Video Find the Perfect Gift    Send a Gift Certificate
Search 
Home › Comedy › General
Review Vision Video Ltd. / Jack Dee - Live In London [1999]
Actors & Directors
  • Tom Poole
  • Jack Dee
Release date: 1997-11-10
Run time: 60 min.
RRP: £14.99
Price: £1.75

Review Jack Dee - Live In London [1999] / Vision Video Ltd.:

Filmed at London's Gielgud Theatre at the culmination of his 1998 tour, Jack Dee Live and Uncut offers the UK's favourite "whinger" in his element-on a stage performing stand-up comedy. Dee has presence in his orange shirt and tailored blue suit, but although he's derogatory about himself-he's a stay-at-home man, he's short, he's fat-he's also unapologetic. Dee isn't afraid to throw harsh words at his audience or swear like the proverbial navvy along with an onslaught of observational humour. He doesn't go in for surrealism, one-liners or complex structural payoffs. He prefers to tackle one subject at a time, explore it, then move on. His themes are universal rather than original but he usually brings a fresh perspective. Take builders… he puts himself at the centre of their Neanderthal attentions rather than women. With relationships, he brings his own experience into the equation and he's particularly hilarious about the division of wardrobe space and the structure of marital arguments in his own home. There isn't much here you could say was overtly political but he does have a dig at ridiculous censorship laws by imagining himself in a world that takes the likes of David Cronenberg's Crash literally. -Emma Perry.

Review Warner Home Video / The World According To Garp [1982]
Actors & Directors
  • John Lithgow
  • Glenn Close
  • George Roy Hill
  • Mary Beth Hurt
  • Robin Williams
Release date: 1993-08-16
Run time: 131 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £19.90

Review The World According To Garp [1982] / Warner Home Video:


Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / White Men Can't Jump [1992]
Actors & Directors
  • Ron Shelton
  • Woody Harrelson
  • Rosie Perez
  • Tyra Ferrell
  • Cylk Cozart
  • Wesley Snipes
Run time: 111 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £3.48

Review White Men Can't Jump [1992] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:

White Men Can't Jump, writer-director Ron Shelton's 1992 follow-up to the baseball comedy-drama Bull Durham, involves a different sport: basketball, as played on the neighbourhood hustler circuit. Woody Harrelson is Billy Hoyle, a good shooter using his white complexion to fool black players into thinking he can be stomped in easy bets. Billy's banter-filled matchup against Sidney Deane (Wesley Snipes) on a public court leads to a partnership in which Sidney becomes Billy's manager, taking the white outsider on a tour of the tougher sections of Los Angeles, where he plays homeboys for a few bucks. Inevitably, the two come apart over their innate competitiveness, a situation that has to be re-evaluated after Billy gets into trouble with some underworld creditors. Meanwhile, Billy's girlfriend (Rosie Perez) sits at home preparing herself for a maybe-someday appearance on Jeopardy. As with all of Shelton's sports-related films (Tin Cup, his script for The Best of Times), White Men Can't Jump is less about the fine points of the game than it is the rules by which players survive it. The script is literate and crackling with wit and satire (a scene in which a politician sponsors a black-white "solidarity" game is hilarious). The actors are entirely in sync, and the scenes under and around the hoops are a thrill to watch. -Tom Keogh, Amazon. com.

Review 2 Entertain Video / Last Of The Summer Wine - The Complete Last Of The Summer Wine - Series One [1973]
Actors & Directors
  • Alan J.W. Bell
  • Danny O'Dea
  • Stephen Lewis
  • Riky Ash
  • Jean Alexander
Run time: 174 min.
RRP: £16.99
Price: £11.75

Review Last Of The Summer Wine - The Complete Last Of The Summer Wine - Series One [1973] / 2 Entertain Video:

"It's destiny, fate that brings us together. Redundancy. They just don't care that your mother used to eat insurance men and that yours was struggling to bring you up nicely as a little poof". So says Clegg (Peter Sallis) addressing his companions, Compo (Bill Owen) and Blamire (Michael Bates), three fellows getting on in years reunited by unemployment after knowing each other all their lives in a small Yorkshire town. There's no real story to Last of the Summer Wine, simply the well-observed banter of the central trio and a gallery of eccentric supporting characters. Compo, the irreverent and scruffy "village idiot" and Clegg, the amiable working man are well-loved figures, but the middle-class Conservative Blamire, a nicely rounded portrayal by Bates, may surprise fans expecting to see Foggy (Brian Wilde), who didn't join the series until 1976. This double-video presents the six episodes of the first series, from 1973, of the longest-running comedy in British television history. It's a shame the pilot episode which introduced the characters has not been included, and that the credits have been edited out, but this is a reminder of how good Last of the Summer Wine once was, when it was new, fresh and laugh-out-loud funny. -Gary S. Dalkin.

