About MovieMail Moviemail Team Q. What’s your favourite Woody Allen film? (Vicky Cristina Barcelona is our film of the month on page 5)
Dan Hunter Editor Annie Hall
It’s our twelfth anniversary but the idea stays the same – to share interesting films and to celebrate one of the world’s great communal art forms. Thousands of DVDs are released every month; we select the best and most worthwhile and let you know about them – in our monthly film catalogue, on our website, in email newsletters and in the podcast.
MovieMail HQ
The Monthly Film Catalogue Graeme Hobbs Writer I’ve been dreading this question...
Becky Smith
Here we present the best new DVD releases from a wide range of genres to bring great films, documentaries and TV programmes to your attention in an easily digested format. Those films and directors we particularly recommend are highlighted with longer reviews and features.
Buyer
Published from wood-free pulp grown in sustainable forests. Please recycle, and let us know if you’d rather not receive it.
Vicky Cristina Barcelona
How to Order
Peter Curtis Customer Services Manager
Order online for the cheapest prices on over 14,000 films at www.moviemail-online.co.uk
Sleeper
Call us on 0844 776 0900 to speak to one of our friendly staff. Calls are charged at 5p/min or less from landlines. Customers outside the UK should call 0208 099 7084
Rena Markogiannaki Assistant Buyer Deconstructing Harry
Send your order and payment details to: MovieMail Direct, PO Box 267, Letchworth, SG6 9BS
? Plus Brian Kelly Sweet and Lowdown
Alan Hunter Vicky Cristina Barcelona
For all enquiries give us a call on 0844 776 0900 or email us at info@moviemail-online.co.uk or write to MovieMail Direct, 5 Stucley Place, London NW1 8NS
All prices in this catalogue are valid until 25th July or while stocks last
www.moviemail-online.co.uk Our website presents many more great films than we could ever fit in a printed publication. Better prices too! Published by Moviemail Direct Limited, Palm Chambers, 197 Main Street, Tortola, British Virgin Islands
Page 2
Order now 0844 776 0900
November 08 MovieMail Newsletter
MovieMail News
T
his month sees the release of the final volume of the BFI’s superb series cataloguing the films of the GPO Film Unit. These documentaries are a vital part of Britain’s heritage and the BFI’s presentations have been absolutely superb – the 3 volumes (Addressing the Nation, We Live in Two Worlds and If War Should Come) are among the DVD highlights of the last 12 months. We trust that the success that has greeted them (and last year’s Land of Promise) leads to more of the same. After all, the GPO wasn’t the only Film Unit – here’s hoping for a Crown Film Unit collection at least!
Contents Film of the Month 5 Vicky Cristina Barcelona Parade Tokyo Sonata
Classic Movies Finally, we are very pleased to announce that the Ingmar Bergman DVDs that went out of print with the demise of Tartan Video last year are now available again. So if you missed out on any of them, now is your chance to add to your collection – see page 16. Enjoy your films,
A. A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy
Contributors James Oliver (Annie Hall). This month, James is looking forward to Michael Mann’s upcoming Public Enemies: ‘I don’t much care for modern Hollywood but I make a happy exception for Mann. Here, he’s tackling the oft-told story of John Dillinger. I’m expecting style, intelligence and guns that go bang! bang! bang! Can’t wait.’
Rick Burin (Hannah and her Sisters) has a weekly film column at www.harrogateadvertiser.co.uk/and has written on film for The Guardian. Alex Davidson (Husbands and Wives) is a content developer for the BFI mediatheque.
Mike McCahill (Everyone Says I Love You) writes on film for The Scotsman and The Sunday Telegraph. David Parkinson (Zelig) is a film critic and historian. Julian Upton (Annie Hall) is the author of Fallen Stars (2004). Peter Wild (Crimes & Misdemeanours) is the editor of Perverted by Language: Fiction Inspired by The Fall & The Flash.
Enquiries 0844 776 0900
12
The Loves of Carmen Jules Dassin Film Noirs
Avant-garde
10
Documentaries
20
GPO Film Unit Volume 3
Television
22
Ivanhoe
Contemporary
25
Aria The Young Victoria Gran Torino
HD Releases
29
From the Cheap Seats
30
Order Form
31
Special Offers Masters of Cinema 9 Woody Allen
Michael Brooke (Manhattan) is Screenonline Curator, BFI National Archive and is a prolific contributor to Sight and Sound.
6
World Cinema
10
Classic Film Noir 15 Iconic Arthouse Directors 16-17
Classic Network Film & TV
19
Summer Treats: 2 DVDs for £15
21 Page 3
Get more from Current Top 10 Chart MovieMail
1 Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Bonus Points Bonus Points are designed to reward you when you buy your films from MovieMail. You accumulate them when you spend money with us and can cash them in to get money off future orders. For every pound you spend on films, you'll receive 5 bonus points. You can convert 625 points into a £5 credit which can be taken off the cost of a future order with MovieMail. You can keep track of your points total via our website and on your invoices. To cash them in, simply let us know when you're making your order.
Service Charter MovieMail does not charge your credit or debit card until the goods are ready for despatch. Any item purchased from us may be returned for a full refund. If the item proves faulty on our equipment we will also refund your postage. We do retain the right not to fulfil any order for any reason whatsoever. None of the above affects your statutory rights. We will not release any of your details to any third party or mailing list. Ever.
Key to MovieMail Recommended
Recommended by MovieMail is a collection of the very best DVDs. Visit www.moviemail-online.co.uk/recommended for the full archive
B Bonus Points Within the Highlighted films’ Buying Details you’ll find the number of points awarded for your purchase.
DVD Extras Following the DVD icon, we list details of the supplementary materials found in the package. Page 4
Sunny, witty romantic comedy drama from Woody Allen, in which, when two young American friends, Vicky (Rebecca Hall) and Cristina (Scarlett Johansson) spend a summer in Barcelona, they both become infatuated with flamboyant artist Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem). Spain / USA | 2008 | OPTIM | 96 min | Cert 12 | # 57892 | RRP £17.99
DVD: £10.99 Save £7
2 Slumdog Millionaire
Jamal is one question away from winning 20 million rupees in Who Wants to be a Millionaire when he is accused of cheating. The film flashes back over his life, taking him from the slums where he was born to meeting the love of his life. UK / India | 2008 | FOX | 115 min | Cert 15 | # 57875 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £11.99 Save £8
3 The Class
A gripping and sharply-observed classroom drama that won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 2008. Thought-provoking, funny and highly enjoyable, it explores the issues and challenges of education today. France | 2008 | ART-E | 128 min | subt | Cert 15 | # 57978 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £11.99 Save £8
4 Parade
Jacques Tati’s last film sees his return to world of the music hall in which he began his career as a mime artist in the 1930s. Parade is a brilliantly conceived spectacle which blurs all distinctions between performers and audience. Sweden / France | 1974 | BFI | 84 min | subt | Cert U | # 57515 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £12.99 Save £7
5
The Reader
6
Milk
DVD: £11.99 Save £8
DVD: £10.99 Save £7
8 Brute Force
DVD: £9.99 Save £6
(Masters Cinema) 9 IlofGrido DVD: £11.99 Save £8
7 Tokyo Sonata DVD: £11.99 Save £8
10
Winstanley DVD: £14.99 Save £5
Reader Feedback Due to popular demand we are now printing your individual customer number on each catalogue we send you – starting with this one. It’s on the back cover next to your address. Why is this important? Well, it means that for those of you who place your orders by telephone or post, you’ll now be able to give us your number and we’ll be able to find your details more quickly. No more S for Sugar or B for Bertie! Also, the latest question in the ‘What’s that film?’ series is a French comedy (possibly mid-1970s) involving three men who occasionally go on drinking sprees, one episode of which involved one of the trio making out he was blind and knocking over a large pyramid of glasses. Suggestions to feedback@moviemail-online.co.uk please!
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
July 09 MovieMail Newsletter
MovieMail’s Film of the Month
Vicky Cristina Barcelona Recommended Director: Woody Allen Starring: Javier Bardem, Penélope Cruz, Rebecca Hall Scarlett Johansson Released: 22nd June DVD Extras: Trailer Spain / USA | 2008 | OPTIM | 96 mins | Cert 12 Item # 57892
Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£10.99
RRP: £17.99 Save £7 (39%)
W B 50 Bonus Points If purchased for £10.99
B Also on Blu-ray Vicky Cristina Barcelona Woody Allen
Spain / USA | 2008 | OPTIM | 96 min | Cert 12 | # 57895 | RRP £24.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £15.99
See Also Annie Hall
Woody Allen USA | 1977 | MGMHE | 89 min | Cert 15 | # 103 | RRP £15.99
Our DVD Price: £5.99
Live Flesh
Pedro Almodóvar Spain | 1997 | PATHD | 97 min | subt | Cert 18 | # 5156 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £15.99
See page 10 for our Woody Allen DVD Sale!
e are glad to report that Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Woody’s sunny, escapist Spanish delight, is that much talked-of and much hoped-for ‘return to form’. Even the most ardent Woody Allen fan has had to admit, in recent years, that there were, in fact, such things as ‘lesser’ Woody Allen films. Although opinion was fairly positive for his first London outing, Match Point, a sort of Hitchcock-esque tennis drama populated by the landed gentry, two subsequent outings – Scoop and, particularly, Cassandra’s Dream – saw Allen gather the worst reviews of his career so far. With its title – Vicky Cristina Barcelona – initially wrongfooting you by leading you to believe that there will be an eponymous central character, the film then introduces bright but cautious Vicky (played by Rebecca Hall, latterly of Frost/Nixon and Red Riding) and sexually adventurous Cristina (played by Woody’s latest muse, Scarlett Johansson), two girlfriends holidaying in Barcelona. Approached over an intimate meal by Javier Bardem’s swarthy and vivacious painter, Juan Antonio, and invited away for the weekend, Vicky and
This sunny, witty, escapist delight sees Woody fully on form Cristina enter into a playful dosey-do that sees each of them dally with the charismatic painter. So far, so Woody Allen you might say. Where the film really comes into its own, however, is in the introduction of Juan Antonio’s tempestuous ex, Maria Elena, a performance that bagged Penélope Cruz a well-deserved Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. The fireworks generated by the pairing of Bardem and Cruz transports the film firmly into Almodóvar territory – albeit Almodóvar by way of Eric Rohmer – and it’s all the better for it. Of course the scenery is breathtaking (the architecture and the cuisine are as much a character as the girls themselves), of course the girls find themselves awe-struck by the culture and of course there is a Woody-type character (in the main played by Vicky but ably supported by Christopher Evan Welch’s narration); all taken together, this makes for a fine Woody Allen film indeed. Peter Wild
Enquiries enquiries@moviemail-online.co.uk
Page 5
World Cinema Films in a Foreign Language
New Releases À L’Aventure
Jean-Claude Brisseau This final instalment of Brisseau’s trilogy, after Les Choses Secrètes and Exterminating Angels, continues his examination of female sexuality. Here, a sexually unsatisfied woman embarks on a journey of sexual discovery with the help of a trainee psychiatrist. France | 2009 | Axiom | 104 min | subt | Cert 18 Item # 57254 | RRP £15.99 | Released 22nd June
Starring: Xavier Lafitte, Pilar López de Ayala
A Woman Called Abe Sada Noboru Tanaka
France | 2007 | Axiom | 85 mins | subt | Cert PG | Item # 58398
Japan | 1975 | HBF | 76 min | subt | Cert 18 Item # 58706 | RRP £12.99 | Released 6th July
Our DVD Price: £9.99
Belle de Jour / Belle Toujours
A pairing of Buñuel’s original film, in which Catherine Deneuve plays a housewife living out her sado-masochistic fantasies, and de Oliveira’s 2006 homage, which revives the characters of Michel Piccoli’s Henri Husson and Catherine Deneuve’s Séverine (now Bulle Ogier).
France | 2006 | ICA | 169 min | subt | Cert 18 Item # 58397 | RRP £19.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Coffin Joe Collection José Mojica Marins
Our DVD Price: £35.99
Page 6
Released: 22nd June DVD Extras: Exclusive interviews with director, cinematographer and actor Xavier Lafitte; Trailer.
This story of the woman who erotically asphyxiated her lover is probably best known through Oshima’s Empire of the Senses. If anything, Tanaka’s film is even more remarkable and shocking in capturing every frisson that occurs between people in a state of erotic intoxication.
Brazil | 1964-76 | ANBAY | subt | Cert 18 Item # 57955 | RRP £39.99 | Released 6th July
Recommended Director: José Luis Guerin
Our DVD Price: £11.99
The claw-handed fiend is here! At Midnight I Will Take Your Soul, This Night I Will Enter Your Corpse, Strange World of Coffin Joe, End of Man, Hellish Flesh, Awakening of the Beast, Hostel of Naked Pleasures, Hallucinations of a Deranged Mind, The Strange World of Mojica Marins.
In the City of Sylvia
5 discs.
