REASONS TO BUY/SIX UP

It’s a busy time for DVD players. Just a single day at the end of February saw the release of six notable British titles. Which are the best buys? Or should the question be:

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Why bother with any of them?

Okay, the extras are always – usually – interesting. Indeed, often more fascinating than the films themselves. Certainly more surprising and suspenseful.

The main film do have to be essential viewing to justify the purchase.

Each one of this lot do seem to have a USP that may make them hard to resist.

Kenneth Branagh’s As You Like It was not universally admired for transferring the action to Japan but or even for the action, but the soundtrack is faultless, scoring a big point.

Michael Clayton deserves a little shelf space not only for a second chance to admire the scintillating performances by Brits Tilda Swinton (main photo) for which she was the Best Supporting Oscar) and Tom Wilkinson (for which he should have won the Best Supporting Oscar) but also for a chance to figure out the plot once and for all.

Elizabeth, The Golden Age, was generally judged to be somewhat inferior to the first Cate Blanchett effort but the costumes were magnificent (Clive Owen sports one above), scooping another Oscar, for Britain’s Alexandra Byrne, so turn off the sound and savour the colour.

The quirky Australian number called Razzle Dazzle provides an admirable outing for Cambridge drop out Ben Miller to crack jokes, make political statements and generally strut his amusing steps.

Finally, two oddities.

Alfred Hitchock, The British Years contains ten of the East End director’s works together in one set for the first time: The Pleasure Garden, The Lodger, Downhill, The Man who Knew Too Much; The Thirty-Nine Steps; Secret Agent, Sabotage, Young & Innocent, The Lady Vanishes and Jamaica Inn. The package costs £59.99 but obviously packs a lot of punch.

And The West Wittering Affair, a very small picture which started out as a 50 minute TV drama and should perhaps have stayed at that phrase but at least provides a few insights into the current state of Britain’s indie filmmaking sector.