Review Fabulous Films Ltd. / Trust Me - Murder Is A Dying Art [1988]
Actors & Directors
  • Adam Ant
  • Talia Balsam
  • Karen Black
  • David Packer
  • Joyce Van Patten
  • Robert Houston
Release date: 1995-06-26
Run time: 85 min.
Price: £10.99

Review Trust Me - Murder Is A Dying Art [1988] / Fabulous Films Ltd.:


Review 2 Entertain Video / Open All Hours [1976]
Actors & Directors
  • David Jason
  • Lynda Baron
  • Ronnie Barker
Release date: 1995-02-28
Run time: 83 min.
Price: £10.99

Review Open All Hours [1976] / 2 Entertain Video:

Written by Roy Clarke, who was also responsible for Last Of The Summer Wine, Open All Hours exhibited a similarly relaxed attitude towards plot. Ronnie Barker plays Arkwright, the miserly grocer who longs to marry busty Nurse Gladys (Lynda Baron) ("Let's strike while the iron's lukewarm". ) David Jason, meanwhile, plays Arkwright's nephew Granville, a romantic who chafes at the confines of shop life and lusts after one "Gloria" (of whom we only ever catch a rear-end view). A series of customers offer little side vignettes, gossipy tittle tattle and tales of their own sexual frustrations. This is a special 90-minute long edition, featuring the pilot. Although it was made in 1983, Open All Hours seems to belong to an earlier era still, in its cosily nostalgic, saucy postcard worldview of everyday Northern folk, a world in which Granville still does his rounds in a cloth cap on a delivery bike. The script creaks with double entendres and how amusing you'll find Arkwright depends on how amusing you find a man with a stammer. Don't expect Steptoe-style pathos or wit, here. Open All Hours is notable, however, in that it constituted Jason's comedy apprenticeship under Barker, standing him in good stead for Only Fools And Horses. -David Stubbs.

Review Video Collection International / The Detectives - Series 3 Part 2 - Undercover Operations : Twitchers / Flash / On Thin Ice
Actors & Directors
  • Robert Powell
  • George Sewell
  • Jasper Carrott
  • Francis Matthews
  • Bill Oddie
  • Ed Bye
Release date: 1998-02-16
Run time: 85 min.
Price: £12.99

Review The Detectives - Series 3 Part 2 - Undercover Operations : Twitchers / Flash / On Thin Ice / Video Collection International:


Price: £10.99

Review Pink Panther Strikes Again:


Review 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment / Jingle All The Way [1996]
Actors & Directors
  • Phil Hartman
  • Arnold Schwarzenegger
  • Robert Conrad
  • Rita Wilson
  • Brian Levant
  • Sinbad
Release date: 2004-11-01
Run time: 86 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £6.81

Review Jingle All The Way [1996] / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment:

It's Christmas Eve, and Arnold needs to find a Turbo Man action figure, the craze of the season. Only they're sold out, of course. So the race is on, and the Austrian Oak must do fierce battle with other shoppers and merchants alike, all for the prize toy with which to purchase his son's affections. All of which is unwittingly very sad, on the content level. But the film supposes itself to be amiable enough, on its own shabby terms, even when it climbs out of the screen and starts gnawing at your furniture. If the humour were to get broader it would make HDTV obsolete. The tone can only be termed good-naturedly mean-spirited. Goofy carnival music runs continuously in the background so we never forget that what we're seeing is, er, um, funny. All the action is composed of comic violence, like an unhip Warner Bros. cartoon. [+]
Do the filmmakers actually consider this cynical foray to be indicative of the Christmas spirit? Apparently so, because the resolution has Arnold winning quite inadvertently, and offers no clear alternative to the competitive commercialism that drives the film's attempts at humour. In a key scene that's meant to be touching, Arnold and his chief rival Sinbad sit down for a heart-to-heart in which we learn that receiving much-wanted Christmas presents in our formative years is responsible for our success in adulthood. You get that Turbo Man, you'll be a billionaire; don't get it, you'll be a loser. Such is the formidable challenge of parenthood, to cater to the child's whims while it can still make a difference. This is what's wrong with America. -Jim Gay, Amazon. com.