José Luis Guerin’s breakthrough feature garnered a cult reputation on its cinema release, and not without reason: this deceptively simple tale of a man seeking the woman he met six years before serves as a primer in how (and why) we watch movies. You won’t be able to look at the world around you in quite the same way again after seeing it. A pale, shaggy-haired, wolfishly handsome young man installs himself upon the terrace of a cafe in Strasbourg, sketching the street theatre passing before his eyes: squabbling couples, hawkers, a hapless waitress. Then his eyes lock with a mysterious brunette. Thinking he knows her, he starts to follow her through the streets… There’s wit here as the pursued constantly wrongfoots her pursuer, and a great deal of pleasure too: the pleasure that comes with wandering city streets in a cool late afternoon breeze and getting the sense of an unfamiliar place – even as with each new turn there follows the possibility of getting lost. MM
Belle Toujours Recommended Director: Manoel de Oliveira Starring: Michel Piccoli, Bulle Ogier Released: 22nd June Also available with Belle de Jour, see left. Portugal / France | 2006 | ICA | 68 mins | subt | 15 | Item # 57255
It takes a filmmaker of rare courage and confidence to pay homage to such an iconic picture as Buñuel’s Belle de Jour (1967) and it’s very much to his credit that cine-centurion Manoel de Oliveira does it with such discreet charm. Exquisitely photographed by Sabine Lancelin, this is an acerbic dissertation on desire, power, physicality, memory and lost time that tantalises with its tainted nostalgia and mordant wit. Moreover, it’s also an inspired exercise in self-reflexivity that exposes how rarely even arthouse cinema dares to make such intellectual demands upon its audience. Indulging in the very Buñuelian conceit of casting Bulle Ogier in the role originally taken by Deneuve (who declined a reprise), de Oliveira revisits the dual actress theme as a character joke from That Obscure Object of Desire. But the emphasis is firmly on the predatory Michel Piccoli, who remains the prisoner of passions that now mock him as cruelly as the enigma he once betrayed by informing her husband that she worked clandestinely as a prostitute to satisfy her sado-masochistic lusts. DP
Buying Details
Buying Details
Our DVD Price:
Our DVD Price:
RRP: £19.99 Save £7 (35%)
RRP: £12.99 Save £4 (31%)
£12.99
£8.99
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
July 09 MovieMail Newsletter
Parade Recommended Director: Jacques Tati Released: 22nd June DVD Extras: Rare interview with Tati, filmed in London, 1977 (20 mins); Illustrated booklet with essays by Philip Kemp and Jonathan Rosenbaum. Sweden / France | 1974 | BFI | 84 mins | subt | Cert U | Item # 57515
Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£12.99
RRP: £19.99 Save £7 (35%)
W B 60 Bonus Points If purchased for £12.99
See Also Jour de Fête Jacques Tati
France | 1949 | BFI | 87 min | subt | Cert U | # 20159 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £12.99
Lola Montes Max Ophuls
France / Germany | 1955 | SECND | 110 min | subt | | Cert PG | # 57175 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £12.99
Playtime
Jacques Tati France | 1967 | BFI | 125 min | subt | Cert U | # 18824 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £12.99
hat you are going to see is not a film; it is a spectacle whose aim is to break the ice between the screen and the audience’ said Tati of his circus-set final feature, ‘in my show, nobody knows who the juggler is, the painter, the spectator, the artist; who is the clown and who isn’t’. Indeed, Parade – Tati’s final feature – is shot through with his comic enterprise to ‘democratise the gag’. It’s a carnival of jugglers, yodellers, duff tricks and early 70s fashion, playing children, cossack dancers, an oompah band and blink-and-you’llmiss-them visual jokes and jokes-to-be. As the audience enters, a decorator backstage paints a flower in a lion’s mouth, and Tati cuts to the same flower on a woman’s dress. Later, a props man puts a ‘professional’ magician to shame, with their duel disrupted by a member of the audience who turns a few neat tricks of his own. To the consternation of his wife, a suited man jumps out of the audience to ride a bucking mule, while a toddler with red and white stripy tights enters a door to applause from inside. Tati is then shown wearing the same colour socks as he performs his impressions sportives – the mime acts with which he began his career. If you are new to the world of Jacques Tati,
Tati’s carnivalesque final feature is also a poignant farewell Parade is not the place to start, but if his comic world is familiar, then this knowledge will enrich the film – and also make it more poignant. The title of Tati’s unrealised satire about television – Confusion – is an accurate description of the background to Parade. Made for Swedish TV to repay the debt Tati owed them after they had enabled the completion of his previous film Trafic, it was filmed – partly framed for 1.33:1, partly for 1.66:1 – on video, 16mm and 35mm, in Stockholm in 1971, 1973, (also in Paris that year), and again in 1974, by which time the child actors had aged noticeably and wore different clothing. It’s a wonder Tati came up with anything at all cohesive by the end of this, let alone something so celebratory. At the end, he simply hands the ring over to two young children who are left to play with the props, while atop the circus building, a prancing horse, recalling the one which trundled in on the merry-go-round 25 years earlier in Jour de Fête, holds our gaze. Graeme Hobbs
Enquiries enquiries@moviemail-online.co.uk
Page 7
World Cinema Flame and Citron
Lemon Popsicle Collection
Ole Christian Madsen Mads Mikkelsen stars in this gripping Danish WWII thriller in which undercover resistance fighters Flame and Citron realise that they have only each other to rely on as they work together to track down a Gestapo chief. Based on the true story of the Danish war heroes. Denmark | 2008 | MET-D | 136 min | subt | Cert 15 Item # 58399 | RRP £15.99 | Released 29th June
DVD Price: £11.99 Blu-ray Price: £14.99
Unashamedly charming story of a man who reluctantly leaves Paris for summer in the South of France, where he has to look after the family’s mobile grocery van while his father recovers from a heart attack. He gradually warms to his experience in the hills and his encounters with the villagers, and in the process rediscovers life and love in the countryside. France | 2007 | ICA | 96 min | subt | Cert 12 Item # 58707 | RRP £12.99 | Released 6th July
A charming meditation on filmmaking in which Rüdiger Vogler’s sound engineer travels to Lisbon to help a filmmaker friend, but finds him missing and the film unfinished. He carries on regardless, recording the city’s sounds for the film, and falling for a singer, whose band (Madredeus) is Booklet. working on the film’s soundtrack. Germany / Portugal | 1994 | Axiom | 100 min | subt | Cert 15 Item # 58143 | RRP £15.99 | Released 6th July
Our DVD Price: £9.99 Save £6
Our DVD Price: £9.99
Lola Montes (Restored Edition)
Insatiable: Diary of a Sex Addict
Max Ophuls
Christian Molina
Angela Molina, Geraldine Chaplin. Erotic drama in which a high-flying businesswoman uses sex as a means for achieving self expression, but then everything changes for her when she falls in love – and discovers that love has a much darker side. Based on the novel. Spain | 2008 | MOMET | 95 min | subt | Cert 18 Item # 57971 | RRP £15.99 | Released 29th June
Martine Carol plays the legendary courtesan whose story is told in flashback as she spends her last years reliving the loves of her life in a circus presided over by Peter Ustinov’s domineering ringmaster. Ophul’s breathtaking mastery of mise en scène has never been more in evidence than here. Full review Lola Montes Revisited. next month! France / Germany | 1955 | SECND | 110 min | subt | Cert PG Item # 57175 | RRP £19.99 | Released 6th July
Our DVD Price: £12.99 Save £7
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Love and Honour
Justine’s Hot Nights
Yoji Yamada
Jean-Claude Roy
1970s French erotica in which Philippe Gasté plays out-of-work film director Mik. A sleazy producer asks him to helm an X-rated film, and as Mik and his wife enjoy a steamy night-in, they conjure up ideas for the movie – all of which revolve around a young girl named Justine.
Page 8
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Wim Wenders
Eric Guirado
Our DVD Price: £9.99
Israel / Germany | 1978-87 | CRNRS | Cert 18 Item # 58587 | RRP £19.99 | Released 6th July
Lisbon Story
The Grocer’s Son
France | 1976 | ODEON | 76 min | Cert 18 Item # 58705 | RRP £12.99 | Released 15th June
The first seven titles from the Israeli cult comedy franchise chronicling the sexual misadventures of Benji, Bobbie and Hughie. Features Lemon Popsicle (1978), Going Steady (1979), Hot Bubblegum (1981), Private Popsicle (1983), Baby Love (1984), Up Your Anchor (1985), 7 discs. and Young Love (1987).
Period drama in which, after court food taster Shinnojo goes blind, his wife tries to provide for them, but is seduced by a feudal boss. With his honour sullied, Shinnojo wants revenge, and is forced into a deadly blind man’s duel. Cue elegant swordplay in impressively traditional style. Japan | 2006 | ICA | 121 min | subt | Cert 12 Item # 57256 | RRP £12.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £9.99
Che: Parts 1 & 2 Recommended Director: Steven Soderbergh Starring: Benicio Del Toro, Demián Bichir Released: 29th June DVD Extras: Behind the scenes; Interviews with Soderbergh, Del Toro, composer Alberto Iglesias and author Jon Lee Anderson; Trailer. Spain / USA | 2008 | OPTIM | 265 mins | subt | 15 | Item # 57964
Che is a surprising and subtle film that manages to combine gravitas with sweep in a way that satisfies the intellect and the desire for spectacle. Che: Part 1(The Argentine) opens amid a flurry of film stocks with Che in Havana in 1964, interviewed by a reporter about the Cuban revolution, before cutting back to his initial meeting with Fidel Castro in a bedroom of beatniks in 1955. Flash forward to 1964: Che is addressing the United Nations General Assembly. Then back to 1957/58, street fighting, the Battle of Santa Clara, strategy, warfare – the Cuban Revolution, blow by blow. Che: Part 2: (Guerilla) is revolutionary life writ large: Che in Bolivia ingratiating himself with the campesinos, dealing with food shortages, betrayals, deserters, botched preparations and sustained bouts of asthma. For all that, Che himself is ‘a man of rags and patches’, and arguably this is as close as we are likely to get to knowing the great, troubled, complicated man himself – and there is no greater recommendation for a biopic than that. PW
Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£17.99
Also on
RRP: £29.99 Save £12 (40%)
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
Masters of Cinema Sale These superb collector’s edition DVDs from Masters of Cinema are, as their name implies, nothing but the very best films presented using the best possible prints and brimming with extras. Now available for a short time at the lowest prices we’ve ever offered!
Faust
Metropolis
Onibaba
FW Murnau
Fritz Lang
Kaneto Shindo
With its barrage of visceral imagery contrasting the simplicity of its spiritual theme, this is a magnificent version of the legend. Emil Jannings relishes his role as a truly horrendous Mephistopheles.
THE science fiction film, set in a radically divided society in which workers’ dehumanization is taken to the ultimate degree. An astounding realisation of a future dystopian society.
A striking, erotically charged film, in which a mother and daughterin-law live among tall reeds and ambush combat-weary samurais for a living, until a returning neighbour provokes destructive sexual jealousy.
Ger | 1926 | EUREK | 110 min | subt | B&W | PG | # 29116 | £22.99
Ger | 1926 | EUREK | 118 min | subt | B&W | PG | # 20982 | RRP £19.99
Japan | 1963 | EUREK | 100 min | subt | B&W | 15 | # 22822 | £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £13
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
Assassination
Humanity and Paper Balloons
Salesman
Dir: Masahiro Shinoda. Period drama, widely considered to be the director’s finest film, in which a masterless samurai tries to prevent civil war. Japan | 1964 | EUREK | 104 min | subt | B&W | 12 | # 26084 | £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
Dir: Sadao Yamanaka. A masterpiece from the first golden age of Japanese cinema, set in feudal Japan. Japan | 1937 | EUREK | 92 min | subt | B&W | PG | # 21699 | £19.99
Dir: Albert & David Maysles. A brilliant narration-free documentary portrait from 1969 of the downbeat lives of door-to-door bible salesmen. USA | 1968 | EUREK | 91 min | B&W | Cert E | # 32876 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
DVD: £8.99 Save £11
Edvard Munch
The Idiot
Silence
Dir: Peter Watkins. A multi-faceted biopic of the Expressionist painter, famously described by Ingmar Bergman as ‘a work of genius’.
Dir: Akira Kurosawa. A wonderful dramatisation of Dostoevsky’s novel, here transplanted by Kurosawa to a snowbound Hokkaido.
Dir: Masahiro Shinoda. An exploration of the violent cultural conflict that came with the arrival of Jesuit missionaries in 17th century Japan
Norway | 1976 | EUREK | 211 min | subt | PG | # 51378 | RRP £19.99
Japan | 1951 | EUREK | 166 min | subt | B&W | PG | # 22212 | £19.99
Japan | 1971 | EUREK | 129 min | subt | 15 | # 51130 | RRP £17.99
DVD: £8.99 Save £11
DVD: £8.99 Save £11
DVD: £9.99 Save £8
The Face of Another
The Naked Island
Spione
Dir: Hiroshi Teshigahara. One of cinema’s most haunting explorations of identity, in which a disfigured man models a lifelike facial mask.
Dir: Kaneto Shindo. A cinematic poem to subsistence living on the virtually deserted Setonaikai archipelago in south-east Japan.
Dir: Fritz Lang. Rudolf Klein-Rogge. Lang’s penultimate silent film is a ripping thriller, set in a world of intrigue, espionage and blackmail.
Japan | 1966 | EUREK | 124 min | subt | 12 | # 21142 | RRP £19.99
Japan | 1960 | EUREK | 94 min | subt | B&W | PG | # 22214 | £19.99
Germany | 1928 | EUREK | 143 min | subt | PG | # 21144 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
F for Fake
Nightmare Alley
Toni
Dir: Orson Welles. A dazzling, dizzying, playful and quintessentially Wellesian meditation on illusionism and fakery in all its forms.
Dir: Edmund Goulding. Tyrone Power stars in this cult classic that is also one of the darkly sophisticated of all Hollywood film noirs.
Dir: Jean Renoir. A landmark French film about a crime of passion, lensed by Claude Renoir, and often described as the first ‘neorealist’ film.
France / Iran | 1974 | EUREK | 85 min | Cert PG | # 31226 | RRP £19.99
USA | 1947 | EUREK | 111 min | Cert PG | # 24114 | RRP £15.99
France | 1934 | EUREK | 109 min | subt | B&W | PG | # 27762 | £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
DVD: £9.99 Save £6
DVD: £8.99 Save £11
Francesco Giullare di Dio
Pitfall
Twenty-Four Eyes
Dir: Hiroshi Teshigahara. Part socialrealist critique, part unsettling ghost fable, this is Teshigahara’s strange and brilliant debut film.
Dir: Keisuke Kinoshita. Twenty years in the life of a teacher and her first class of children. One of Japan’s most cherished films.
Japan | 1962 | EUREK | 97 min | subt | Cert 15 | # 21141 | RRP £19.99
Japan | 1954 | EUREK | 155 min | subt | B&W | PG | # 25388 | £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
Dir: Roberto Rossellini. A tableau of episodes from the life of ‘the people’s saint’. One of Rossellini’s best. Italy | 1950 | EUREK | 90 min | subt | B&W | PG | # 21698 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £8.99 Save £11
Order now from MovieMail!
Offer ends 25th July or while stocks last
2 discs.
