P.D. James: Devices and Desires
by John Davies
from Koch Vision
P.D. James earned the moniker "Queen of Crime" for twisty mysteries just like this one which features her ace sleuth Adam Dalgliesh. The Scotland Yard commander leaves his post to go on holiday. He arrives on the East English seashore intent on little more than rest and recreation. His planned vacation though is disrupted by several nasty occurrences -- suicide blackmail and murder. A troublesome nuclear power facility nearby appears to be the crux of these events. Then police find the acting administrative officer of the power plant slain. Local officials chalk up the incident to a serial killer who has already left behind a trail of dead bodies. But Dalgliesh hasn't yet drawn his own conclusions...System Requirements:Running Time: 310 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: ACTION/ADVENTURE/THRILLERS UPC: 741952656494 Manufacturer No: KOC-DV6564
War & Peace (1972)
by John Davies
from Koch Vision
Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace towers over most novels. It isn't merely the length that impresses--over 1,200 pages--but the number of characters. This BBC/Time-Life serial spans the Napoleonic Wars (1805-20) and incorporates 52 principals and 110 supporting players (a 44-page booklet proves indispensable with identification). Chief among them is Pierre (a bespectacled Anthony Hopkins), an illegitimate idler who becomes Count Bezuhov upon his father's death. Pierre admires Napoleon (David Swift), and chooses not to fight. Cousins Nikolai Rostov (Sylvester Morand) and Andrei Bolkonsky (Alan Dobie) harbor no such reservations.
The Yugoslavia-filmed battle sequences convince with their cavalcade of extras, but the drawing-room scenes serve as the heart of the series. (The soft exteriors were shot on film; the crisp interiors on video.) In these sequences, the other Rostovs, Bolkonskys, and Bezuhovs--notably Nikolai's impetuous sister, Natasha (Morag Hood)--emerge as complex individuals. Occasional inner monologues distinguish them further. There's some overacting from a few cast members, like the splenetic Anthony Jacobs (Prince Bolkonsky), but Dobie, Angela Down (Andrei's sister, Maria), and especially BAFTA winner Hopkins, give three of the more nuanced performances. Dramatized by Jack Pulman (I, Claudius) and directed by TV veteran John Davies (Germinal), this 20-part series follows a black-and-white silent, a Hollywood production (with Henry Fonda and Audrey Hepburn), and an Oscar-winning Russian epic. The British edition, however, stands as the most complete adaptation. As Pulman stated at the time, "Part of the novel's effect is achieved by its sheer weight of detail, the piling up of incident upon incident." After 15 increasingly compelling hours of marriages, affairs, births, duels, and deaths, it's hard not to feel a kinship with these fatefully entwined families. --Kathleen C. Fennessy
Leo Tolstoy's timeless masterpiece of love and loss is universally recognized as one of the greatest novels ever written. Focusing on the consequences faces by three Russian families during the Napoleonic Wars, this classic work is retold in twenty parts in this epic BBC production, complete with award-winning design and breathtaking battle sequences.
Anthony Hopkins heads the cast as the soul-searching Pierre Bezuhov (a role for which he won the 1972 Best Actor BAFTA); Morag Hood is the impulsive and beautiful Natasha Rostova; Alan Dobie is the dour but heroic Andrei Bolkonsky; and David Swift is Napoleon, whose decision to invade Russia in 1812 has far-reaching consequences for both the Rostov and Bolkonsky families.
Includes a 44-page booklet featuring production notes, episode summaries, character profiles and stunning behind the scenes photography.
Miss Marple - Set 1 (Sleeping Murder / A Caribbean Mystery / The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side / 4:50 from Paddington)
by Martyn Friend
from A&E Home Video
Not even friends of Miss Marple's (Joan Hickson) can escape the strange disturbances that always seem to occur in the same vicinity as our overly curious and incredibly charming leading lady. When Elspeth McGillicuddy goes for a short trip to visit her good friend Miss Marple, she chances to witness a woman being strangled to death on a passing train. Nobody wants to believe a dithering old lady with a vivid imagination, not even the detective, because no corpse shows up to corroborate her story. Fortunately for everyone else, Miss Marple knows better than to dismiss her good friend's wild imagination. Instead, Miss Marple takes on the quest to find the corpse and solve the murder, which brings her to Rutherford Hall. Here she meets the rather crusty and cranky character Luther Crackenthorpe, who inadvertently helps her fish out the clues and gather them in her mystery-solving net. As always, it's up to Miss Marple to figure out whodunit this time. --Samantha Allen Storey
Dame Christie's most popular character, prim and proper Miss Jane Marple, is adored worldwide by mystery fans for her razor-sharp mind, intuitive understanding of criminal behavior, and trademark knitting needles. Enjoy four feature-film adaptations of Miss Marple's greatest mysteries in one collectible 2-pack. It's hours of great whodunnits for all ages.
