SANTA CLAUS: THE MOVIE U

1985 ★★★★★ OUT NOW CINEMAS, DVD, BD, 4K UHD, DIGITAL

EXTRAS ★★★★★ Making of, Featurettes, Deleted scenes

A misguided attempt by producers Alexander and Ilya Salkind to transpose the Superman: The Movie template to Santa’s story, this stodgy festive flop is lacking any real Christmas magic. Only John Lithgow seems to understand the tone needed, bringing some pantomime-villain pep to his turn as an unscrupulous New York toy maker. Speaking of which, if you want to make a film railing against capitalism hijacking Christmas, probably best not to pack it quite so full with blatant product placement.

MIAMI VICE 15

2006 ★★★★★ OUT NOW BD

EXTRAS ★★★★★ Commentary, Documentary, Featurettes, Booklet, Poster

Favouring pixels over pastels, Michael Mann’s reinvention of his 80s TV show opened to mixed reviews. It wasn’t just the go-fast narco boats, jets, choppers and gun-metal-grey Ferrari that left some critics behind; there was also the pin-sharp digital lensing, cacophonous action and disorientating transnational drug operation infiltrated by Crockett and Tubbs (Colin Farrell, Jamie Foxx, both ace). Now it plays immersive and masterful, whether you opt for the theatrical or director’s cut – both offered on this super-sleek Blu.

THE LAST PICTURE SHOW 15

Spool’s out…

1971 ★★★★★ OUT NOW 4K UHD, BD

EXTRAS ★★★★★ Commentaries, Documentaries, Interviews, Screen tests, Essay

In the 60s, Peter Bogdanovich wrote several monographs on directors including Welles, Hitchcock and Hawks. He made a film to rank alongside his heroes with his second feature, a rites-of-passage movie that plays like an older, wiser man’s work in its push-pull of youthful longing and midlife melancholy.

‘Nothing’s ever the way it’s supposed to be,’ says Cybill Shepherd’s Jacy, learning early about adult disappointment. Between visits to the pool hall and picturehouse in a flat and dusty Texas town, thoughtful high-schooler Sonny (Timothy Bottoms) and his beer-for-breakfast bud Duane (Jeff Bridges) fall for Jacy. But as the soon-to-close fleapit and the area’s older denizens will teach them, friendship and romance – and, indeed, life - don’t last forever.

Shot in weathered black-and-white, …Picture Show unfolds as an elegy for losses accrued and losses to come, framed in a farewell to Old Hollywood. The cast embody these transgenerational sorrows divinely, from Bottoms’ sensitive lead to Cloris Leachman’s tearful turn as his middle-aged lover. And while the winds whistling through DoP Robert Surtees’ widescreen images speak volumes about inevitable change, Ben Johnson focuses the film’s yearnings for fleeting happiness as grizzled local Sam the Lion. If Bogdanovich’s later films never matched it, that only makes this piercing classic seem the more precious.

THE VERDICT Bogdanovich’s ode to his heroes remains a wistful wonder: poetic, poignant and played to perfection.

THE GINGER SNAPS

TRILOGY 18 2000-04 ★★★★★OUT NOW BD

EXTRAS ★★★★★ Commentaries, Making Of, Featurettes, Deleted scenes, Book, Art cards

Werewolves are typically rendered as symbols of male aggression. The genius of the original Ginger Snaps and its two decent sequels is that they highlight emerging female sexuality. Spooky teen sisters Ginger (Katharine Isabelle) and Brigitte (Emily Perkins) are the focus, with Ginger bitten by a werewolf in part one, Brigitte in recovery in 2004’s GS2: Unleashed, and both reunited for the same year’s 1815-set prequel Ginger Snaps Back. Strong extras underline the films’ continuing cult status. Time for a reboot?

THE ROYAL TRAMP COLLECTION 15

1992 ★★★★★ OUT NOW BD

EXTRAS ★★★★★ Commentaries, Featurettes, Booklet

Based on Jin Yong’s historical novel The Deer and the Cauldron, this 1992 Stephen Chow (Kung Fu Hustle, Shaolin Soccer) actioncomedy duology takes the central set-up (an epic tale of palace intrigue, mistaken identities and double crosses) and mixes in plenty of slapstick silliness and knob gags. However, the jokes that do land are pretty funny, the production design is unexpectedly lavish and the ball-crushing, nipple-twisting wire-fu brawls are heaps of fun. Includes interviews and new Asian-film-expert commentaries.