World Cinema Man of War
Woody Allen
Joachim Rønning
Norwegian biographical drama based on the life of resistance fighter Max Manus, who masterminded a series of successful sabotage missions against the Nazis. Singled out by the Gestapo as a special target, he avoids capture, but as the war wears on and he loses friends, he must face up to his demons and the realisation that in wartime, everyone is a victim. Norway / Denmark | 2008 | REV | 118 min | subt | Cert 15 Item # 58438 | RRP £14.99 | Released 15th June
DVD Price: £12.99 Blu-ray Price: £14.99
Motorcycle Diaries (Blu-ray) Walter Salles
Gael García Bernal. In 1952, two young Argentinians, medical student Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara and his friend Alberto Granada, set out on a road trip to discover the real Latin America. Guevara’s own journals form the basis of this wonderful film of self-discovery. Also available on DVD, RRP £19.99. Argentina / USA | 2004 | 4DVD | 128 min | subt | Cert 15 Item # 57933 | RRP £19.99 | Released 15th June
Blu-ray Price: £14.99
Spring of Life Milan Cieslar
Wartime drama based on real events, in which a young Czech girl – favoured by Nazi officials for her blonde good looks, is taken to a remote spa where she receives an education. Then eager Nazi officers come for the night and she discovers with horror that she is part of an Aryan breeding programme... Czech Republic | 2000 | REDMP | 107 min | subt | Cert 15 Item # 58791 | RRP £12.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £9.99
Wonderful Town Aditya Assarat
Thai drama, exploring the after-effects of the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami, in which a young Bangkok architect arrives in a small coastal town to oversee the construction of a new resort. He begins a tentative relationship with a local girl, but local resentment threatens to undermine his work. Thailand | 2007 | SODA | 92 min | subt | Cert TBC Item # 58366 | RRP £15.99 | Released 29th June
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Page 10
DVD Sale Man of Iron Recommended Director: Andrzej Wajda Starring: Jerzy Radziwilowicz, Krystyna Janda Released: 22nd June Poland | 1981 | Bongo | 147 mins | subt | Cert PG | Item # 58666
Andrzej Wajda built his reputation on the back of probing and impassioned recreations of Polish history, but with Man of Iron he went one better. By filming on location at the Gdansk shipyard during the 1980 strike and interspersing his fictional characters with real-life Solidarity heroes (Lech Walesa himself pops up as a wedding guest), the film doubles as a valuable snapshot of the mindset of the time, its triumphant conclusion tragically undermined by the military crackdown just a few months after its Palme d’Orwinning triumph at Cannes. Aware that he had to work quickly in order to seize the moment, Wajda resurrected characters from his earlier Man of Marble, including Krystyna Janda’s filmmaker turned political dissident Agnieszka, and Jerzy Radziwilowicz’s activist Tomczyk. But the film’s real star, a potent metaphor for the ordinary Pole caught between government and an unprecedentedly popular mass movement, is Marian Opalnia as the weaselly journalist Winkel, initially hired by the authorities to dig dirt on the strikers but realising that their cause is too powerful to oppose. MB
Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£12.99
RRP: £15.99 Save £3
We’ve been praising his latest film on page 5, but what about Allen’s great back catalogue? Here are some favourites, from just £6.99
The Woody Allen Collection A selection of Allen’s ‘earlier, funnier’ films, enduring favourites all: Annie Hall, Manhattan, Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex, Sleeper, Love & Death and Bananas. 6 discs. USA | 1971-79 | MGM | 507 min | Cert 18 | # 20323 | RRP £49.99
DVD: £15.99 Save £34
Annie Hall Woody Allen might disagree, but many rate this breezy, fractured love story as his most satisfying and accessible serio-comic film. USA | 1977 | MGMHE | 89 min | Cert 15 | # 103 | RRP £15.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £10
Crimes and Misdemeanors ‘A film about humanity.’ A superbly balanced tragicomedy that deconstructs the ‘greed is good’ era. USA | 1989 | MGMHE | 100 min | Cert 15 | # 7937 | RRP £15.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £10
Hannah and Her Sisters A brilliant 3 Oscar-winning comedy that examines the romantic attachments of three sisters in New York. USA | 1986 | MGMHE | 102 min | Cert 15 | # 11190 | RRP £15.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £10
Manhattan Dir: Woody Allen. Diane Keaton, Meryl Streep. Arguably Allen’s masterpiece, this portrait of middle-class New York life remains unsurpassed. USA | 1979 | MGMHE | 92 min | B&W | Cert 15 | # 388 | RRP £15.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £10
Manhattan Murder Mystery Upbeat comedy thriller in which a bored Manhattan housewife suspects foul play when a neighbour dies. USA | 1993 | COL-T | 103 min | Cert PG | # 13190 | RRP £12.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £10
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
July 09 MovieMail Newsletter
Tokyo Sonata Recommended Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa Starring: Teruyuki Kagawa, Kyôko Koizumi, Haruka Igawa Released: 22nd June DVD Extras: Luminous HD transfer of the film; Making-of documentary; Japanese press junkets, cast and crew interviews, award ceremonies; Trailer; Booklet with a brand new essay by writer B. Kite. Japan | 2008 | EUREK | 119 mins | subt | Cert 12 | Item # 57859
Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£11.99
RRP: £19.99 Save £8 (40%)
B 55 Bonus Points If purchased for £11.99
Also on Blu-ray Tokyo Sonata
Kiyoshi Kurosawa Japan | 2008 | EUREK | 120 min | Cert 12 | # 57860 | RRP £22.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £15.99
See Also Time Out
Laurent Cantet France | 2001 | ART-E | 134 min | Cert PG | # 11390 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £15.99
Billy Elliot
Stephen Daldry UK | 2000 | UPV | 106 min | Cert PG | # 22327 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £7.99
L
ike so many in these straightened times, Ryûhei Sasaki (Teruyuki Kagawa) has suffered a personal economic crisis: after many years of loyal service, his company has downsized him out of a job. Too proud to tell his wife (Kyôko Koizumi), he gamely carries on as before, spending his days fruitlessly searching for further employment and being the best-dressed man at the soup kitchens. Keen to preserve his domestic authority, the sham salary man forbids his younger son from taking piano lessons: but the lad is as skilled at deception as his father and ignores the sanction. It isn't long before family life starts buckling under the combined weight of their lies. This is not the first film to deal with the trauma of redundancy – both The Full Monty and Laurent Cantet's Time Out have characters who could stand alongside Sasaki in the job centre – but Tokyo Sonata tackles the subject with originality and considerable ambition. It is, of course, a family drama – a particularly vivid and mordant one at that. It avoids the easy sentimentality traditionally associated with such things and instead mines a rich vein of black comedy as the world finds ever more inventive ways to
A major film that bears comparison with Ozu and Akira Kurosawa humiliate Ryûhei. But while the film delights in complicating things for the Sasaki clan, it never denies the possibility of hope. It builds toward a perfectly judged final scene that shows the value of hard-won optimism. For all that, Tokyo Sonata is as much a depiction of a nation ill at ease with itself as it is a personal story. As such, it bears comparison to other Japanese filmmakers like Yasujiro Ozu and the director’s more famous namesake, Akira-san. It shows Japan uncomfortably caught between tradition and modernity, a country defined by the lies it tells itself. Unusually for a domestic drama, it is richly visual. Hitherto best known for his horror films, Kiyoshi Kurosawa here shows what a confident filmmaker he is, employing beautiful photography and staging the action in long, precise takes. He richly deserves his place in the Masters of Cinema range: this is a major film and comes highly recommended. James Oliver
Enquiries enquiries@moviemail-online.co.uk
Page 11
Classic Movies English Language Films, 1930 - 1969
New Releases A Hill in Korea Julian Amyes
Vintage war movie, based on real events, which charts the fortunes of a small group of British soldiers in the Korean war who try to fight their way to safety with the enemy surrounding them on all sides. A top-drawer cast includes Michael Caine in his first credited film role. UK | 1956 | OPTIM | 69 min | Cert PG Item # 57191 | RRP £15.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Norman Lee
John Lodge. Actionpacked instalment from the hugely popular series of thrillers based on Sapper’s soldier of fortune. Here a group of nefarious arms smugglers are after the blueprints to Britain’s new remote-controlled warplane. USA | 1937 | OPTIM | 78 min | Cert PG Item # 57948 | RRP £15.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Campbell’s Kingdom Ralph Thomas
British-made action film set in Canada and starring Dirk Bogarde as a young Englishman who travels to the Canadian Rockies to take over an inheritance of land from his grandfather and find the oil that the old man was convinced lay beneath his ‘Kingdom’. A powerful adaptation of Hammond Innes’ novel.
Our DVD Price: £7.99
Five Weeks in a Balloon Irwin Allen
A group of daring adventurers set out in a unicorn-shaped balloon on a trip across the African continent. During their perilous travels they battle everything from sandstorms to Sultans. Based on Jules Verne’s novel. USA | 1962 | 4DVD | 101 min | U Item # 57604 | RRP £19.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Page 12
Recommended Director: Alexander Korda
Bulldog Drummond at Bay
UK | 1957 | NWORK | 102 min | Cert U Item # 58877 | RRP £9.99 | Released 22nd June
An Ideal Husband
The London Collection Recommended
DVD Extras: Image Gallery.
Contains: Pool of London (Dearden, 1951), The Yellow Balloon (J. Lee Thompson, 1953), The Small World of Sammy Lee (Hughes, 1963), Sparrows Can’t Sing (Littlewood, 1963), Les Bicyclettes de Belsize (1965) and London Nobody Knows (1967).
UK | 1947 | NWORK | 93 mins | Cert U | Item # 58682
Released: 15th June
Starring: Paulette Goddard, Diana Wynyard, Michael Wilding, Glynis Johns, Hugh Williams Released: 15th June
Ironically, this very British adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s play was the work of Hungarians Alexander Korda (director) and Lajos Biró (writer). In this hugely underrated film, the two men effortlessly capture Wilde’s wit and social satire, in which the fiendish Lady Cheveley (Paulette Goddard) blackmails an upright member of the House of Commons, who fears the condemnation of his saintly wife. But can his best friend save the day? Michael Wilding is on fine form as the waggish dandy (“To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance”), and Glynis Johns is wonderful as the object of his affection – their banter and rapport make them a splendidly unlikely couple. Yet it’s Goddard who steals the show with a cool masterclass in sophisticated cattiness; you root for her to triumph over her simpering, pious victims even as her machinations become increasingly immoral. Other highlights are Cecil Beaton’s lavish costumes and a lovely pay-off that proves you can’t keep a good villainess down. AD
DVD Extras: 5 discs. UK | 1967 | OPTIM | 444 mins | Cert 12 | Item # 57935
London is not so much a location as a living, breathing character in this diversely fascinating collection. Indeed, although familiar landmarks appear, each film presents the city in ways that are almost antithetical to the traditional travelogue favoured by mainstream cinema, and largely eschews images of ‘swinging London’ so prevalent in the 1960s and 70s. There are four films new to DVD here: Basil Dearden’s Pool of London sees black sailor Johnny get entangled in a romance with a white girl and in the criminal activities of his shipmate; J. Lee Thompson’s The Yellow Balloon is a tense tale of a young boy, used and deceived by a crook; Joan Littlewood’s Sparrows Can’t Sing is a vivid depiction of East End life that has weathered better than many stilted examples of ‘social realism’, while Ken Hughes’ The Small World of Sammy Lee is a gutsy noir, featuring a tragicomic tour-de-force from Anthony Newley as a down-at-heel-crook. JU
Buying Details
Buying Details
Our DVD Price:
Our DVD Price:
RRP: £12.99 Save £3 (23%)
RRP: £49.99 Save £12 (24%)
£9.99
£37.99
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
July 09 MovieMail Newsletter
The Loves of Carmen Recommended Director: Charles Vidor Starring: Rita Hayworth, Glenn Ford, Ron Rendell Released: 6th July DVD Extras: TBC USA | 1948 | SPHE | TBC mins | Cert TBC | Item # 58549
EXCLUSIVE! Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£11.99
RRP: £12.99 Save £1 (25%)
B 55 Bonus Points If purchased for £11.99
See Also 3:10 to Yuma Delmer Daves
USA | 1957 | COL-T | 88 min | Cert PG | # 10374 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £8.99
Carmen
Carlos Saura Spain | 1984 | OPTIM | 103 min | subt | Cert PG | # 55859 | RRP £12.99
Our DVD Price: £7.99
Gilda
Charles Vidor USA | 1946 | COL-T | 105 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 4738 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £6.99
R
ita Hayworth and Glenn Ford are perhaps best known for Gilda, a near-mythic Argentina–set noir lit by Rita’s femme fatale fireworks, including a famous striptease sequence. The Loves of Carmen, filmed previously with Dolores del Rio, came two years later, and while it’s rooted in the 19th century and shot in glorious Technicolor, it has notably noirish trappings, with a thick vein of fatalism running through its centre and Rita cast once more as a moral vacuum. Ford plays a Spanish soldier, newly arrived at a Seville barracks. He’s a gentleman, destined for a government role if he can steer clear of wine and women. No chance. Five minutes in he meets Carmen and the die is cast. Carmen, of course, is Hayworth. She’s a gypsy, the product of a ‘lawless and unhappy breed’, according to the film’s titles. We first meet her sitting on a wall, coquettishly eating an orange, her long legs swinging. ‘There’s nothing so good to the taste as a thing that’s been warmed by the Spanish sun,’ she says. Flirting relentlessly, she runs rings around the smitten Ford. An army buddy tries to warn him. ‘She’s bad all the way through. She lies as easily as other people drink water,’ he says, but it’s no good. A deadly duel later, Ford’s
A glorious Technicolor film with notably noirish trappings running for his life, a price on his head. These metropolitan sequences are really flavourful, with a fine evocation of time and place, thanks to sumptuous sets and some 1,200 extras. The duel is particularly interesting, the shadow of crossed swords falling on Hayworth as Ford and his superior fight for her love. This eye for the unusual is evident throughout, culminating in a delicious final pull-away: the camera descending a staircase littered with red roses, as the film’s favourite omen – the black cat – strolls across the screen. It’s a fine wrap-up to a fascinating movie that suggests amoral, seductive women weren’t unique to 1940s America, while serving as a dry run for another of Ford’s lovelorn psychos – 3.10 to Yuma’s Ben Wade. And if it can’t quite match Gilda, it’s still a welcome chance to see Columbia’s signature stars doing what they did best. Indeed, this was the studio’s biggest grosser of 1948. Rick Burin
Enquiries enquiries@moviemail-online.co.uk
Page 13
Classic Movies The Importance of Being Earnest
Jules Dassin
Anthony Asquith
Bracknell.
Joan Greenwood, Michael Redgrave, Edith Evans, Margaret Rutherford, Dorothy Tutin, Michael Denison. Star-studded 1952 adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s classic comedy, perhaps best-remembered for Edith Evans’ towering performance as the formidable Lady Featurette; Promo material (PDF).
UK | 1952 | NWORK | 91 min | Cert U Item # 58668 | RRP £12.99 | Released 15th June
Director: Richard Quine
The Italian Job (40th Anniversary Edition)
Starring: Fred Astaire, Jack Lemmon, Kim Novak, Lionel Jeffries
Peter Collinson
Released: 6th July.
Featuring one of the great car chases, this thoroughly entertaining caper achieved cult status for Michael Caine and a red, white and blue trio of Mini Coopers. Also features Noel Coward’s final screen performance and music from Quincy Jones.
USA | 1962 | SPHE | TBC mins | B&W | Cert TBC | Item # 58551
UK | 1969 | PARAH | 96 min | Cert PG Item # 57758 | RRP £12.99 | Released 15th June
DVD Price: £9.99 Blu-ray Price: £14.99
Kansas City Confidential Phil Karlson
John Payne, Preston Foster, Coleen Gray. ‘Exploding! Like a gun in your face!’ A little gem of a film noir thriller that follows the story of an ex-con trying to go straight, but who is framed for an armoured car robbery and needs to unmask the real culprits.
Our DVD Price: £7.99
Lilli Marlene
Arthur Crabtree Fictitious tale of espionage and romance set during the North African campaign, where Nazis locate the original girl on whom the famous song is based, kidnap her and force her to sing it in German for them. The Allies come to the rescue, but hidden dangers await... UK | 1950 | SIMP | 85 min | Cert U Item # 58867 | RRP £12.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £9.99
Page 14
The Notorious Landlady Recommended EXCLUSIVE!