Agatha Christie's Why Didn't They Ask Evans?
by Tony Wharmby
from Acorn Media
Brew some tea and curl up by the fire for murder, intrigue, and madcap upper-class high jinks in Agatha Christie's Why Didn't They Ask Evans? James Warwick and Francesca Annis play plucky amateur sleuths Bobby Jones and Lady Frankie Derwent (and yes, you've also seen them paired as plucky amateur Christie sleuths Tommy & Tuppence). In the very opening scene, Bobby happens upon a dying man who whispers the mysterious title question and we're off. Why Didn't They Ask Evans? has everything one looks for in an old-fashioned bloodcurdler: murder, false identities, a mysterious institution, and even morphine addiction. Warwick and Annis have the light touch of seasoned pros and slide with ease into the period setting. The rest of the cast dives into the fun and includes such noble veterans as Sir John Gielgud and Joan Hickson, herself one of the more memorable incarnations of Christie's Miss Marple. --Ali Davis
P.D. James - A Taste for Death
by John Davies
from KOCH VISION
Roy Marsden returns for another of his ever-deepening performances as Inspector Adam Dalgliesh of Scotland Yard, the protagonist hero of a series of much-honored, P.D. James mystery novels. A perfect match of procedural deduction, horrifying but imaginative crimes to solve, and James's familiar embrace of resonant characterization, A Taste for Death finds Dalgliesh investigating twin murders in a London church: one victim a beleaguered, former minister of the Crown and a man of Dalgliesh's favorable acquaintance, the other a homeless man accustomed to finding shelter in the vestibule. Dalgliesh, a perfect and perhaps unique blend of humble compassion and take-no-prisoners probing mind, becomes the thread in a complex tale of multiple motives, seething emotions, unusual suspects, and such puzzling clues as a burnt diary, all in the effort to find an elusive link between two dead men of very different breeding and destinies. --Tom Keogh
When threatening letters arrive at his fashionable London home, prominent Government Minister Sir Paul Berowne calls his old friend Adam Dalgliesh for assistance.
Berowne's own household is a challenge. His exquisite wife makes no secret of her adulterous affair with a fashionable surgeon. His only daughter, deeply involved in left-wing politics, has rejected her Conservative father. He is even resented by his own, strong-willed mother, whose favored son was killed in an IRA terrorist ambush.
Dalgliesh has barely started on the case when a series of bizarre deaths turn the informal investigation into an urgent assignment.
With characteristic determination Scotland Yard's enigmatic star detective pursues every possibility, ruthlessly exposing dark secrets and ugly emotions as the case proceeds toward its terrifying and bloody conclusion.
Stars Roy Marsden, Dame Wendy Hiller, Simon Ward, Fiona Fullerton and Penny Downie
P.D. James - Unnatural Causes
by John Davies
from KOCH VISION
A mutilated corpse, its hands severed at the wrist, is found floating in a dinghy at sea. Investigating the bizarre death, Scotland Yard's Commander Adam Dalgliesh is drawn into an increasingly macabre murder case and a multi-million dollar currency scam.
He quickly discovers that the victim had many enemies, all of them with a strong motive for wishing him dead - and all with cast iron alibis. As the case deepens, Dalgliesh's dedication to finding the murderer threatens his relationship with the woman he loves, puts her life at risk and ultimately finds him in a desperate fight to save his own.
P.D. James - Cover Her Face
by John Davies
from KOCH VISION
Roy Marsden returns as Scotland Yard's Adam Dalgliesh in a richly plotted mystery from P.D. James. Dalgliesh and his team are investigating an international drug ring when a major player turns up dead. The only witness, pretty single mother Sally Jupp, turns out to have some dark secrets of her own. Cover Her Face is an immensely entertaining mystery. The characters lead rich emotional lives, it seems like all of them and none of them could have done it, and the solution is genuinely satisfying. As is always the case in this series, the cast is excellent and Roy Marsden is a standout. His Dalgliesh is a beautifully subtle blend of cold manipulation and a poet's humanity. DVD special features includes career and awards highlights for author P.D. James, a biography of Roy Marsden, and information about the gorgeous old house used in the production. --Ali Davis
A complex web of lies, murder, international drug trafficking and passion.
Scotland Yard's Adam Dalgliesh is called in to investigate the murder of a drug dealer found strangled in the basement of a respectable London book club. His key witness in the case turns out to beautiful young single mother, Sally Jupp, on a day visit to London to "introduce" her eight-week-old son to former employers and co-workers at the book club.
The investigation switches back and forth between the urban drug scene, where one detective has already been killed, and the country residence of the socially conscious Maxie family, where the recently employed young woman has made more enemies than friends.
As mysterious deaths pile up, Dalgliesh is immersed in a sea of suspects, aggressive, evasive answers and deeply hidden motives.
P.D. James: The Essential Collection
by Andrew Grieve
from Koch Vision
This 12-disc collection contains seven thrilling Adam Dalgliesh mysteries by popular suspense writer P.D. James.The stories included are:COVER HER FACESHROUD FOR A NIGHTINGALETHE BLACK TOWERDEATH OF AN EXPERT WITNESSUNNATURAL CAUSESA TASTE FOR DEATHORIGINAL SINSystem Requirements:Running Time: 2075Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: ACTION/ADVENTURE/THRILLERS UPC: 741952656593 Manufacturer No: KOC-DV6565
P.D. James - Cover Her Face
by John Davies
from Lance Entertainment
Roy Marsden returns as Scotland Yard's Adam Dalgliesh in a richly plotted mystery from P.D. James. Dalgliesh and his team are investigating an international drug ring when a major player turns up dead. The only witness, pretty single mother Sally Jupp, turns out to have some dark secrets of her own. Cover Her Face is an immensely entertaining mystery. The characters lead rich emotional lives, it seems like all of them and none of them could have done it, and the solution is genuinely satisfying. As is always the case in this series, the cast is excellent and Roy Marsden is a standout. His Dalgliesh is a beautifully subtle blend of cold manipulation and a poet's humanity. DVD special features includes career and awards highlights for author P.D. James, a biography of Roy Marsden, and information about the gorgeous old house used in the production. --Ali Davis
P.D. James - Unnatural Causes
by John Davies
from Lance Entertainment
Scotland Yard Commander Adam Dalgliesh investigates the bizarre murder of a man with his hands cut off found floating in a dinghy out at sea.
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