jason (Aussie hearthrob Ryan Kwanten - Vinnie Patterson from Home And Away) a ladies' man who can't seem to stay out of trouble; tough-as-nails Tara Sookie's loyal best friend; Sam the owner of Merlotte's who tries to keep his feelings for Sookie to himself; Lafayette a man about town who's always cooking up something illicit and off the menu and a quirky cast of characters who each hide their dark secrets in the shadows of night in this series that's like no other. If you want to sink your fangs into more vampire TV and movies then check out some of these blood-sucking beauties: True Blood: Season 1: The first season of HBO's Charlaine Harris-adapated Sookie Stackhouse vampire series is a deliciously sexy and sensational TV debut. True Blood: Season 2: The second season features even more vampish undead tomfoolery from the Deep South HBO-style in this Play.com Exclusive edition with art cards! The Vampire Diaries Season 1: Developed by Dawson's Creek/Scream creator Kevin Williamson superb supernatural horror meets teen drama. Cirque Du Freak: Based on the popular books by Darren Shaw this fang-tastic fantasy film is a rollicking good adventure with a dark twist. New Moon: Adapated from Stephenie Meyer's sequel book this one howls quality with great performances from Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson.

• Lillie - The Complete Series | DVD | (17/04/2019) from £15.18   |  Saving you £14.81 (97.56%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Lillie Langtry had it all: beauty talent wealth fame-and the heart of any man she desired. Now her storied past comes to life in this riveting series starring Francesca Annis as the incomparable Lillie Langtry. When Lillie Langtry defies the moral traditions of Victorian England and nineteenth century America she becomes one of the most celebrated and scandalous women of her time. Bold intelligent and witty Lillie' dazzling beauty and brazen determination liberate her from a woman's proper place in society. Rising from modest beginnings to international superstar to the bed of the Prince of Wales she is a ""serial"" lover attracting attention from kings judges princes and commoners-and manipulating them as she desires. Lillie features over 1 000 performers Victorian and Edwardian details (right down to the bustles and petticoats) plus a performance that earned Francesca Annis critical Acclaim. Share the life and loves of Lillie Langtry and witness a legend in the making.

• The Book of Henry (DVD + digital download) | DVD | (30/10/2017) from £6.55   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  A single mother raises a child genius.