Our DVD Price: £9.99
USA | 1952 | REV | 98 min | Cert 12 Item # 58477 | RRP £9.99 | Released 22nd June
New Film Noirs
The half-forgotten teaming of Jack Lemmon and Kim Novak star in this sprightly mystery comedy with an endearingly synthetic London setting and an impressive Anglo-American cast. Lemmon, as relentlessly affable as ever, is William Gridley, an American diplomat in London who takes lodgings with the mysterious Carly Hardwicke (Novak). A fellow American, Carly has lived alone since the death of her husband and, needless to say, Gridley falls for her serene and enigmatic charms on sight. But Carly has a dark past — she may or may not have murdered said husband. Before Gridley knows it, his natty boss (a mature but still light-footed Fred Astaire) and an excitable Scotland Yard detective (the great Lionel Jeffries) have got him trailing her through the London fog in an attempt to prove what he hopes not to be true. Never taking itself too seriously, this is a tasty confection that exudes a strong Hitchcockian flavour, from the liberally sprinkled red herrings to a finale where the California coastline stands in for Cornwall. JU
Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£11.99
RRP: £12.99 Save £1 (7%)
An exciting new double-bill of noir DVDs from the director of Rififi.
Brute Force Jules Dassin
Burt Lancaster, Hume Cronyn. The tagline nails it: ‘Raw! Rough! Ruthless!’. Inspired by, among other things, the recent ‘Battle of Alcatraz’ from 1946, where rebelling prisoners opted to die rather than surrender, this is a brutal and brooding prison-set film noir in which Burt Lancaster’s hardened inmate Joe Collins plans to break out of Westgate Prison to get to his sick wife. Standing in his way is Hume Cronyn’s sadistic prison guard. As the film builds to its explosive climax, Dassin makes evocative use of William Daniels’ noirish imagery, but the power comes from the performances and the grim brutality of Richard Brooks’s screenplay. One of the best prison movies ever made. USA | 1947 | ARROW | 98 min | Cert TBC Item # 57974 | RRP £15.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £9.99 Save £6
The Naked City Jules Dassin
‘There are eight million stories in the Naked City, and this has been just one of them’ says the narrator at the close of this breathtakingly vivid film in which, one sweltering New York night, two men subdue and murder an ex-model. When one of the murderers, conscience-stricken, gets drunk, the other kills him and hoists his body into the East River. Assigned to the case are Barry Fitzgerald’s veteran Homicide Detective Lt. Dan Muldoon and his rookie associate, Jimmy Halloran. This dazzling police procedural from Dassin and newspaperman-cum-producer Mark Hellinger was shot entirely on location in New York. As influenced by Italian neorealism as American crime fiction, this double Oscar-winner (for cinematography and editing) remains a benchmark for naturalism in film noir. USA | 1948 | ARROW | 96 min | Cert TBC Item # 57934 | RRP £15.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £9.99 Save £6
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
Double Indemnity
Gilda
Billy Wilder
Charles Vidor
Fred MacMurray, Edward G. Robinson. The archetypal film noir with Barbara Stanwyck as the femme fatale in this tale of an insurance agent conniving with a beautiful client to kill her husband.
Employed to run a casino, Glenn Ford finds his boss’s wife is former lover Rita Hayworth, who proceeds to taunt and tantalise his jealous lust. A steamily atmospheric, sultry and vengeful noir.
Fritz Lang
USA | 1944 | UPV | 103 min | B&W | Cert U | # 32714 | RRP £9.99
USA | 1946 | COL-T | 105 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 4738 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £4
DVD: £6.99 Save £13
USA | 1944 | OPTIM | 95 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 56920 | RRP £15.99
The Asphalt Jungle
The Killers
Out of the Past
Dir: John Huston. Hugely influential in its use of criminal vernacular, this classic heist movie spawned a host of inferior imitations.
Dir: Robert Siodmak. Burt Lancaster waits resignedly in a hotel room for two hit-men to find and kill him. Why? From Hemingway’s story.
Dir: Jacques Tourneur. Aka Build My Gallows High. Quintessential film noir, which catapulted Robert Mitchum to superstardom.
USA | 1950 | WHV | 112 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 26083 | RRP £15.99
USA | 1946 | UPV | 105 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 32362 | RRP £9.99
USA | 1947 | UPV | 93 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 32364 | RRP £9.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £10
DVD: £5.99 Save £4
DVD: £5.99 Save £4
The Big Heat
The Lady from Shanghai
Rififi
USA | 1953 | SPHE | 89 min | B&W | Cert 15 | # 26697 | RRP £12.99
Dir: Orson Welles. Murders, intrigues, plot twists, the famous hall of mirrors sequence – classic forties cinema. USA | 1948 | COL-T | 87 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 14487 | RRP £12.99
A ruthless, brilliantly-wrought noir, filled with raking shadows and suffused with fatalism, in which Edward G. Robinson’s mild professor suddenly finds himself a murderer. DVD: £7.99 Save £8
Dir: Jules Dassin. Highly influential Gallic film noir, famous for its wordless half-hour robbery sequence, in which thieves execute a jewel heist. France | 1955 | ARROW | 114 min | subt | 12 | # 13328 | RRP £17.99
DVD: £6.99 Save £6
DVD: £6.99 Save £11
The Big Sleep
The Maltese Falcon
Scarlet Street
Dir: Howard Hawks. An essential noir, with Bogie/Bacall magic, fizzing sexual chemistry, a labyrinthine plot and electric dialogue.
Dir: John Huston. Existing in dark, moody interiors, ruthless characters in a corrupt and cynical world search 2 discs. for a bejewelled bird.
Dir: Fritz Lang. Edward G. Robinson stars as an ordinary man who unwittingly strays from his normal path into a world of seduction and deceit.
USA | 1946 | WHV | 110 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 6230 | RRP £15.99
USA | 1941 | WHV | 101 min | B&W | PG | # 30676 | RRP £16.99
USA | 1945 | ODEON | 103 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 55777 | RRP £9.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £10
DVD: £5.99 Save £11
DVD: £6.99 Save £3
Force of Evil
Ministry of Fear
Sunset Boulevard
Dir: Abraham Polonsky. One of the most powerful crime dramas of the 1940s, acknowledged as a great influence by Martin Scorsese.
Dir: Fritz Lang. Ray Milland stars as a paranoid man who, on his release from an asylum into wartime England, stumbles into a spy ring.
Dir: Billy Wilder. A seminal film. Gloria Swanson plays the silent screen diva longing to return, William Holden the writer longing for a break.
USA | 1948 | SECND | 75 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 25930 | RRP £15.99
UK | 1944 | OPTIM | 83 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 50615 | RRP £12.99
USA | 1950 | PARAH | 105 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 12572 | RRP £15.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £10
DVD: £5.99 Save £7
DVD: £5.99 Save £10
The Glass Key
Night and the City
Dir: Stuart Heisler. Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake star in this entertaining whodunit, adapted from a Dashiell Hammett novel.
Dir: Jules Dassin. Full of angst-ridden visuals, this noir is built around Richard Widmark’s dynamic, febrile central performance.
Where the Sidewalk Ends
USA | 1942 | UPV | 85 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 32360 | RRP £9.99
UK / USA | 1950 | BFI | 92 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 50880 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £4
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
DVD: £6.99 Save £6
Dir: Otto Preminger. Dana Andrews, Gene Tierney. Gritty noir thriller shot on the rain-slicked New York streets. USA | 1950 | BFI | 91 min | B&W | Cert 12 | # 17301 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
Offer ends 25th July or while stocks last
Dir: Fritz Lang. Lang’s landmark thriller is a violent tale of corruption, vengeance, and loss. Glenn Ford plays the unscrupulous cop.
The Woman in the Window
Iconic Arthouse
These directors epitomise a rare approach to cinema – art and intelligence over immediate gratificatio
Ingmar Bergman
Krzystof Ki
Persona Ingmar Bergman Liv Ullmann and Bibi Andersson play the patient and nurse whose personalities blur in bizarre osmosis in one of Bergman’s most acclaimed films, brilliantly photographed by Sven Nykvist. Swe | 1966 | TARTN | 80 min | subt | B&W | 15 | # 13295 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
Cries and Whispers Harriet Andersson. A tense period psychodrama, stunning in its expressive use of saturated colour, in which two sisters watch over a dying third. Swe | 1972 | TARTN | 88 min | subt | Cert 18 | # 9332 | RRP £19.99
Born in 1918 to a stern Lutheran pastor, Bergman entered the world of films in 1943, directing 62 of them, mostly from his own screenplays, across the following six decades, with his work forming a prolonged existential examination of faith and its loss, mortality, loneliness, human frailty and desire. Whether the films are familiar – as with The Seventh Seal, his allegory set in a medieval world of plague and sin, or deserving of rediscovery, such as Summer Interlude or Summer with Monika – about an idyllic summer in the Stockholm archipelago, they feature scenes and images as enduring as any in cinema, just as the faces of his ‘repertory’ cast – Max von Sydow, Bibi Andersson, Harriet Andersson, Erland Josephson, Ingrid Thulin, and Gunnar Björnstrand – are etched into our minds through their performances in such films as the enigmatic Persona, the colour-saturated Cries and Whispers or the unforgettable Scenes from a Marriage.
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
Summer with Monika A frank and tender portrait of first love. Harriet Andersson is unforgettable in her breakthrough role – written especially for her by Bergman. Swe | 1952 | TARTN | 91 min | subt | B&W | 15 | # 11835 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
Through a Glass Darkly Bergman’s Oscar-winning film traces a schizophrenic young woman’s descent into madness. Swe | 1961 | TARTN | 91 min | subt | B&W | 15 | # 8849 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
Scenes from a Marriage Bergman’s riveting examination of a relationship as it fractures, starring Liv Ullman and Erland Josephson. Swe | 1973 | TARTN | 164 min | subt | Cert 15 | # 14745 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10
The Seventh Seal Bergman’s allegory of Man’s search for meaning in which a knight returning from the Crusades plays chess with Death for his life. Special Edition. Swe | 1957 | PALIS | 92 min | subt | B&W | PG | # 50782 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £10 Unavailable for almost 12 months, we’re delighted to be able to present these Bergman DVDs once again. More films are available, please contact usfor details.
That Kieslowski always insisted that he lacked a talent for filmmaking shows just what expectations he had of himself and of the medium. He sometimes expressed his dissatisfaction with film’s apparent inability to convey the inner life of his characters, though anyone who has seen Dekalog, or his meditative later films, will know that his ability to capture characters’ thought on film came from a deep humanism and understanding of his characters, often people attempting to reconcile the experiences of their daily lives with creeds and ideals of various forms, whether these are communist propaganda, biblical proverbs, or revolutionary slogans. There’s a degree of pessimism evident in many of his films however, as Kieslowski dwells on the cruel ironies that fate imposes. Yet he also strove after moral truth and an innate sense of personal spirituality. Although he claimed to have retired from film after Red, his unexpected death at 55 was a huge loss to film.
Order now at www.moviemail-o
e Directors
Great DVD Prices!
on. Often tackling profound subjects, their films are rewarding, essential viewing.
Andrei Tarkovsky Andrei Rublev
Three Colours Trilogy
Filled with astounding widescreen compositions, this story of an icon painter’s turbulent life through 15th century Russia is regarded as Tarkovsky’s finest film, and is among the most profound artistic achievements of the 20th century.
Blue, White, and Red: three films which form his universally acclaimed meditations on the virtues symbolized by the French tricolour – Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. 4 discs; Documentary: I’m So-So.
Rus | 1966 | ART-E | 185 min | subt | B&W | 15 | # 9044 | RRP £22.99
France | 1993-94 | ART-E | subt | 15 | # 17916 | RRP £39.99
DVD Box Set: £17.99 (or £5.99 each)
DVD: £9.99 Save £13
Blind Chance
Ivan’s Childhood
A film that follows up the possible consequences of a man running after a train, and whether he catches it or not. Consummate filmmaking.
From its opening scene of a child’s magical flight through images of wartime desolation, Tarkovsky’s debut film is strikingly assured.
Poland | 1982 | ART-E | 124 min | subt | 18 | # 14661 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £14
Camera Buff An 8mm camera becomes an allconsuming passion in this compelling exploration of the power and responsibility of the filmmaker. Poland | 1979 | ART-E | 106 min | subt | PG | # 15285 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £14
Dekalog 1-5 & 6-10 Kieslowski’s wonderful series of films made for Polish TV, based on the 10 Commandments, and set in 2 discs per volume. Warsaw. Poland | 1988 | ART-E | 278 min | subt | 15 | RRP £24.99 each
DVD: £9.99 each Save £15
The Double Life of Veronique Perhaps Kieslowski’s finest work, in which Irène Jacob plays the dual role of identical strangers. 2 discs. France | 1991 | ART-E | 94 min | subt | 15 | # 27563 | RRP £22.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £12
A Short Film about Killing A powerful drama that compares two murders – one by a young man, one by the state. From a Night Porter’s Point of View (Kieslowski, 1977). Poland | 1988 | ART-E | 81 min | subt | Cert 18 | # 14548 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £5.99 Save £14
Rus | 1962 | ART-E | 96 min | subt | B&W | PG | # 10314 | RRP £19.99
Tarkovsky died in 1986 at the age of just 54. His seven feature films, commencing with Ivan’s Childhood in 1962, form one of the greatest and most individual bodies of work in cinema. Whether nominally making films in the areas of war, medieval history, science fiction or autobigraphical reflection, his work completely transcends genres. He was one of cinema’s true visionaries and throughout his films, his commitment to the poetry of cinema, to faith and to human transcendence, shines through. The director’s moral concerns and probing scrutiny of spiritual malaise have inevitably prompted comparisons with Ingmar Bergman, an admirer who proclaimed him to be ‘the greatest, the one who invented a new language, true to the nature of film, as it captures life as a reflection, life as a dream’. These are films to live with and reflect upon, profound and sometimes magical sources of inspiration and consolation, not reducible to easy formulas.
DVD: £6.99 Save £13
Mirror Dir: Andrei Tarkovsky. This is film as pure visual poetry, seamlessly blending past and present, dreams and memory, art and levitation. Magical. Russia | 1974 | ART-E | 102 min | subt | Cert U | # 9319 | RRP £19.99
DVD: £6.99 Save £13
The Sacrifice Hours before a nuclear holocaust a man promises God he will sacrifice all he holds dear to save the world. The next day dawns. 2 discs. Swe | 1986 | ART-E | 142 min | subt | 12 | # 11950 | RRP £24.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £15
Solaris An entrancing film metaphysical science-fiction about a psychologist sent to a space station to investigate 2 discs. mysterious deaths. Russia | 1972 | ART-E | 159 min | subt | PG | # 9045 | RRP £22.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £13
Stalker The battle between science, faith and art is played out in a forbidden, poisoned wasteland where dreams become flesh. 2 discs. Russia | 1979 | ART-E | 155 min | subt | PG | # 9312 | RRP £22.99
DVD: £9.99 Save £13
online.co.uk or call 0844 776 0900
Offer ends 25th July or while stocks last
ieslowski
Classic Movies Port of New York Laszlo Benedek
Yul Brynner, Richard Rober, Scott Brady. Documentary style film noir in which a federal agent goes undercover as a San Francisco dealer in order to catch a murderous gang of miscreants led by Yul Brynner’s powerful drug-smuggling ringleader. USA | 1949 | REV | 82 min | Cert TBC Item # 58484 | RRP £9.99 | Released 22nd June
Avant-Garde Strangers When We Meet Richard Quine
Walter Matthau. Kirk Douglas plays a married LA architect embroiled in an affair with his beautiful neighbour Maggie Gault (Kim Novak). They both know what they’re doing is wrong, but their mutual attraction is too strong. USA | 1960 | SPHE | 117 min | 12 Item # 58550 | RRP £12.99 | Released 6th July
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Our DVD Price: £7.99
The Red Shoes (Restored Anniversary Edition)
The Strange Woman Edgar G. Ulmer
‘So shocking she could only be spoken about in whispers!’ Classic melodrama set in 1820s Maine, where Hedy Lamarr’s beautiful, ambitious sexual temptress Jenny Hager uses her evident charms to ensnare and despatch the men who cross her path.
