Videos

One, Two, Three (PG). Billy Wilder's 1961 Cold War comedy stars James Cagney as an American Coca-Cola executive in West Berlin, who's plunged into a broadly farcical mess when his boss's dizzy teenage daughter crosses the border and marries a Communist. Cagney's rapid-fire delivery is irresistible, but the political satire is hopelessly clumsy. Wilder, determined to overpower the au- dience, keeps the gags flying at an absurdly furious pace; inevitably, his scattershot method produces at least as many misses as hits. Two other movies are released as part of the Wilder collection: Avanti! (15), a somewhat languid romance with Jack Lemmon and Juliet Mills, and Kiss Me, Stupid (PG), one of his coarser comedies, featuring Dean Martin as a lecherous crooner.

When We Were Kings (PG). Twenty-two years in the making, Leon Gast's Oscar-winning documentary recaptures the excitement surrounding the legendary "Rumble In the Jungle", the 1974 Muhammad Ali-George Foreman championship fight in Kinshasa, Zaire. Gast employs a handful of talking-head narrators (Spike Lee, George Plimpton, and a highly excitable Norman Mailer), but leaves the spotlight to Ali, who, the film reminds us, was also an articulate political activist and, arguably, the prototypical rapper - "If you think the world was surprised when Nixon resigned, wait till I kick George Foreman's behind."

The Star Wars Trilogy Special Edition (all U). Star Wars revolutionised Hollywood (or, if you prefer, dealt it a death blow); The Empire Strikes Back remains at once the most awkward and the best of the three; and Return of the Jedi is still overpitched, sentimental nonsense. The few minutes of new footage make no real difference, and it must be said, none of them are much fun at all on the small screen.