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High quality framed art print by Joseph Mallord William Turner measuring 35×44cm
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Prizzi’s Honor [1985]
Customer Review: The less you know about it, the more you’ll enjoy it
So many of the laughs in Prizzi’s Honor come from the plot twists (most of them included in the film’s trailer, conspicuous by its absence on this DVD) that it’s best not to go into it knowing too much. The fact that I’d forgotten so many of them is perhaps why I enjoyed it so much more the second time around. It’s a civilized entertainment - perhaps a little too civilized at times, although William Hickey’s deathly white vampiric Don gives a whole new meaning to the phrase Cookie Monster - elegantly made and plotted, which wasn’t so rare in 1985 but these days is a positive novelty. Jack Nicholson’s hamming it up again, but not as much as usual as the luckless Mafia enforcer who meets the woman of his dreams only to discover she’s ripped off the family. His comparative restraint helps keep the film from disappearing into slapstick and ridicule, but he still feels something of an impostor in this world - far more so than Kathleen Turner, on good form here as his fatal attraction. Quietly enjoyable.

No real extras on the UK DVD apart from a few text trivia notes, but at least it isn’t panned-and-scanned like other titles from theABC library but has an acceptable non-anamorphic 1.85:1 widescreen transfer.

Customer Review: Bullets are hitting the wrong targets and missing the right ones
When the mafia becomes the argument of an action film and little more it is no longer funny, it is no longer strange, it is no longer fascinating. It is nothing but outlandish and terroristic. It takes all Jack Nicholson can give to make these characters in anyway palatable, and even so. In the Prizzi family all other considerations than the family is outlawed, except maybe for a couple of weeks and the woman concerned by this out-breeding passing passion has to submit and take the color of the wall on which she is being pinned. If she does not then she will be executed and cut off. There is no depth in that film, no subtleties or even subtlety. Get the message, bang it down on the table and then cram it down your brain. Business is business and in-breeding is the rule. I will always wonder why a hit-woman with a reputation of efficiency and effectiveness misses her husband when he intends to kill her though she manages to shoot one bullet first. Suspend your disbelief and incredulity. The cinema is the new church of the visual dominant animal man is. To see is to believe. But at times to believe is easier when you are blind, and probably deaf too. Apart from that it is interesting even if we do spend a little bit too much time in planes going east and planes going west, kind of an airlift between New York, or whatever may titillate you, and Los Angeles, or whatever it takes to please you.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine & University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne

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Needful Things [1994] (REGION 1) (NTSC)
Customer Review: MODERATELY ENTERTAINING, IF IN THE RIGHT MOOD
In the town of Castle Rock, Sheriff Alan Pangborn, (Ed Harris) decides to investigate the opening of a new shop in town run by Leland Gaunt, (Max Von Sydow) called Needful Things. Taking time out first to propose to girlfriend Polly, (Bonnie Bedelia) a local diner waitress, he goes over to see what he’s selling. Simply selling odd things, he’s allowed to stay as he asks merely of favors for later. As more and more townspeople visit the shop, the more they each get aggravated with each other over a series of pranks and practical jokes they are pulling on each other. When everyone in town is ready to kill each other, the remaining ones start to discover the startling secret that has haunted the town. Gathering up the clues and solving the mystery, they head out to stop the deadly force contaminating the town once and for all.

The Good News: Frankly, there isn’t a whole lot to commend about this film. All of it’s good points come from the final third, where the film lets loose and really goes all out. There’s just an endless stream of exciting action going on that there’s just pure joy as the result. When a full-on riot in the streets, complete with random fistfights from the extras in the background, looting, vandalism and more going on, this one really gets going in the best sense. Couple that in with the realization of what’s been going on, some really bloody deaths and some huge explosions that do a ton of damage, this one can’t get any better than it does in these segments. That it blows up nearly the entire town in this segment is a testament to it, really taking it’s time and drawing it out in a grand sense to give it the illusion of Hell on Earth, which is exactly what’s at sake. That it decides to drop the really lame subplot about the pranks, yet still manages to include them, is a nice move and ties things together nicely. Overall, this is watchable only for this section, and it alone holds the film above water.

The Bad News: This is an incredibly boring film. The fact that the majority of time is spent with absolutely nothing going on other than the residents of the town. There’s no scares in this section of the film as we get seemingly endless scenes of the citizens going to the store and receiving gifts from there. This pretty much is repeated for just about every citizen in town, and with only very few differences with how they come into contact with the store, but the overall sense from these scenes is just boredom. Nothing at all happens and the film just takes forever to get going. By being as long as it is brings out that one even more. By spending so much time with the townspeople and staying away from the horror, this has the ability to really drain the life out of the film and really bring it down. There was too much time spent here and not on the much more lively and interesting second half, which is where all the good stuff is, and that leaves the beginning with a ton of areas to get through before which is just plain boring. The last main flaw with this is that it’s just not all that scary. The central premise isn’t anywhere near being scary and doesn’t offer the chance for anything at all to happen because of the fact that this produces nothing in the way of scares, nor has the ability to do so. That, almost as much as the really slow plotting really doom this one.

The Final Verdict: Basically watchable only for one section of the film, this one is a tough sell. While King fans might get some enjoyment out of it, the slow beginning and uneventful nature, until the ending, will really tax the more liberal viewers out there. Take this one as with your feelings on King, a fan should give it a watch while non-fans should heed caution.

Customer Review: Amazing
The devil in disguise comes to a quiet, peaceful town and opens a store called Needful Things. The store has an item for everyone in town. All the devil asks for in return is a few dirty pranks. Little do they know, that they’ve sold their souls, and the pranks escalate to murder

Wow! this film was really good. Not all Stephen King films are scary but this one is pretty creepy. I would recommend this to anyone that likes horrors and thrillers.