Michael Powell
Having undergone an extensive two-year restoration initiated by Martin Scorsese, who calls it ‘the movie that plays in my heart’, this new print of The Red Shoes premiered at Cannes this year, where it wowed the audience with its colours that leapt from the screen. ‘Stupendous’ and ‘ravishing’ were comments. In the film, Moira Shearer’s dancer is taken on by a charismatic but ruthless impresario who creates a starring role for her in a new ballet. Then a brilliant young composer joins the company and they fall in love, setting the stage for jealousy and the battle between love and artistic devotion. Combining music, art and cinema in a work of sublime beauty and intelligence, this is one of the truly great films in the history of British cinema. After the recent superb restoration of Black Narcissus, it seems that Powell & Pressburger’s films are starting to receive the attention that is their due. This restored version of The Red Shoes is due to appear on Blu-ray a little later this year. UK | 1948 | G-VEN | 153 min | Cert U Item # 58828 | RRP £15.99 | Released 29th June
Noel Langley Derek Bond, Hildegard Knef, Donald Wolfit. ‘She was his toy ... and his triumph!’ A sinister hypnotist uses dark powers to subdue his leading lady and force her to ignore her true love. Together they develop a successful concert act – but her lover is out to win her back. UK | 1954 | SIMP | 82 min | Cert PG Item # 58868 | RRP £12.99 | Released 15th June
Charles Saunders
Walter Summers
Ralph Richardson takes the role of retired British military officer Capt. Hugh ‘Bulldog’ Drummond for this politically dubious entry in the series, which sees him play the leader of the ‘Black Clan’, a secret alliance (with more than a passing resemblance to Oswald Mosley’s blackshirts) fighting to free England of crime by expelling foreign undesirables.
Page 18
Our DVD Price: £7.99
Svengali
A Time to Kill / The Impersonator
The Return of Bulldog Drummond
Our DVD Price: £11.99
USA | 1946 | REV | 100 min | Cert TBC Item # 58483 | RRP £9.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £9.99
Our DVD Price: £11.99
UK | 1934 | OPTIM | 65 min | Cert U Item # 57949 | RRP £15.99 | Released 22nd June
EXCLUSIVE!
BFI: Exploring Alternatives Continuing the BFI’s release of important British avant-garde films, July sees the first appearance on any video format, anywhere in the world, of these three feature-length collaborations between radical feminist writer/actress Jane Arden and TV director Jack Bond.
Separation
An elliptical study of a woman’s inner life during a marital breakdown. Her past and possible future are revealed in the fragmented, often humorous narrative, in which dreams are as real as the ’swinging’ London (complete with Procul Harum music and Mark Boyle light show) of the Commentary by Jack Bond; film’s setting. Beyond Image (1969) short film from The London Sensual Laboratory. UK | 1968 | BFI | 93 min | Cert 15 Item # 58646 | RRP £19.99 | Released 13th July
DVD Price: £14.99 Blu-ray Price: £17.99
The Other Side of Underneath
Arden’s intense and imaginative study of women undergoing various therapies in a remote Welsh retreat and the vividly depicted psychological traumas that arise from them. A powerful adaptation of her work with The Cinema Holocaust women’s theatre troupe. version and a longer workprint cut; Interviews. UK | 1972 | BFI | 107 min | Cert 18 Item # 58647 | RRP £19.99 | Released 13th July
DVD Price: £14.99 Blu-ray Price: £17.99
John Le Mesurier, Joan Hickson, John Crawford. A double bill of British thrillers. A Time to Kill (1955) is a complex drama about an innocent man accused of murdering his mistress, while The Impersonator (1960) sees a schoolmistress go on a date with a US Sergeant – who becomes a murder suspect when he doesn’t show.
Anti-Clock
UK | 1955; 1960 | ODEON | 122 min | Cert PG Item # 57430 | RRP £12.99 | Released 22nd June
UK | 1980 | BFI | 107 min | Cert 15 Item # 58650 | RRP £19.99 | Released 13th July
Our DVD Price: £9.99
A complex avant-garde examination of time and personality in which, mixing cinema and video techniques, Arden and Bond create a movie that captures the anxiety and sense of danger that has infiltrated the consciousness of so many people in Super-8-Film Vibration western society. (1974).
DVD Price: £14.99 Blu-ray Price: £17.99
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
Classic Film & TV Sale
Network have an unrivalled DVD catalogue of classic film and British Television. Here we’ve picked out some of our favourites with films from Alfred Hitchcock, Anthony Asquith, Basil Dearden, Carol Reed and more. Excellent savings to be had, so dig in! Alfred Hitchcock: The British Years
The Ghost Train
Room at the Top
10 marvellous British films: The Pleasure Garden; The Lodger; Downhill; The Man Who Knew Too Much; The 39 Steps; Secret Agent; Sabotage; Young and Innocent; The Lady Vanishes; Jamaica Inn. 10 discs.
Walter Forde
Jack Clayton
A group of rail passengers have to spend a night in the waiting room of a ghostly rural railway station. Arthur Askey and Richard Murdoch are among the travellers in for a night of frights.
Groundbreaking cinema from the British new wave, boldly exploring sexual attitudes and the boundaries of class and wealth. Winner of 2 Oscars, including Best Actress for Simone Signoret.
UK | 1941 | NWORK | 83 min | | B&W | Cert U | # 26716 | RRP £9.99
UK | 1959 | NWORK | 113 min | | B&W | Cert 12 | # 56914 | £14.99
DVD: £6.99 Save £3
DVD: £8.99 Save £6
The Dead
The Singing Ringing Tree / The Tinderbox
DVD: £29.99 Save £30
Bad Timing Dir: Nicolas Roeg. Art Garfunkel plays a moody psychiatrist whose obsession with a fun-loving girl (Theresa Russell) leads to tragedy.
John Huston’s final film, a vignette from Joyce’s Dubliners about a family’s gathering, is a delicate meditation on memory and lost love.
USA / | 1980 | NWORK | 117 min | Cert 18 | # 33149 | RRP £14.99
USA / UK | 1987 | NWORK | 80 min | Cert U | # 28353 | RRP £9.99
DVD: £8.99 Save £6
DVD: £6.99 Save £3
Casting the Runes
League of Gentlemen
Dir: Lawrence Gordon Clark. A masterful reworking of MR James’ classic gothic story. Iain Cuthbertson is unsettling as the malevolent Karswell. UK | 1979 | NWORK | 48 min | Cert PG | # 51170 | RRP £9.99
DVD: £6.99 Save £3
Cottage To Let
Dir: Basil Dearden. Richard Attenborough. One of the best British comedy crime capers, in which a gang of ex-soldiers rob a bank. UK | 1960 | NWORK | 109 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 31203 | RRP £14.99
DVD: £6.99 Save £8
The much-loved East German children serial shown on the BBC in the 60s. In German or English language. Germany | 1957 | NWORK | 146 min | subt | U | # 11941 | RRP £24.99
DVD: £14.99 Save £10
Tales of the Unexpected Series 1-8 of the sinister, suspenseful and darkly humorous adaptations from Roald Dahl’s stories. UK | NWORK | RRP £19.99 each
DVD: £9.99 each
The Owl Service
Things To Come
An adaptation of Alan Garner's award-winning novel combining mystery, adventure and history. Broke new ground in TV for teenagers.
Dir: William Cameron Menzies. The extended version of the pro-science fantasy showcasing the hopes and predictions of H.G. Wells. 2 discs.
UK | 1969 | NWORK | 240 min | Cert 12 | # 53806 | RRP £14.99
UK | 1936 | NWORK | 94 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 30200 | £19.99
DVD: £7.99 Save £7
DVD: £7.99 Save £12
The Red Balloon / White Mane
Three Films by Somerset Maugham
Dir: Albert Lamorisse. A red balloon follows a little boy around the streets of Paris in this magical short film.
Three sets of adaptations (Trio, Quartet & Encore) of Maugham short stories featuring superb acting talent.
DVD: £7.99 Save £12
France | 1953; 1956 | NWORK | Cert PG | # 55605 | RRP £14.99
UK | 1948-51 | NWORK | 279 min | B&W | PG | # 51244 | RRP £24.99
DVD: £7.99 Save £7
DVD: £9.99 Save £15
Paul Robeson Film Collection
This Sporting Life
Who Killed Teddy Bear
Dir: Anthony Asquith. Alastair Sim, John Mills. A stylish and assured WWII thriller about an inventor who is in danger of being kidnapped. UK | 1941 | NWORK | 86 min | B&W | Cert U | # 32295 | RRP £9.99
DVD: £7.99 Save £2
Odd Man Out Atmospheric and suspenseful, this Carol Reed film stars James Mason as an idealistic IRA leader, hunted relentlessly by the police. UK | 1947 | NWORK | 110 min | B&W | Cert PG | # 29582 | RRP £19.99
Sanders of the River, Song of Freedom, King Solomon's Mines, Big Fella & Body and Soul. Music CD. UK | 1925-1937 | NWORK | B&W | Cert U | # 51268 | RRP £39.99
DVD: £24.99 Save £15
Dir: Lindsay Anderson. Richard Harris gives a powerful performance in this film from the British New Wave. One of the best films of the 1960s. UK | 1963 | NWORK | 128 min | B&W | Cert 12 | # 50650 | RRP £14.99
DVD: £7.99 Save £7
Dir: Joseph Cates. Sal Mineo. A wonderfully sleazy noir masterpiece of American independent cinema. USA | 1965 | NWORK | 87 min | B&W | Cert 15 | # 56434 | RRP £14.99
DVD: £8.99 Save £6
Order now from MovieMail!
Offer ends 25th July or while stocks last
UK | 1925-39 | NWORK | B&W | Cert PG | # 52908 | RRP £59.99
Documentaries “The Creative Interpretation of Actuality”
Harlan County USA
New Releases Anvil! The Story of Anvil Sacha Gervasi
Alternately hilarious and moving documentary about Canadian metal band Anvil, who influenced a generation of mighty bands but who themselves languish in obscurity. The film tracks them as they take an illadvised European tour. Interviews; Featurettes. USA | 2008 | UPV | 81 min | Cert 15 Item # 58530 | RRP £22.99 | Released 15th June
British Air Traffic Control: 1963-1973 Five unique archive films that explore the essential work and responsibilities of Britain’s National Air Traffic Control Service, including an early film from Peter Watkins that he made for the Ministry of Information, The Controllers (1963).
Juraj Lehotsky The phrase ‘love is blind’ takes on new significance in this ravishing docudrama that mixes whimsical animation with real experiences of four blind men and women. Made with compassion, this is a touching, inventive and funny portrait of the way people live without sight.
A unique film drama, written by John Osborne and Charles Wood, about composer Henry Purcell. Simon Callow plays King Charles, and the film features the Monteverdi Choir conducted by John Eliot Gardiner. UK | 1995 | TONYP | 153 min | 12 Item # 58531 | RRP £14.99 | Released 1st May
Our DVD Price: £12.99
Page 20
The Lancaster bomber was the mainstay of RAF Bomber Command during WWII. This film provides riveting firsthand accounts of what it was like to fly and fight in the bomber from surviving veterans. Their testimonies, illustrated by archive film, include vivid recollections of famous bombing missions.
Marc Isaacs Collection
Blind Loves
Tony Palmer
Lancaster Voices
Our DVD Price: £12.99
Our DVD Price: £9.99
England, My England
USA | 1976 | ARTF | 103 min | Cert E Item # 57814 | RRP £14.99 | Released 29th June
UK | 2008 | SIMP | 85 min | Cert E Item # 58873 | RRP £14.99 | Released 15th June
UK | NWORK | 100 min | Cert E Item # 58736 | RRP £12.99 | Released 11th May
Our DVD Price: £9.99
This Oscar-winning film documents the coal miners’ strike against the Eastover Mining Company in Kentucky in 1973, capturing on film the miners’ violent struggles with strikebreakers, local police and company thugs. With a haunting soundtrack by country and bluegrass artists, the film chronicles the long struggle between a community fighting for its life and a corporation dedicated to the bottom line.
