Week of 31 January
DVD: Jungle Burger AKA Shame of the Jungle ? (Stars the voices of Johnny Weissmuller Jr, Bill Murray, John Belushi, Christopher Guest; £12.99; UK cert 18; runtime 79 mins) An animated and (very) soft-core porn riff on Tarzan, Shame of The Jungle (for some reason released here with the title Jungle Burger on the packaging, but the film inside is still called Shame of The Jungle) hails from the deepest, darkest depths of 1975. When his "mate" June is kidnapped by a gang of giant penises – because their 14-breasted bald queen, Bazonga, wants to steal her hair – Shame sets off to rescue her With only his faithful chimp friend Cheapo by his side. It's rude and tacky, nicely drawn (with watercolour backgrounds) but dated and not terribly entertaining. You'd be better of watching Jungle Book instead. No extras — Stuart O'Connor
DVD: Tajomaru: Avenging Blade ? (Stars Shun Oguri, Yuki Shibamoto, Kei Tanaka, Kyosuke Yabe, Hiroyuki Ikeuchi, Hirotaro Honda, Hiroki Matsukata; £15.99; UK Cert 15; Runtime 126 mins) Essentially a belated telling of the bandit angle that wasn't explored in Akira Kurosawa's masterpiece, Rashomon, itself based on the short story In the Grove by Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Tajomaru: Avenging Blade takes the classic story and quite literally butchers it. Set in feudal Japan, two siblings are betrayed and turned against each other by their adopted brother when his intentions to steal a vast fortune and become the heir to the position of Steward to the Shogun become clear. This comes after many years of bickering between the brothers over who will eventually take the honourable reins once the Shogun dies. When the volcano of tension finally erupts, the youngest flees his family home and seeks his own identity on the wrong side of the law, joining a group of thieves and abandoning his regal roots. The story is a discombobulated mess with more holes in it than the Endurance and a distinct lack of action for a film with such a title and place in the samurai action genre. Despite sharp cinematography and great costume design, the film is over-long, cloyingly melodramatic, and has the most bizarre soundtrack (including Jet and Dead By Sunrise) for a period film that I've ever heard. Extras: A making-of feature (17:07) and the domestic and original Japanese trailers. — Adam Stephen Kelly
DVD: Missing ??? (Stars Moon Sung-Keun, Choo Ja-Hyun, Jeon Se-Hong, Ja-Hyeon Chu, Min-hee Ha, Gi-ho Heo, Eun-jeong Hwang; £15.99; UK Cert 18; Runtime 99 mins) Apparently based on true events – although how much the film plays with reality it is unclear – Missing is a brutal horror out of South Korea that manages to successfully blend the raw violence of Hostel with the unsettling integral theme of Misery. This unpleasant story revolves around a 60-year-old recluse whose identity is split between quietly humble and psychopathic. Having killed a film director and kidnapped the actress he was meeting for lunch, the deranged and murderous farmer subjects the young woman to a nightmare of torture, humiliation and rape over the course of several days. Concerned by the lack of communication, the actress' sister traces her steps to a small town and eventually discovers more than she bargained for. Refusing to waste any time in getting down to the nitty gritty, the film sets the tone with the first grisly kill happening just 10 minutes in, and it doesn't let go from that point onward. Missing is a solid horror with a stellar performance from its villain, who channels the unpredictable split personality of the seminal Norman Bates to great effect. Extras: Just the original teaser and trailer, as well as a selection of trailers for other DVD and Blu-ray releases from Cine Asia. — Adam Stephen Kelly
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Week of 24 January
DVD: The Last Remake of Beau Geste ???? (Stars Marty Feldman, Michael York, Ann-Margaret, Spike Milligan, Peter Ustinov, Terry-Thomas, Roy Kinnear, James Earl Jones, Henry Gibson; £15.99; UK Cert 12; runtime 81 mins) If only Hollywood would take a leaf out of Feldman's book and start doing "last" remakes. The Beau Geste story had been done a few times before – most famously in 1926 with Ronald Colman and 1939 with Gary Cooper. But this version is easily the funniest, and most star-studded. It follows the classic original story – brothers who join the French Foreign Legion after claiming responsibility for the mysterious disappearance of a priceless family heirloom, the Blue Water sapphire – but goggle-eyed director Feldman and the rest of the cast play it strictly for laughs. As a spoof, it's closer in tone to Mel Brooks's brilliant Blazing Saddles than recent attrocities such as Vampires Suck, Meet the Spartans and Date Movie. A great blend of slapstick, sight gags and energy. No extras — Stuart O'Connor