The latest video releases reviewed.
KING KONG *****
Directed by Peter Jackson. Starring Naomi Watts, Jack Black, Adrien Brody, Andy Serkis, Jamie Bell, Lobo Chan 12 cert
Big ape meets girl. Stockholm Syndrome high jinks result. Jackson's all-too-brief remake of the RKO epic is finally released in a director's cut. Only joking. This fabulous picture, whose only serious flaw was its daunting length, arrives as an impressively appointed two-disc set. The three hours of behind-the-scenes footage, which help garner the release the highest rating, should delight the flick's millions of fans. Better than Lord of the Rings. Donald Clarke
LASSIE ***
Directed by Charles Sturridge. Starring Peter O'Toole, Samantha Morton, John Lynch, Edward Fox PG cert
Animal lovers and children alike should enjoy this appealing entertainment, which is old-fashioned in the best sense of the word, and bolstered by a winning cast, impressive production design and a lovely orchestral score as it follows the engaging collie on an adventure-filled journey home to Yorkshire in the late 1930s. Michael Dwyer
PAVEE LACKEEN - THE TRAVELLER GIRL ****
Directed by Perry Ogden. Starring Winnie Maughan PG cert
Ogden's intimate, observational film effectively blends documentary and fictional drama and challenges stereotypical images as it charts the experiences of a young Traveller living with her family in a roadside trailer in Dublin. Michael Dwyer
13/TZAMETI ****
Directed by Géla Babluani. Starring George Babluani 15 cert
Babluani's superb debut feature tells the story of a young Georgian man, working as a labourer in France, who gets inadvertently drawn into a Russian roulette circle. Featuring glassy monochrome photography, the picture manages an impressive blend of existential angst and terrifying tension. A real original. Donald Clarke
STONED ***
Directed by Stephen Woolley. Starring Leo Gregory, Paddy Considine, David Morrissey, Tuva Novotny 18 cert
Woolley, who has produced most of Neil Jordan's films, turns director with a film on the hedonistic life and mysterious death of Rolling Stones guitarist Brian Jones. Woolley adeptly employs a time-shifting structure to draw an impressionistic and essentially unflattering picture of Jones, who drowned in his swimming pool in 1969 at the age of 27. Michael Dwyer
CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN 2 *
Directed by Adam Shankman. Starring Steve Martin, Bonnie Hunt, Eugene Levy, Hilary Duff, Piper Perabo PG cert
In this calculating blend of slapstick and schmaltz, the family of 14 take a lakeside holiday, offering new sites for destruction and for mocking the infantile behaviour of adult males, as it pits Dad (Martin) against an equally competitive old acquaintance (Levy). Michael Dwyer
JUST FRIENDS *
Directed by Roger Kumble. Starring Ryan Reynolds, Amy Smart, Anna Faris, Chris Klein, Julie Hagerty 12 cert
Rolypoly Reynolds leaves high school behind for a glamorous job in Hollywood, a buff new bod and a string of girlfriends. Inevitably, he finds himself stranded back in hicksville and embarks on wooing cutesy Smart, who back in the day never saw him as more than an XXL "best friend". To say you'd have more fun getting your stomach stapled would be unfair to skilled medical professionals. Hugh Linehan