Our DVD Price: £12.99
DVD Price: £16.99 Blu-ray Price: £17.99 Limited Edition DVD + CD Price: £17.99
Slovakia | 2008 | ICA | 77 min | subt | Cert TBC Item # 58750 | RRP £12.99 | Released 6th July
Barbara Kopple
Three films from British documentary filmmaker Marc Isaacs: Lift (2001), Travellers (2002) and Calais: The Last Border (2004) – all films of transitional spaces: a lift in a tower block, railway carriages and stations, and Calais, a place which attracts both English booze-cruisers and asylum seekers. Isaacs’ great skill is to ask questions of people in these places that draw us into their worlds and the Director larger themes of their lives. Interview; Booklet essay by Graeme Hobbs. UK | 2001-04 | 2RUN | 130 min | Cert E Item # 58790 | RRP £12.99 | Released 29th June
Our DVD Price: £9.99
Space Conquest
A film about the history of Nasa and Space exploration. Includes an extended interview with Buzz Aldrin as well as the story of Apollo XI, the craft that put men on the Moon in July, 1969. UK | 2009 | SIMP | 97 min | Cert E Item # 58872 | RRP £12.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £9.99
Summers of Love Dig out the beads and tassels for these seminal festival movies! Glastonbury Fayre 1971: The True Spirit of Glastonbury Nicolas Roeg
A vivid documentary of the second Glastonbury Festival in June 1971, when it was a true underground hippie festival still (even the music press didn’t go that year), directed and photographed by Nic Roeg. On stage, the bands give a real flavour of the time, with Terry Reid, Linda Lewis, Family, Melanie, Swarbrick fiddling up a storm with Fairport Convention, an extended Quintessence jam, Stevie Winwood’s Traffic and typically crazy offering from Arthur Brown. Meanwhile in the (spacious) grounds, there’s communal drumming, ecstatic naked dancing and bog writhing. Unseen for over thirty years since its original cinema release, this is a unique Making-of docrecord of a visionary festival. umentary; Audio Commentary by Nic Roeg. UK | 1973 | ODEON | 84 min | Cert 15 Item # 58734 | RRP £17.99 | Released 8th June
Our DVD Price: £11.99 Save £6
Woodstock (40th Anniversary Edition) Michael Wadleigh
Right from the moment that Crosby, Stills & Nash’s Wooden Ships kicks in on the soundtrack, this evocative documentary about the legendary ‘3 days of peace and music’ festival held down on Yasgur’s farm in New York State in August 1969 holds you fast. The line-up of rock icons on stage – The Who, Santana, Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead, Joan Baez, Jimi Hendrix, plus many more, is peerless, and this anniversary edition now features two hours of never-before-released footage, including new performance material from Joan Baez, Country Joe McDonald, Santana and The Who among others, while five of the acts now included – Paul Butterfield, Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Grateful Dead, Johnny Winter and Mountain – have never appeared in any previous version of the film. Remastered 5.1 audio; Essential. It rained. The ‘60s and the Woodstock Generation. USA | 1970 | WHV | 178 min | Cert 15 Item # 58598 | RRP £20.99 | Released 15th June
DVD Price: £13.99 Blu-ray Price: £15.99
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
July 09 MovieMail Newsletter
The GPO Film Unit Vol 3: If War Should Come Recommended Released: 22nd June Features: The City, The Islanders, Spare Time, A Midsummer Day’s Work, If War Should Come, The First Days, SS Ionian, War Library Items 1,2 & 3, Squadron 992, La Cause Commune, French Communique, The Front Line, Men of the Lightship, London Can Take It!, Spring Offensive, Story of an Air Communique, War and Order and Christmas Under Fire. DVD Extras: 2 disc presentation set; Britain Can Take It!; Video interview with Pat Jackson; Illustrated booklet. UK | 1939-40 | BFI | 271 mins | B&W | Cert E | Item # 58050
Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£15.99
RRP: £24.99 Save £9 (36%)
B 75 Bonus Points If purchased for £15.99
B
See Also GPO Film Unit: Vol 2 - We Live in Two Worlds UK | 1938 | BFI | 269 min | B&W | Cert E | # 57113 | RRP £24.99
Our DVD Price: £21.99
T
he final volume in this essential series of British documentaries features the final productions of the GPO Film Unit, from the years 1939-40, before it took on official war duties as the Crown Film Unit. The subject of war of course dominates the films, although it takes a while for this to become apparent. While The City considers the ‘higgledy-piggledy mass of brick and concrete’ that is London, and its possibilities for redevelopment, The Islanders journeys from Eriskay in the Hebrides to Guernsey, and (this being the GPO with communication on its mind) optimistically states that ‘water, air and ether are not barriers but bridges’. The first mention that times are awry comes in A Midsummer Day’s Work, about laying an underground telephone cable between Amersham and Aylesbury, when the narrator mentions that it ‘plays an important part in the plans for the defence of Britain’. One senses that the film’s celebration of the countryside comes from an awareness that it is under threat. Then, with If War Should Come, the tone becomes serious, serving notice that times have changed completely, not just with advice about building shelters and putting
An essential BFI release with films by Humphrey Jennings buckets of sand on the landing, but also that personal requirements now come second after the needs of the nation. It’s a sobering short film, whose anxious tone is not alleviated by the forced levity of War Library Items 1, 2 & 3, which deals with identity cards, watchful waiting and the Auxiliary Fire Service respectively. The best known films in the set though are those featuring the input of Humphrey Jennings: Spare Time, his portait of leisure activities in the steel, cotton and coal industries; The First Days, an evocative film of Londoners fighting war with tolerance and co-operation; London Can Take It!, a report from the heart of the Blitz that helped shift American public opinion towards supporting the Allies, and Spring Offensive, about wartime farming. Innovative docu-dramas, poignant dispatches and assorted rarities complete the set, and the films look better than any previous outing on dvd, with some prints startling in their clarity. Graeme Hobbs
Enquiries enquiries@moviemail-online.co.uk
Page 21
Television Programmes Originally Broadcast
Bust: Series 1
New Releases A Waste of Shame John McKay
Rupert Graves, Indira Varma, Zoë Wanamaker. Shakespeare’s sonnets are one of the greatest lyric sequences in literature. But who are ‘the young man’ and ‘the dark lady’ to whom they allude? This feature-length drama, written by William Boyd for the BBC’s ‘Shakespeare Retold’ season, imagines the events at the heart of the mystery. UK | 2005 | DEMAND | 90 min | Cert E Item # 57831 | RRP £14.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £12.99
All the Rivers Run George Miller
Sigrid Thornton. After a shipwreck off the Victorian coast, the beautiful, spirited orphan Philadelphia Gordon finds love and adventure on board a paddle-steamer on the Murray River in this epic Australian mini3 discs. series.
UK | 1987 | PNE | 360 min | Cert 12 Item # 58758 | RRP £24.99 | Released 29th June
Our DVD Price: £17.99
The Capone Investment
John Thaw, Peter Sallis, Glyn Owen. The complete 1974 ITV drama about Al Capone’s ill-gotten gains. A brutal murder triggers an investigation revealing that £4m of Capone’s original haul may be located in England. Following a trail of bodies the sleuths attempt to recover the money and solve the mystery. UK | 1974 | SIMP | 149 min | Cert PG Item # 58866 | RRP £14.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £12.99
Columbo: Season 10, Vol 1
Australia | 1983 | FAB-F | 271 min | Cert PG Item # 58692 | RRP £24.99 | Released 29th June
Our DVD Price: £17.99
Ashes to Ashes: Series 2
Philip Glenister, Keeley Hawes. The 80s are back and it’s criminal. All the episodes from the second series of the drama which serves as a sequel to the 2006 series Life on Mars. UK | 2009 | CTEND | Cert TBC Item # 58535 | RRP £39.99 | Released 13th July
Our DVD Price: £35.99
Blackadder Remastered: The Ultimate Edition
All the episodes from all four series of Blackadder, which follow Rowan Atkinson’s ever more contemptuous Edmund Blackadder through the ages. With him on the journey is Tony Robinson’s loyal human pack-animal Baldrick. Digitally Remastered; Blackadder Rides Again; Audio commentaries; Interviews and much more! UK | 1983 | 2ENT | 719 min | Cert 15 Item # 58241 | RRP £58.99 | Released 15th June
All six episodes from the first series of the major ITV drama series starring Paul Nicholas as unsuccessful businessman Neil Walsh, struggling to rebuild his life after being made bankrupt. Episodes are: Write Off, Hidden Assets, Stag at Bay, Selling a Dummy, Man of 2 discs. Property and Family Business.
Peter Falk dons his trench coat once again to winkle out even the most wellconcealed of crimes. Episodes featured: Caution: Murder Can Be Hazardous to Your Health, Columbo and the Murder of a Rock Star, Death Hits the Jackpot, No Time to Die, A Bird in the Hand, Columbo Goes to College, It’s All in the Game 4 discs. and Butterfly in Shades of Gray. USA | 1990 | UPV | 716 min | Cert 12 Item # 57678 | RRP £29.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £26.99
The Comedians: Series 4
The quintessential quickfire stand-up comedy show. With their routines honed to perfection in the hard-knocks territory of northern working men’s clubs, Frank Carson, Charlie Williams, Bernard Manning, George Roper, Mike Reid and Ken Goodwin all became masters of the excruciatingly bad joke and the knowing wink. This set contains all the best bits from Series 4, first shown in 1972.
The Cup
Matt Lipsey Samantha Power, Steve Edge, Tanya Franks. The complete first series of the BBC’s riotously funny flyon-the-wall style drama that follows the desperate antics of the parents of a Ashburn United’s under 11s team. They play dirty, and want success at any 2 discs. cost! UK | 2008 | BBC | Cert 15 Item # 56394 | RRP £19.99 | Released 6th July
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Diagnosis Murder: Season 3 Dick Van Dyke takes the role of good-natured, quirky Dr. Mark Sloan in this the underrated whodunit series, in which he receives assistance from his medical partner Dr. Amanda Bentley (Victoria Rowell), and new resident Dr. Jesse Travis.
5 discs.
USA | 1993 | PARAH | Cert 12 Item # 58772 | RRP £34.99 | Released 13th July
Our DVD Price: £31.49
Doctor Who: Delta and the Bannermen
This adventure sees the good Doctor (Sylvester McCoy) and Mel (Bonnie Langford) win a trip to Disneyland circa 1959. Knocked off course by a satellite, the bus in fact delivers its passengers to the Shangri-La holiday camp in 1950s Wales, but while the Doctor becomes determined to make the most of the break, the menacing Gavrok is not far behind. Features a guest appearance by Ken Dodd as Tollmaster. Commentary; Featurettes; Out-takes. UK | 1987 | 2ENT | 74 min | Cert PG Item # 58174 | RRP £19.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Doctor Who: Planet of the Dead Lee Evans, Michelle Ryan. The 2009 Easter special starring David Tennant as the Time Lord. Here, a meeting with a jewel thief on a London bus takes a turn for the worse when the bus takes an unexpected detour to a desertlike planet where the deadly Swarm awaits.
UK | 1972 | NWORK | 94 min | Cert E Item # 58875 | RRP £12.99 | Released 15th June
UK | 2009 | 2ENT | 60 min | Cert PG Item # 58176 | RRP £12.99 | Released 29th June
Our DVD Price: £9.99
DVD Price: £9.99 Blu-ray Price: £12.99
Our DVD Price: £53.49
Page 22
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
July 09 MovieMail Newsletter
The Incredible Human Journey
All five episodes of the BBC2 documentary series presented by Dr Alice Roberts. Using the latest genetic, climatic and archaeological evidence, the series examines the five epic routes that our ancestors took across the globe, and the obstacles and brutal challenges they encountered along the way. It also looks at where the human race came from and how our 2 discs. ancestors colonised the world. UK | 2009 | 2ENT | 300 min | Cert E Item # 58223 | RRP £19.99 | Released 8th June
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Just William: Series 1
The adventures of Richmal Crompton’s famous schoolboy – along with fellow Outlaws Ginger, Henry and Douglas – have delighted generations. Made in 1977, set in the 1920s, this is the definitive production of the stories of the scruffy, crafty schoolboy. Bonnie Langford plays the dreaded 2 discs. Violet Elizabeth Bott! UK | 1977 | NWORK | 325 min | Cert U Item # 57302 | RRP £19.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Kingdom: Series Two
All six episodes from the second season of the ITV drama series starring Stephen Fry as Peter Kingdom, the slightly eccentric country solicitor who stands up for the little guy, but whose life is overshadowed by the mysterious disappearance 2 discs. of his brother.
UK | 2008 | ACORN | 240 min | Cert 12 Item # 58632 | RRP £19.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Magpie
A collection of highlights from the 1970s children’s series. Created by Thames TV in 1968 as a more accessible rival to the BBC’s Blue Peter, the series featured fun items on pop music and fashion trends as well as educational features. Out of the 1000 or so episodes made, less than a hundred survive. This volume 2 discs; contains twelve of the best. Orphaned clips; Magpie Annual (PDF). UK | 1972-80 | NWORK | 300 min | Cert E Item # 58742 | RRP £19.99 | Released 29th June
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Ivanhoe Recommended EXCLUSIVE! Director: Douglas Camfield Starring: Anthony Andrews, Ronald Pickup, Michael Hordern, James Mason, Sam Neill, Julian Glover, Lysette Anthony, Olivia Hussey Released: 6th July. UK | 1982 | SPHE | 150 mins | Cert PG | Item # 58552
Filled with square-jawed heroes and swooning maidens, this 1982 re-telling of Sir Walter Scott’s classic yarn is pure swashbuckling gold. Freshly returned from the crusades, Ivanhoe (Anthony Andrews), is disinherited by his father over his support for good King Richard. Joining forces with fellow loyalist Robin of Locksley, Ivanhoe sallies forth to battle Prince John and marry his true love, the fair Rowena (Lysette Anthony). Scott’s novel has been filmed many times but this is regarded as the best version by some measure. Director Douglas Camfield treats the material with respect but never forgets his main job is to tell a cracking story, balancing galloping action scenes with the human interest that’s at the heart of the saga. It’s a film that evokes the classic sword play films of old Hollywood; Anthony Andrews can’t quite fill Errol Flynn’s shoes but makes an attractive lead, ably supported by James Mason as the noble Isaac and Sam Neill playing a silky villain. It has also taken on a life of its own in Sweden, where it is traditionally broadcast on TV every New Year’s Day!
Napoleon and Love: Complete Recommended Starring: Ian Holm, Billie Whitelaw, Stephanie Beacham, Peter Bowles, Sorcha Cusack Released: 15th June DVD Extras: 3 discs. UK | 1974 | NWORK | 450 mins | Cert 12 | Item # 57294
From Abel Gance’s masterpiece Napoléon (1927) to Bondarchuk’s Waterloo (1970), attempts to bring Napoleon to the screen have tended towards the grandiose. However, this nine-hour 1974 Thames TV serial focuses on The Little Corporal’s personal life, telling the story of Napoleon’s rise through his relationships with women. Whether in love or war, Ian Holm plays the diminutive general as virile and intense, and his small talk with Joséphine (Billie Whitelaw) over the fine points of artillery positions still manages to smoulder. We first encounter him as an unemployed general, put out to pasture in Marseilles. Desperate to return to Paris, he courts the daughter of a wealthy merchant, a union which he hopes will fund his return to politics, but then his defence of the Palais des Tuileries earns him favour with a political leader – and his mistress, a certain Joséphine de Beauharnais. With a great cast, clever script and an outstanding central performance, this quality series was long overdue a release.
Buying Details
Buying Details
Our DVD Price:
Our DVD Price:
RRP: £14.99 Save £1 (6%)
RRP: £24.99 Save £7 (28%)
£13.99
Enquiries enquiries@moviemail-online.co.uk
£17.99
Page 23
Napoleon and Love Featuring an illustrious cast headed by Ian Holm, this dramatised account of the life and loves of Napoleon Bonaparte is a much sought-after classic series. Billie Whitelaw stars as Josephine, alongside Catherine Schell, Peter Bowles, and Stephanie Beacham, this complete series features all nine hour-long episodes, originally transmitted in 1974.
An Ideal Husband Oscar Wilde’s drawing-room comedy tells the tale of a prospective cabinet minister who plans to expose a fraudulent canal scheme during a parliamentary sitting but is blackmailed into supporting it by the mysterious Mrs. Cheveley. With costume design by Cecil Beaton, Alexander Korda produces and directs his last film in this classic adaptation of a well-loved play.