Review 4 Front Video / To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything Julie Newmar [1995]
Actors & Directors
  • John Leguizamo
  • Blythe Danner
  • Patrick Swayze
  • Stockard Channing
  • Wesley Snipes
  • Beeban Kidron
Release date: 2001-04-16
Run time: 104 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £2.49

Review To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything Julie Newmar [1995] / 4 Front Video:

This clunky road movie about three drag queens (Patrick Swayze, Wesley Snipes, and John Leguziamo) who get stranded in a sleepy Nebraska town on their way to a beauty contest, is too uplifting for its own good. Released during drag's mid-90s heyday when RuPaul and the Wigstock documentary were all the rage, To Wong Foo aimed straight for the mainstream with its inoffensive camp and "can't we all get along" morality. While gay-activist groups howled about straights getting the lead roles in To Wong Foo, in the end the filmmakers really couldn't have done better than this trio of actors. John Leguziamo provides real sass and bite as a Latino (or should we saw Latina?) drag queen, and Wesley Snipes is surprisingly fierce as the imposing leader of the pack. Saddled with a cloying Southern accent and off-kilter wig, Patrick Swayze barely holds his own with his co-stars, though. To Wong Foo is best viewed as a cultural artefact of a time when it seemed as though drag could rule all tomorrow's parties. -Ethan Brown, Amazon. com.

Review Universal Pictures UK / Bill Bailey - Live
Actors & Directors
  • Nick Morris
  • Bill Bailey
Release date: 2004-11-22
Run time: 124 min.
RRP: £15.99
Price: £7.99

Review Bill Bailey - Live / Universal Pictures UK:


Review Castle Pictures CAS9081 / Pink Flamingos
Actors & Directors
  • Mink Stole
  • Mary Vivian Pierce
  • Edith Massey
  • John Waters
  • David Lochary
  • Divine
Run time: 95 min.
Price: £10.99

Review Pink Flamingos / Castle Pictures CAS9081:

Hailed as the most infamous film of all times, 'Pink Flamingos' was originally billed as 'An excercise in bad taste'. Divine is Babs Johnson, the queen of Sleaze, who with her troubled family of outcasts earns the title of 'The Filthiest People Alive'. But the title is challenged by Connie and Raymond Marble, a jealous, publicity-hungry couple with pre-punk red and blue hair who will do anything to steal Babs' notoriety. The film sets out to shock. It is nauseating. It is absurd. Not for the faint of heart, this film will not be forgotten.

Actors & Directors
  • Benjamin Soames
Release date: 2002-11-25
Run time: 720 min.
RRP: £39.99
Price: £39.99

Review Absolutely Fabulous Series 1-4 Box Set [1992] / 2 Entertain Video:

Absolutely Fabulous was first broadcast in 1992 and became an instant hit. Originally a sketch on the French and Saunders Show, Jennifer Saunders saw its potential and created one of the most ground-breaking and debauched comedies on British TV. Centred around the hip London fashion scene the series follows Edina (Saunders) and Patsy (Joanna Lumley), two women who refuse to grow up and are constantly on a mission to lose weight, gorging themselves with cocaine and/or champagne, endlessly throwing parties (or throwing up at parties), and sporting outrageous outfits, which were the height of fashion at the time-honestly sweetie! The superb comic performances reinvented the careers of Joanna Lumley and June Whitfield. Saunders meanwhile secured her status as one of Britain's top female comedians. Although its consciously chic clothing looks a little dated now, its mad characterisations endure and the jokes remain as hilariously slick and apt as ever. On the DVD: Absolutely Fabulous DVD box set comes beautifully packaged in mock velvet, with each series individually packaged inside. The original sketch from the French and Saunders Show and the pilot episode, "Mirrorball", offers all you need to understand the show's origins The commentary with Jennifer Saunders and John Ploughman on Series 4 is refreshing, owning up to the mistakes they made and the jokes that didn't work. The outtakes are funnier than the usual Hollywood blips. The 4:3 transfer is standard for a television comedy. -Nikki Disney.

Review Sony Pictures Home Entertainment / Ghostbusters [1984]
Actors & Directors
  • Harold Ramis
  • Ivan Reitman
  • Rick Moranis
  • Dan Aykroyd
  • Bill Murray
  • Sigourney Weaver
Release date: 2000-05-22
Run time: 152 min.
RRP: £10.99
Price: £4.98

Review Ghostbusters [1984] / Sony Pictures Home Entertainment:

Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis wrote the script, but Bill Murray gets all the best lines and moments in this 1984 comedy directed by Ivan Reitman (Meatballs). The three comics, plus Ernie Hudson, play the New York City-based team that provides supernatural pest control, and Sigourney Weaver is the love interest possessed by an ancient demon. Reitman and company are full of original ideas about hobgoblins-who knew they could "slime" people with green plasma goo?-but hovering above the plot is Murray's patented ironic view of all the action. Still a lot of fun, and an obvious model for sci-fi comedies such as Men in Black. -Tom Keogh, Amazon. com.

