DONALD CLARKEreviews the new DVDs on release...

I Love You, Beth Cooper **

Directed by Chris Columbus. Starring Hayden Panettiere, Paul Rust, Jack T Carpenter 15 Cert

Clumsy, boring high-school comedy details the events that immediately succeed an archetypal nerd’s graduation. Persuaded into ill-advised honesty by his closeted best friend, Denis (Rust) finds time in his valedictory address to announce his love for cheerleader Beth Cooper (Panettiere). It thinks it’s this generation’s Ferris Beuller. It isn’t.

Katalin Varga ****

Directed by Peter Strickland. Starring Hilda Peter, Tibor Palffy, Norbert Tanko 15 Cert

Here’s a singular slice of Transylvanian melodrama that will really put the willies up you. Made for peanuts by a debut director from Reading, the picture follows a wronged woman as she hunts down the man who ruined her life. Strickland’s gift for an insidious image and his taste for drones and rumbles assure us that few concessions are being made to naturalism. Unique.

Ong Bak: The Beginning ***

Directed by Tony Jaa. Starring Tony Jaa. 16 Cert

The beginning of what exactly? Not of the (literally) smashing Ong Bak, which took place some 500 years after this film ends and which employed a very different tone. The new film deals with a 15th-century Thai martial artist as he exacts revenge for the murder of his powerful parents. As before, the fights remain the thumpiest and the ouchiest you could hope for.