The Importance of Being Earnest Oscar Wilde’s classic comedy follows the fortunes of two lovestruck bachelors and their deceptive shenanigans. Featuring Michael Redgrave, Michael Denison and Joan Greenwood, this star-studded 1952 adaptation of one of Wilde’s best-loved plays won a BAFTA nomination for Dorothy Tutin and a Golden Lion nomination for writer and director Anthony Asquith, and is perhaps best-remembered for Edith Evans’ towering performance as the formidable Lady Bracknell.
www.networkdvd.co.uk Packaging design © 2009 Network
OUT THIS JUNE
July 09 MovieMail Newsletter
Television Fireball XL5: Complete Series Gerry Anderson
The year is 2062, and Fireball XL5, piloted by the intrepid Steve Zodiac, faces planetomic missiles, space spies, and alien races both warlike and benign. This definitive special edition box set features all 39 episodes, together with the first full6 discs; Two new length colourised episode. documentaries; Commemorative booklet. UK | 1962 | NWORK | 975 min | Cert U Item # 58357 | RRP £49.99 | Released 29th June
Our DVD Price: £44.99
Midsomer Murders: Series 7
John Nettles’ DCI Barnaby battles the constantly cunning propensity for murder that festers beneath the tranquil surface of village life. Features The Green Man, Bad Tidings, The Fisher King, Sins of Commission, The Maid in Splendour, The Straw Woman and 6 discs. Ghosts of Christmas Past. UK | 2004 | ACORN | 672 min | Cert 12 Item # 58538 | RRP £59.99 | Released 6th July
Our DVD Price: £53.99
Moonlighting: Season 4 The complete fourth season of the 1980s comedy drama series starring Cybill Shepherd and Bruce Willis, revolving around the cases investigated by the Blue Moon Detective Agency and its two partners, Madeline ‘Maddie’ Hayes and David 4 discs; Commentary. Addison.
USA | 1987-88 | COL-T | Cert 12 Item # 58759 | RRP £29.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £26.99
Plastic Man: Complete Series Sarah Anderson
ITV mini-series starring John Thaw as a highly respected, principled plastic surgeon who seems to have it all: a wonderful, supportive wife, three lovely children, a beautiful home and a fulfilling job to which he is devoted. But when Frances Barber’s feisty clinical psychologist appears in his life, he is torn between deep love for his wife and an all-consuming desire for his younger colleague. UK | 1999 | NWORK | 100 min | Cert TBC Item # 58670 | RRP £12.99 | Released 1st June
Our DVD Price: £9.99
Red Dwarf: Back to Earth
The crew returns after a 10-year break, and Lister (Craig Charles), Rimmer (Chris Barrie), Kryton (Robert Llewellyn) and Cat (Danny John-Jules) find themselves back on Earth in 2009 – as characters in a TV show called Red 2 discs; ComDwarf. mentaries; Featurettes; Deleted Scenes; Smeg-ups and more!
UK | 2009 | 2ENT | Cert PG Item # 58246 | RRP £19.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £14.99
The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes BAFTA-winning series featuring the worldfamous detective’s fictional rivals on different cases in a fog-shrouded London. This top-flight series attracted an incredible array of talent, including Peter Vaughan, Robert Stephens, Donald Pleasence, Roy Dotrice, Ronald Hines, Peter Barkworth and Donald 4 discs. Sinden. Complete first series. UK | 1971 | NWORK | 650 min | Cert PG Item # 57299 | RRP £29.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £26.99
Robin Hood: Series 3
All the episodes from the third and final season of the BBC adventure series with Jonas Armstrong in the title role. Three months since Marian’s untimely death, Robin is a changed man. Fuelled by anger and grief, he is stuck in a downward spiral – but hope arrives 5 discs. in the form of Friar Tuck.
South Pacific
Superlative BBC natural history documentary series exploring the vast South Pacific ocean and its many islands, giving viewers the opportunity to see beyond the white sandy beaches and palm trees of the tourist experience. Highlights include spectacular sights of giant crabs that can open coconuts, undersea volcanos, and super slow-mo footage that captures the scale of the world’s biggest 2 discs. waves. UK | 2009 | 2ENT | Cert TBC Item # 58259 | RRP £24.99 | Released 15th June
DVD Price: £15.99 Blu-ray Price: £17.99
The Two Ronnies: Series 5
More wit from Ronnies Barker and Corbett in the fifth series of the comedy show that became an institution. This particular packed programme, broadcast in 1976, showcases them at their peak and features their most famous sketch – Fork Handles, as well as the Spike Milligan-penned Phantom Raspberry 2 discs. Blower of Old London Town. UK | 1976 | 2ENT | Cert PG Item # 58123 | RRP £19.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Mad Men: Season 2
Jon Hamm. The second season of the highly acclaimed HBO series centred around a prestigious New York ad agency in the 1960s. This is an expertly-scripted series on the reality of 1960s life, offering a reflection on our own times. USA | 2008 | LGATE | Cert TBC Item # 58917 | £29.99 | Released 13th July
UK | 2009 | 2ENT | 585 min | Cert 12 Item # 58430 | RRP £39.99 | Released 29th June
DVD: £26.99 Blu-ray: £35.99
Our DVD Price: £35.99
Shut That Door!
Larry Grayson’s highcamp humour made him one of the great stars of light entertainment. Spinning tales of his singular friends – Everard, Slack Alice and Apricot Lil – his comedy was tinged with a saucy sense of wickedness. This set includes both series of The Larry Grayson Show, Larry’s Hour of Stars, the sole surviving edition of Shut That Door! 3 discs; Archive interview; and more. Documentaries; Grayson at the Palladium.
Wainwright Walks: Coast to Coast with Julia Bradbury All six episodes of the BBC4 series in which the presenter walks across the heart of Northern England from the Irish Sea in the West to the shores of the North Sea on the East coast in the footsteps of walker and guidebook writer Alfred Wainwright.
UK | 2009 | ACORN | 165 min | E Item # 58624 | RRP £16.99 | Released 15th June
Our DVD Price: £14.99
UK | 1975 | NWORK | Cert PG Item # 58645 | RRP £24.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £17.99
Enquiries enquiries@moviemail-online.co.uk
Page 25
Contemporary Film English Language Films, 1970 – present
Electra Glide in Blue
New Releases
James Wiliam Guercio
‘He’s a good cop. On a big bike. On a bad road.’ First release of this cult postVietnam America road movie about a bike cop who progresses from patrolman to plainclothes detective but becomes ever more disillusioned with his work and police attitudes.
Anchoress
Chris Newby Natalie Morse. In stunning black and white, and inspired by actual records, this vivid evocation of medieval village life tells of a young peasant girl, walled up in a church as a Three holy woman. Chris Newby shorts: The Old Man of the Sea, Flicker, and Stromboli. Belgium / UK | 1993 | BFI | 104 min | Cert 12 Item # 56602 | RRP £19.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Franklyn
Gerald McMorrow Urban fantasy set in modern-day London and ‘Meanwhile City’, a future metropolis dominated by religious fervour. The film follows four lost souls divided between the two worlds: a masked detective out for revenge on the city’s leader, Eva Green’s beautiful but suicidal art student, Sam Riley’s heartbroken lover, and Bernard Hill’s deeply religious man with a missing son.
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Bloody Mama Roger Corman
Roger Corman wraps a Jacobean tragedy in a gangster movie as he presents the sordid true saga of ‘Ma’ Barker and her brutal sons. Shelley Winters puts in a blistering lead performance, and Robert De Niro plays his first major role.
France / UK | 2008 | CTEND | 98 min | Cert 15 Item # 58861 | RRP £15.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £11.99 Blu-ray: £22.49
USA | 1970 | OPTIM | 89 min | Cert 18 Item # 58532 | RRP £15.99 | Released 29th June
Little Ashes
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Paul Morrison
Bronson
Nicolas Winding Refn A brutal portrait of Michael Peterson, Britain’s most notorious prisoner, who has spent 28 years in solitary confinement, during which time his own personality has been supplanted by his alter ego, hardened criminal ‘Charles Bronson’. Bronson Audio Intro. UK | 2009 | CTEND | 92 min | Cert 18 Item # 58064 | RRP £19.99 | Released 6th July
Robert Pattinson, Javier Beltrán and Matthew McNulty take the roles of Salvador Dalí, Federico García Lorca and Luis Buñuel in this film about their friendship, life and loves, and especially one summer between Dalí and Lorca in Cadaqués, where they share their deepest beliefs, secrets and inspirations. UK | 2008 | SPIRI | 108 min | Cert 15 Item # 58488 | RRP £15.99 | Released 6th July
DVD Price: £11.99
DVD Price: £14.99 Blu-ray Price: £17.99
On the Game
Stanley A. Long
Doubt
JP Shanley An involving examination of religion, morality, and authority, in which Philip Seymour Hoffman’s charismatic priest at a Catholic school in the Bronx is suspected by Meryl Streep’s old-fashioned principal of taking an unhealthy interest in a Doubt: Stage to Screen. young student. USA | 2008 | BUENA | 105 min | Cert 15 Item # 58608 | RRP £17.99 | Released 6th July
A riotous look at the history of the oldest profession, from the ancient Hebrews and Romans through to the Victorians. A vintage slice of slap ‘n’ tickle, directed by Stanley A. Long (of Adventures of... fame), narrated by Charles Gray, and featuring a bevy of beauties. UK | 1974 | ODEON | 83 min | Cert 18 Item # 57418 | RRP £9.99 | Released 22nd June
Our DVD Price: £7.99
DVD Price: £13.99 Blu-ray Price: £21.99
Page 26
USA | 1973 | OPTIM | 108 min | 18 Item # 57947 | RRP £15.99 | Released 22nd June
Aria Recommended Released: 15th June Directors Include: Godard, Altman, Jarman... DVD Extras: Documentary, featuring director interviews; Commentary by Don Boyd. UK | 1988 | 2ND | 85 mins | subt | Cert 18 | Item # 58621
This ambitious and enthralling film – the pet project of producer Don Boyd – is a portmanteau collection of ten arias, directed by ten leading directors, of whom the veterans provide the most inspired contributions. Theresa Russell cross-dresses as a doomed King in a gender-bending dreamy visualisation of Un ballo in maschera, courtesy of Nicolas Roeg, while Robert Altman takes a brave (and successful) risk by filming an audience at a Parisian opening night. Best of all is Godard’s fetishistic rendition of Lully’s Arminde, complete with naked, potentially murderous nymphs and oblivious bodybuilders. Derek Jarman’s intensely personal adaptation of Charpentier’s Louise uses Super-8 footage of Tilda Swinton to poignant effect as an ageing opera singer completes her swan song, while a typically extreme short from Ken Russell stars porn actress Linzi Drew in a pervy take on Nessun Dorma with a nasty twist in its tale. Knowledge of the arias is by no means essential to appreciate the ten visions, which fuse two art forms without compromising either. AD
Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£13.99
RRP: £19.99 Save £6 (30%)
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
July 09 MovieMail Newsletter
The Young Victoria Recommended Director: Jean-Marc Vallée Starring: Emily Blunt, Rupert Friend, Jim Broadbent, Mark Strong, Paul Bettany Released: 13th July DVD Extras: TBC UK | 2009 | MOMET | 100 mins | Cert PG | Item # 58859
Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£12.99
RRP: £19.99 Save £7 (35%)
B 60 Bonus Points If purchased for £12.99
See Also Mrs Brown
John Madden UK | 1997 | BUENA | 101 min | | | Cert PG | # 3720 | RRP £17.99
Our DVD Price: £5.99
The Queen
Stephen Frears UK | 2006 | FOX | 98 min | | | Cert 12 | # 32443 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £15.99
Victoria and Albert John Erman
UK | 2001 | ACORN | 225 min | Cert PG | # 11976 | RRP £24.99
Our DVD Price: £22.49
J
udi Dench won rave reviews for her portrayal of Victoria in Mrs. Brown, a film which showed the Queen in her later years. In The Young Victoria, Emily Blunt takes the crown in a beautifully filmed historical romance which depicts the Queen not as a grieving widow, but as a fresh-faced, strong-willed young woman in the early years of a reign that would define a century, and at the start of a love affair that would last her lifetime. Written by Julian Fellowes (an Oscar winner for his multi-layered screenplay for Altman’s Gosford Park), the film shows Victoria’s rebellion against the confinements and pressures of palace life and her very old fashioned relationship with the shy but practical Prince Albert (Rupert Friend). Produced by Sarah, Duchess of York and Martin Scorsese, The Young Victoria has a royal pedigree as well as a cinematic one, and French-Canadian director Jean Marc Vallée reveals a deft hand for period drama. With fabulous costumes and locations, scenes such as Victoria’s 1838 coronation are brought to life with a fine eye for detail and a grand sense of spectacle. The film opens with Victoria as a 17-year old heiress presumptive who must be chaperoned up and down staircases and share a bedroom with her overbearing
A beautifully filmed historical romance about the young Queen mother, the Duchess of Kent (a steely-eyed Miranda Richardson). Soon, these personal frustrations begin to take on political dimensions: Victoria’s aged uncle, King William IV (a scenery-chewing Jim Broadbent), is sick, and should he die before her 18th birthday, Victoria’s mother would be appointed Regent and she and her lover, Sir John Conroy (Mark Strong), would be free to dominate the young Queen’s early reign. Forced to rely on the whig Prime Minister Lord Melbourne for advice, Victoria finds herself caught between political networks and rivalries, and facing constitutional disaster, assassination attempts, and a neverending parade of would-be suitors. The contemporary twist is that, as monarch, Victoria is the one who must propose. Britain’s longest-serving monarch (to date) is usually depicted as if perpetually trapped in haughty old age, but this wellwritten, finely-acted drama breathes new life into a familiar figure, and captures the youth and energy of the Victorian era. RS
Enquiries enquiries@moviemail-online.co.uk
Page 27
Contemporary Revolutionary Road
This Filthy Earth
Sam Mendes
Andrew Kötting
Acclaimed emotional drama based on the novel by Richard Yates. Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio star as a successful young suburban couple living in a Connecticut in the mid1950s. However, they are unfulfilled by the trivial routines and limitations of suburban life, and cracks soon appear in their Lives of Quite Desperation. relationship. USA / UK | 2008 | DWORK | 119 min | Cert 15 Item # 58408 | RRP £19.99 | Released 29th June
Thriller starring Julia Ormond and Bill Pullman as FBI agents posted to Santa Fe to investigate a series of gruesome murders. As they interrogate witnesses and victims, the testimonies diverge as the seedy underbelly of the community, complete with corrupt police officers, drug addicts and sadistic deviants, is grimly revealed. USA | 2008 | CTEND | 97 min | Cert 18 Item # 58083 | RRP £15.99 | Released 29th June
Our DVD Price: £11.99
The International Tom Tykwer
Clive Owen and Naomi Watts star in this action thriller set in the world of high finance. When an obsessive Interpol agent joins forces with an attorney to target arms dealing within a powerful banking institution, the pair soon find themselves caught in a deadly global Making-of. cat-and-mouse chase. USA | 2009 | COL-T | 118 min | Cert 15 Item # 58498 | RRP £19.99 | Released 6th July
DVD Price: £14.99 Blu-ray Price: £17.99
USA | 1973 | SPHE | 91 min | Cert 18 Item # 58553 | RRP £12.99 | Released 6th July
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Page 28
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Released: 29th June
Jennifer Lynch
In a must-see film for any fan of Death Wish, Charles Bronson plays a tough detective who uncovers a plot by a mafioso in LA to use Vietnam vets to murder his enemies. Hard-hitting 70s cop drama with great car chase (of course)
UK | 2001 | BFI | 106 min | Cert 15 Item # 57989 | RRP £19.99 | Released 22nd June
Director: Clint Eastwood Starring: Clint Eastwood, Bee Vang
Surveillance
Michael Winner
Gran Torino Recommended
DVD Price: £13.99 Blu-ray Price: £17.99
The Stone Killer
Inspired by Emile Zola’s novel La Terre and John Berger’s Pig Earth, This Filthy Earth tells the tragic story of sisters whose lives are disrupted by two men – a brutal villager greedy for their land and a gentle stranger who offers the possibility of escape. Amidst rural hardship and a community consumed with superstition, events unfurl which threaten their sibling bond. Shadows Across Baked Earth; Booklet.
