The John Woo gangster classic that started it all, a romantic, violent, swirlingly stylish melodrama about duelling brothers--with a mesmerizing lead performance by Hong Kong's favourite actor, Chow Yun-Fat. In repose, Chow's sleepy magnetism recalls the glory days of Robert Mitchum, Steve McQueen, and Takakura Ken; when he's stepping high, Chow has a unique, ebullient star presence, a man who embraces life so unselfconsciously that he becomes vulnerable to all kinds of suffering and heartache (he endures masochistic megadoses of violence here). The sequence in which Chow's Mark avenges his betrayed best friend---by blasting his way into, and then out of, a Chinese restaurant, twin .45s blazing---is a swashbuckling standout. Woo's film technique may have been more polished in later efforts, but A Better Tomorrow has a direct emotional power that is still unique. Kung fu star of the 1970s, Ti Lung is also terrific here as the 40ish established mobster, relied upon by all, who allows conflicting loyalties toward Mark and toward his younger brother, now a cop, to undermine the stability of his position. --David Chute, Amazon.com

A Better Tomorrow is one of the most influential films in Hong Kong film history, a massive hit which launched the "Heroic Bloodshed" genre, made an instant superstar of Chow Yun Fat, set director John Woo on a path to Hollywood blockbusterdom, and spawned a series of hit sequels starting with the inevitable A Better Tomorrow II (1987). The story is a gangster archetype: Ho (Ti Lung) and best friend Mark (Chow Yun Fat) are counterfeiters, while Ho's younger brother Kit (Leslie Cheung), is a trainee law officer. When tragedy strikes Ho determines to go straight, and Kit seeks to bring them to justice. It's an age-old plot which leads to wholesale mayhem and a blood-soaked finale. Yet unlike many Hong Kong action movies, A Better Tomorrow packs the powerful emotional resonance of the best gangster flicks through coherent storytelling and believable characters struggling with impossible dilemmas. Rather than draw on crime movie imagery, Woo appropriates much of the visual style, not to mention individual set-pieces, ferociously intense gunplay, menacing electronic soundscapes and blue backlighting from James Cameron's then-recently released The Terminator (1984). That the result launched a filmmaking revolution testifies to John Woo's skill behind the camera, a talent which would reach full flower in The Killer (1989).

On the DVD: A Better Tomorrow--Special Edition is anamorphically enhanced and transferred at 1.78:1, but the use of a slightly soft, washed-out print and regularly apparent compression artefacts makes for a mediocre picture. The sound is two-channel mono, which is often harsh and borders on distortion. The only choice on the first DVD is to watch the film in Cantonese, with optional English subtitles, or in a poor English dub. The second DVD has a new ten-minute featurette edited mainly from archive interviews with the stars and John Woo. There are further archive interviews; 18 minutes with Chow Yun Fat, 10 minutes with Woo and two minutes with Ti Lung. These are interesting, but are not all specific to the film. Also included is a short text transcription of an interview with Woo, biographies and filmographies, a gallery of assorted stills and two trailers. All this could easily have fitted on the first DVD and doesn't do justice to either the film or the idea of a special edition. --Gary S Dalkin

Michel Poiccard (Jean-Paul Belmondo), an ex-airline steward turned hoodlum, steals a car and heads to Paris. Discovering a gun in the car's glove department, he uses it to shoot and kill a cop who tries to wave him down. He wants to escape to Italy with his American girlfriend Patricia (Jean Seberg), but the police are after him, and he is distracted by all the pleasures Paris has to offer.

Story-wise, Jean-Luc Godard's A Bout De Souffle (1960) (aka Breathless) is pretty thin, but as its director always proclaimed, you don't need much in the way of narrative to make a movie. Sometimes a girl and a gun are quite enough. The effortlessly cool and laconic Belmondo mirrors the director's mischief and flamboyance. With his fat cigarette stub perched on his bottom lip, his shades, his felt hat and white socks, he looks like a cross between a left-bank intellectual and an American gumshoe (perhaps his beloved Bogart). With her close-cropped hair and New York Herald Tribune T-shirt, his girlfriend (Jean Seberg) is equally stylish. A Hollywood star (she had appeared in the lead in Otto Preminger's Saint Joan in 1957 when she was still a teenager), the Iowa-born Seberg is turned by Godard into the lithe embodiment of European radical chic.

The film has a spontaneity that studio-bound offerings of the time missed by a mile. Cameraman Raoul Coutard uses natural light and real locations whenever possible. Lots of the pet tricks in the movie--jump cuts, whip pans and improvised tracking shots--have been copied relentlessly by imitators ever since. A Bout De Souffle, though, is unique: anarchic, liberating and hugely stylish, "the best film around now", as its trailer proclaimed. It made Godard, almost overnight, into "the world's most discussed, interviewed and quoted filmmaker". --Geoffrey Macnab

On the DVD: Godard's greatest movie has been lovingly transferred to disc by Optimum, and comes with several extras including trailers and production notes and an old Godard short, Charlotte Et Son Jules, also starring the swaggering, arrogant Belmondo. --Geoffrey Macnab

There was a rare magic on the big screen in 1995, when the people at Pixar came up with the first fully computer-animated film, Toy Story, and their second feature film, A Bug's Life, may miss the bull's-eye but Pixar's target is so lofty that it's hard to find the film anything less than irresistible. Brighter and more colourful than the other animated insect movie of 1998 (Antz), A Bug's Life is the sweetly told story of Flik (voiced by David Foley), an ant searching for better ways to be a bug. His colony unfortunately revolves around feeding and fearing the local grasshoppers (lead by Hopper, voiced with gleeful menace by Kevin Spacey). When Flik accidentally destroys the seasonal food supply for the grasshoppers he decides to look for help ("We need bigger bugs!"). The ants, led by Princess Atta (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), are eager to dispose of the troublesome Flik. Yet he finds help--a hearty bunch of bug warriors--and brings them back to the colony. Unfortunately they are just travelling performers, afraid of conflict. As with Toy Story, the ensemble of creatures and voices is remarkable and often inspired. Highlights include wiseacre comedian Denis Leary as an un-ladylike ladybird, Joe Ranft as the German-accented caterpillar, David Hyde Pierce as a stick insect and Michael McShane as a pair of unintelligible woodlice. The scene-stealer is Atta's squeaky-voiced sister, baby Dot (Hayden Panettiere), who has a big soft spot for Flik. More gentle and kid-friendly than Antz, A Bug Life's still has some good suspense and a wonderful demise in store for the villain. However, the film--a worldwide hit--will be remembered for its most creative touch: "outtakes" over the end credits à la many live-action comedy films. These dozen or so scenes (both "editions" of outtakes are contained here) are brilliant and deserve a special place in film history right along with 1998's other most talked-about sequence: the opening Normandy invasion in Saving Private Ryan. --Doug Thomas