Review 4 Front Video / A Change Of Seasons [1981]
Actors & Directors
  • Bo Derek
  • Mary Beth Hurt
  • Anthony Hopkins
  • Richard Lang
  • Michael Brandon
  • Shirley Maclaine
Release date: 2000-07-03
Run time: 97 min.
Price: £5.99

Review A Change Of Seasons [1981] / 4 Front Video:


Review 2 Entertain Video / Calendar Girl [1993]
Actors & Directors
  • Steve Railsback
  • Jerry O'Connell
  • Jason Priestley
  • Gabriel Olds
  • John Whitesell
  • Joe Pantoliano
Release date: 1997-03-03
Run time: 87 min.
Price: £4.99

Review Calendar Girl [1993] / 2 Entertain Video:


Review Vision Video Ltd. / An Audience With Bob Monkhouse [1996] [1994]
Actors & Directors
  • Bob Monkhouse
Release date: 1996-10-21
Run time: 66 min.
RRP: £12.99
Price: £3.70

Review An Audience With Bob Monkhouse [1996] [1994] / Vision Video Ltd.:


Review 2 Entertain Video / The Young Ones - The Complete Young Ones - Series 1 [1982]
Actors & Directors
  • Geoff Posner
  • Paul Jackson (II)
Release date: 1992-09-21
Run time: 200 min.
RRP: £16.99
Price: £14.30

Review The Young Ones - The Complete Young Ones - Series 1 [1982] / 2 Entertain Video:

"Have we got a video?" "No, not till series two". "What would be on it if we did, not another sickeningly nice sitcom like The Good Life?" "No, six episodes of a horrible, vile, disgusting sitcom about four students who live in the most revolting house in Britain. " "Utterly, utterly brilliant!" Like Fawlty Towers (1975/79), The Young Ones ran for just two series and 12 episodes. Every episode was packed with insane situations, wildly inventive surrealism, deranged dialogue (occasionally involving SPG, the talking hamster) side-splitting OTT cartoon violence and more bellylaughs than a 100 normal comedies. The Young Ones made stars of Adrian Edmondson and Rik Mayall (Bottom, was a sort-of-sequel), Nigel Planer and Alexei Sayle, while the guests were a roll-call of the finest young comedy talent. The Young Ones was, alongside Black Adder (1983-9), the best laugh of the 80s. With an atom bomb in front of the fridge, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and a proletariat revolutionary poet obsessed with Cliff Richard, it's still exhaustingly funny. Father Ted (1995-8) and Men Behaving Badly (1991-8) might be considered mutant offspring. -Gary S. Dalkin.

Review Warner Home Video / The Titfield Thunderbolt [1953]
Actors & Directors
  • Stanley Holloway
  • Godfrey Tearle
  • George Relph
  • John Gregson
  • Charles Crichton
  • Naunton Wayne
Release date: 1998-07-06
Run time: 80 min.
RRP: £10.99
Price: £4.99

Review The Titfield Thunderbolt [1953] / Warner Home Video:


Review 4 Front Video / You Can't Take It With You [1938]
Actors & Directors
  • James Stewart
  • Frank Capra
  • Jean Arthur
  • Lionel Barrymore
  • Edward Arnold
  • Mischa Auer
Release date: 2002-07-01
Run time: 121 min.
RRP: £5.99
Price: £2.49

Review You Can't Take It With You [1938] / 4 Front Video:

You Can't Take It With You, Frank Capra's 1938 populist spin on the George S Kaufman and Moss Hart play about a family of happy eccentrics, is a great deal of fun, though it significantly rewrites the original work and doesn't represent Capra (Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington) at his best. Jean Arthur plays a member of the blissful Vanderhof househ old who falls in love with a rich man's son (James Stewart) and brings him into her nutty home. Lionel Barrymore, who played such a bad guy eight years later in Capra's It's a Wonderful Life, is the wonderful Grandpa Vanderhof, who addresses God during the dinner prayer as "sir" and speaks plainly and beautifully of why it's good to be alive. Capra took this opportunity to rail against big business and champion the common man, but the overall tone of the film-typical for the director's comedies-is buoyant and snappy. -Tom Keogh, Amazon. com.

Models & Brands:
Jack Dee - Live In London [1999], The World According To Garp [1982], White Men Can't Jump [1992], Last Of The Summer Wine - The Complete Last Of The Summer Wine - Series One [1973], Trust Me - Murder Is A Dying Art [1988], Open All Hours [1976], The Detectives - Series 3 Part 2 - Undercover Operations : Twitchers / Flash / On Thin Ice, Pink Panther Strikes Again, Jingle All The Way [1996], To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything Julie Newmar [1995], Bill Bailey - Live, Pink Flamingos, Absolutely Fabulous Series 1-4 Box Set [1992], Ghostbusters [1984], A Change Of Seasons [1981], Calendar Girl [1993], An Audience With Bob Monkhouse [1996] [1994], The Young Ones - The Complete Young Ones - Series 1 [1982], The Titfield Thunderbolt [1953], You Can't Take It With You [1938]

Top headlines:
Search 
DVD Rental: try it for free