A real archaeological artefact from 1967, Good Times will be mostly of interest to anyone who wants to see a parade of fashions that Austin Powers would reject as too garish to be seen on the street in. The nothingy plot concerns then-married Sonny and Cher playing themselves as a one-note bickering sit-com couple, signing up with sinister film tycoon Mordicus (an impeccable George Sanders) to make a movie but not wanting to do the mouldy rags-to-riches hillbilly script on offer. Cher is supposed to be less interested than Sonny in making a movie-which might well have been the truth since she mostly lies around doodling outrageous fashion designs or contributing her strange sung-through-the-nose vocals as poor, goofy Sonny does all the hard work flogging life into skits that had been squeezed dry by the Monkees before being passed to him. The finale finds Sonny and Cher standing up for integrity and refusing to make a bad film even if it means they gets blacklisted all over town-a lesson it's a shame that they (especially Cher) didn't take to heart in their later careers. Astonishingly, this was the feature directorial debut of The Exorcist's William Friedkin, who fills the screen with colour, action and gaggery after the manner of the then-hip Batman TV show while focusing on screaming outfits that remain among the darnedest things you ever saw. Aside from a reprise of "I Got You, Babe", the score is a little light on the slim canon of S&C hits; the songs included are "It's the Little Things", "Good Times", "Trust Me", "Don't Talk to Strangers", "I'm Gonna Love You" and "Just a Name". The DVD extras include a few sketchy bios and a jump-to-a-song feature. -Kim Newman.

Alferd Packer was the only man in the United States ever convicted of cannibalism-what better hero for fellow Coloradan and future South Park creator Trey Parker to celebrate in music? Blue-eyed and boyish Parker was still in college when he wrote, directed, composed the songs for and took the starring role as the innocent young Packer in this film, giving a gee-whiz performance as an ambitious pioneer who joins an ill-fated trek west that ends up stranded in the mountains. At times resembling a perverse community theatre parody of Rodgers and Hammerstein ("My heart's as full as a baked po-ta-to!"), Parker bounces back and forth between cheery production numbers and goony songs ("Let's build a snowman", sings one starving-mad hiker) and grotesque gore (bloody body parts, festering sores, human hors d'oeuvres). It lacks in style and consistency and the juvenile gags and fart jokes wear thin over the course of a feature film, but Parker's sheer energy and inventiveness carry the overlong picture to a rousing conclusion. Regular Parker collaborators Matt Stone and Dian Bachar co-star in this tuneful barbecue. -Sean Axmaker.

If you've ever wanted to hear Jack Nicholson sing (or try to) or marvel at the sight of Ann-Margret drunkenly cavorting in a cascade of baked beans, Tommy is the movie you've been waiting for. As it turns out, the Who's brilliant rock opera is sublimely matched to director Ken Russell's penchant for cinematic excess, and this 1975 production finds Russell at the peak of his filmmaking audacity. It's a fever-dream of musical bombast, custom-fit to the thematic ambition of Pete Townshend's epic rock drama, revolving around the titular "deaf, dumb, and blind kid" (played by Who vocalist Roger Daltrey) who survives the childhood trauma that stole his senses to become a Pinball Wizard messiah in Townshend's grandiose attack on the hypocrisy of organised religion. The story is remarkably coherent considering the hypnotic dream-state induced by Russell's visuals. Tommy's odyssey is rendered through wall-to-wall music, each song representing a pivotal chapter in Tommy's chronology, from the bloodstream shock of "The Acid Queen" (performed to the hilt by Tina Turner) to Nicholson's turn as a well-intentioned physician, Elton John's towering rendition of "Pinball Wizard" and Daltrey's epiphanous rendition of "I'm Free". Other performers include Eric Clapton and (most outrageously) the Who's drummer Keith Moon, and through it all Russell is almost religiously faithful to Townshend's artistic vision. Although it divided critics when first released, Tommy now looks likes a minor classic of gonzo cinema, worthy of the musical genius that fuelled its creation. -Jeff Shannon Even by the standards of a genre not characterised by restraint, the 1974 rock opera Tommy is endearingly barmy, a bizarre combination of Pete Townshend's disturbed inspiration and director Ken Russell's wildly eccentric vision. Even if you gamely try and read allegorical meaning into it, the story is frankly odd: a child becomes psychosomatically deaf, dumb and blind after witnessing the murder of his father by his stepdad and goes on to become rich and famous as the world pinball champion (since when was pinball a world-class competitor sport?), before setting himself up as a latter-day messiah. It's about the travails of the post-war generation, the disaffection of youth, the trauma of childhood abuse, the sham nature of new-age cults, and many other things besides. [+]

This movie version of Bizet's popular opera Carmen was filmed on location, conveying a kind of atmosphere, a sense of space, movement, and presence that's hard to achieve in a staged performance. It takes the action out of doors for many scenes, with the opening titles superimposed on the bloody conclusion of a bullfight. Elsewhere the changing of the guard, the crowd scenes, the dance number that opens Act 2, and the panoramic scenery of the smugglers' mountain hideout all benefit from the freedom granted by movie cameras. It's an exciting Carmen, too, with a young-looking Placido Domingo in top form for a role he has sung hundreds of times. For Julia Migenes, though, it was her first performance in a role she would have trouble performing in an opera house. Her voice does not fit easily into Carmen's range, and she spent months training it, very successfully, before singing the role in a recording studio where the soundtrack was taped before the film was shot. Casting her in the role was a gamble, but it worked; she is a convincing actress. Unlike most opera-house performances this movie version uses the opera's original opera comique form with some spoken dialogue rather than recitatives. -Joe McLellan, Amazon. com.