DVD Extras: Manning the Wheel: American Car Culture; Gran Torino: More than a Car. USA | 2008 | WHV | 116 mins | Cert 15 | Item # 58606
Walt Kowalski (Eastwood) is a bitter man. His wife’s dead, he can’t relate to his soft, suburban children and he despises the Asians who are now his neighbours. At least he still has his beloved 1972 Gran Torino, the finest car ever to roll off a Detroit production line. When a local youngster tries stealing it however, Walt is ready to stop growling and start biting. But the miscreant is contrite and the old curmudgeon is horrified to find that he likes the kid: enough to protect him when a vicious gang starts cutting up rough. Just as Unforgiven commented on Clint’s western career, so Gran Torino reflects upon his urban avenger films. But Walt’s no Dirty Harry: the joy of this excellent film comes in seeing him realise that although America looks very different, the working class values he cherishes – community, respect, hard work – are still there and still worth fighting for. Eastwood has suggested Gran Torino might be the last time he appears on screen. If that’s true, it’s a magnificent last hurrah. JO
Buying Details Our DVD Price:
£12.99
RRP: £20.99 Save £8 (35%)
Also on
Two Minute Warning Larry Peerce
Beau Bridges. Taut thriller in which a lone psycho with a hunting rifle goes on a sniping spree at a crowded football stadium. Charlton Heston’s police chief, John Cassavetes’ SWAT team commander and stadium manager Martin Balsam try to stop him before it’s too late. USA | 1976 | IN2FI | 111 min | Cert 15 Item # 58612 | RRP £5.99 | Released 6th July
Our DVD Price: £5.99
Viva
Anna Biller
Retro sexploitation drama written, directed by and starring Anna Biller, as a bored suburban housewife in 1972 LA who finds herself looking for adventure in the middle of the sexual revolution. Nudist colonies, orgies, modelling, prostitution, drugs, bisexuality, bohemia, and Exotic Slide Show. even liberation await. USA | 2007 | NOUVE | 120 min | Cert 18 Item # 58814 | RRP £15.99 | Released 6th July
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Wendy and Lucy Kelly Reichardt
An unostentatious, moving and lucid inquiry into lives adrift in contemporary American society, in which a woman loses her job and heads out with her dog to Alaska in the hope of turning her life around with a wellpaid summer job. USA | 2008 | SODA | 80 min | Cert 15 Item # 57847 | RRP £15.99 | Released 29th June
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
July 09 MovieMail Newsletter
Also Released DVD Releases Brief Encounter (1974) Alan Bridges
UK | 1974 | NWORK | 99 min | PG | # 58869 | £9.99
Our DVD Price: £8.99
Rachel Getting Married Starring: Anne Hathaway, Rosemarie DeWitt, Debra Winger, Bill Irwin, Tunde Adebimpe
Our DVD Price: £17.99
USA | 2002 | 35 min | B&W | 15 | # 58749 | £15.99
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Duplicity
Released: 29th June DVD Extras: Actors and screenwriters commentary; Behind the Scenes; The Wedding Band; Cast and crew Q&A; Deleted Scenes. USA | 2008 | COL-T | 112 mins | Cert 15 | Item # 58536
Jonathan Demme’s thoroughly entertaining latest provides genuine cause for celebration. Rachel (Rosemarie DeWitt) is indeed getting hitched, but it’s to her younger sister that all eyes soon turn. Arriving from rehab, Kim (Anne Hathaway) hasn’t picked the ideal time to reassimilate: swiftly usurping the head bridesmaid and seducing the best man, she’s too busy working through her own issues to want to toast the happiness of others. Demme proceeds after the manner of his concert films, installing his actors and musicians around the family’s upstate New York grounds, and catching the happy accidents that follow on the fly. Among the invitees, both DeWitt and Bill Irwin (as cheerfully suffering patriarch) are terrific; Debra Winger returns on fearsome form as the sisters’ estranged mother; while Hathaway, displaying keen comic timing, continues the smoothest transition from teen star to fullyfledged leading lady the movies have witnessed of late. MM
Buying Details RRP: £19.99 Save £6 (30%)
USA | 2008 | WDHV | 92 min | PG | # 58878 | £18.99
David Lynch
Director: Jonathan Demme
£13.99
Byron Howard
Dumbland
Recommended
Our DVD Price:
Bolt
Also on
Tony Gilroy USA | 2009 | UPV | 125 min | 12 | # 58804 | £24.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £22.49
Harry Potter 1-5
High Definition Releases Bolt
Byron Howard USA | 2008 | WDHV | 92 min | PG | # 58876 | RRP £23.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £21.99
Duplicity
Tony Gilroy USA | 2009 | UPV | 125 min | 12 | # 58804 | RRP £24.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £22.49
East Is East
Damien O’Donnell UK | 1999 | 4DVD | 92 min | 15 | # 57899 | RRP £19.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £17.99
Ghostbusters Ivan Reitman
UK / USA | WHV | 157 min | £8.99 each
USA | 1984 | COL-T | 101 min | PG | # 58367 | £19.99
Our DVD Price: £7.99 each
Our Blu-ray Price: £17.99
House by the Cemetery
Harry Potter 1-5
Lucio Fulci
Various
Italy | 1981 | ARROW | 82 min | Cert 18 | # 58080 |
UK | WHV | PG | # 58696 | RRP £18.99
RRP £15.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £17.99 each
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist Peter Sollett
USA | 2008 | COL-T | 90 min | Cert 12 | # 58862 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £17.99
Push
Paul McGuigan USA | 2009 | ICON | 111 min | 12 | # 58417 | £19.99
Our DVD Price: £17.99
A Rage in Harlem Bill Duke
USA | 1991 | OPTIM | 104 min | 18 | # 58684 | £15.99
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Thief
Michael Mann USA | 1981 | 118 min | Cert 18 | # 58542 | £15.99
Our DVD Price: £14.99
Zoltan, Hound of Dracula Albert Band
USA | 1977 | OPTIM | 84 min | Cert 18 | # 57972 | RRP £12.99
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Weird Science John Hughes
USA | 1985 | UCA | 90 min | 15 | # 25647 | RRP £9.99
Our DVD Price: £4.99
Highlander
Russell Mulcahy USA | 1985 | OPTIM | 111 min | 15 | # 58897 | £24.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £22.49
Mad Men: Season 2 USA | LGATE | # 58918 | RRP £39.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £35.99
Nature’s Great Events UK | 2009 | 2ENT | 360 min | E | # 58136 | £29.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £26.99
Junebug
Phil Morrison USA | 2005 | EUREK | 109 min | 15 | # 58732 | £19.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £17.99
Rockers
Theodoros Bafaloukos Jamaica | 1978 | WIENR | 90 min | 15 | # 57826 | £24.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £22.49
The Pink Panther 2 Harald Zwart
USA | 2008 | FOX | 92 min | PG | # 58760 | RRP £27.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £25.49
In the Shadow of the Moon David Sington
USA | 2007 | 4DVD | 100 min | U | # 57897 | RRP £19.99
Our Blu-ray Price: £17.99
Enquiries enquiries@moviemail-online.co.uk
Page 29
James Oliver’s From the Cheap Seats
Painting with Light
I
t’s the nature of the movies that the backroom boys seldom get the credit they deserve from the wider media. Film might be a collaborative medium but some collaborators are more prominent than others; it’s these public faces – the actors, the director – that soak up the acclaim, often at the expense of vital-butobscure colleagues. So when a cameraman gets eulogised by the press, you know he was something special. And special Jack Cardiff most certainly was. He was (arguably) the greatest ever colour cinematographer; it’s a measure of his achievement that it wasn’t just the film buff faithful who mourned him. Rather than offer a tribute of my own, I’ll recommend you watch Black Narcissus again or Under Capricorn or... take your pick. I’m inclined to think that words can’t do justice to the achievements of such a visual artist. Instead, let us consider the profession that he mastered. Of course, it must be acknowledged that whatever contributions a cameraman makes, they do not operate in a vacuum. Cinematography cultists often overlook the vital role played by other technicians, especially the production designer and editor. Their contributions are, however, more discreet, sometimes invisible; cameramen, by contrast, are all about what’s on screen. The minimum responsibility of a Director of Photography (DoP) is lighting the picture but can also encompass designing camera moves or even compositions (many directors are less pictorially minded than is commonly supposed.) The best of them have styles so characteristic, it’s like signing their name on every frame. This delicate balance of craft and art is explored in the excellent documentary Visions of Light, a celebration of the cinematographer’s trade.
Jack Cardiff was arguably the greatest ever colour cinematographer In the earliest days of cinema, the greatest challenge was getting an image to register on film. Lighting was done by the sun; artificial lights were nowhere near powerful enough. As the equipment evolved, so cameramen were able to create more elaborate images on film – ‘painting with light’, as later master John Alton had it. DoPs were constantly pushing their kit as hard as it would go. For Der Letze Mann, Karl Freund invented cranes, dollies and harnesses so that the camera could dance about the set. The toys improved: film stocks got faster, lenses got wider and cameramen started playing with all sorts of new tricks. James Wong Howe, for instance, developed the ‘deep focus’ techniques that Greg Toland would use so successfully on Citizen Kane, the most influential job of photography there’s ever been. In cinematography, technology has
always facilitated art. The revolution of the French New Wave was enabled by smaller cameras which allowed Raoul Coutard, the movement’s great cameraman, to escape the studio and shoot on location, creating a new filmic style. We’re in the middle of another revolution right now, as celluloid is subsumed by digital. Digital is still in its infancy but it’s already produced its first genius: Anthony Dod Mantle, who won a deserved Oscar for Slumdog Millionaire. His work doesn’t try to replicate the analogue experience but rather, creates images that could only be produced digitally. Radical changes are surely afoot, new techniques will be developed and new adepts emerge. Whether any will prove worthy of comparison to Jack Cardiff, however, remains to be seen.
Related Films Visions of Light: The Art of Cinematography USA | 1992 | BFI | 91 min | PG | # 27420 | RRP £19.99
Our DVD Price: £15.99
The Red Shoes
New restored edition, see page 18. UK | 1948 | G-VEN | 153 min | U | # 58828 | RRP £15.99
Our DVD Price: £11.99
Visit the Cheap Seats blog and join in on the discussion! blogs.moviemail-online.co.uk/cheapseats Page 30
Order now www.moviemail-online.co.uk
The New MovieMail Website June Highlights • Film trailers – advertised last month but, after a short delay, now available - over 3,000 to choose from! • Exclusive online sales – Merchant Ivory Productions, Britain on Film - documentaries from Panamint, Almodovar Sale, BBC Sale • New Cinebox downloads – A Christmas Tale and more • Full length reviews for – Aria, Che: Parts 1 and 2 and The London Collection Visit: www.moviemail-online.co.uk
MovieMail Filmcast The MovieMail Filmcast is a fortnightly programme that gives considered and insightful introductions to significant films and directors. Presented by Graeme Hobbs, the programmes aim to inspire you to watch the films with a fresh eye as well as introduce their themes and context. Listening and downloading is simple - you don't need an iPod or mp3 player, just a computer. Those with iTunes can easily subscribe to the podcast. Go to www.moviemail-online/podcasts
Mailorder Form Title / Item #
Complete and send to MovieMail Direct, PO Box 267, Letchworth, SG6 9BS
Qty
Price
Name Tel / Email Address
If delivery address is different please supply separately
Please note that prices listed on Ref: July 09 W Payment this catalogue are valid for online I enclose a cheque made payable to MovieMail, or please charge orders only. If you wish to order by my credit\debit card: Card # Phone or Mail please call us for the CSC No. Exp. Date appropriate prices Postage:
Total:
UK Postage: £1 per DVD, except with multiple discs in the same item, where it’s £1 for the first disc and 50p for every disc thereafter. VHS £2 each. Max postage charge £6. International: Please call for details
Start Date Signature
Issue No.
Summer Treats 2 DVDs for just £15!
Choose any 2 of these DVDs to enjoy this summer and pay just £15, or indeed 4 for £30... Mamma Mia!
The Overlanders
Somers Town
Dir: Phyllida Lloyd. Feelgood blockbuster adaptation of the smash-hit stage musical based on Abba songs. Meryl Streep leads the all-star cast.
Dir: Harry Watt. Ealing WWII drama of Australian outback life, which follows Chips Rafferty’s drover as he escapes the threat of Japanese invasion.
Dir: Shane Meadows. A warmhearted portrait of an unlikely friendship between two boys, newcomers to the city, on a London housing estate.
UK / USA | 2008 | UPV | 104 min | Cert PG | # 55981 | RRP £21.99
Australia | 1946 | OPTIM | 91 min | B&W | U | # 56946 | RRP £15.99
UK | 2008 | OPTIM | 72 min | B&W | Cert 12 | # 56917 | RRP £17.99
Tell No One
They Made Me a Fugitive
The Wave
Dir: Guillaume Canet. A tense and twisting thriller in which a man discovers that his apparently murdered wife may not be dead after all.
Dir: Alberto Cavalcanti. Gritty film noir in which Trevor Howard’s bored exRAF man joins a criminal gang.
France | 2006 | REV | 130 min | subt | 15 | # 51362 | RRP £19.99
UK | 1947 | ODEON | 96 min | Cert PG | # 54319 | RRP £9.99
La Bête Humaine
Charlie Bubbles
Cloak and Dagger
RRP £17.99
RRP £7.99
RRP £9.99
The Kite Runner
The Last King of Scotland RRP £19.99
Man on Wire
RRP £19.99
RRP £19.99
Dir: Jürgen Vogel. German school drama exploring the cult nature of fascism, inspired by true events that took place in Palo Alto, California. Germany | 2008 | MOMET | 107 min | subt | 15 | # 57017 | RRP £17.99
The Crimson Pirate RRP £9.99
The Dark Knight
The Fall
RRP £22.99
RRP £17.99
A Run for Your Money RRP £15.99
State of Play (BBC)
Sunday Bloody Sunday RRP £15.99
RRP £19.99