Shallow Grave   Starring: Kerry Fox, Christopher Eccleston and Ewan McGregor 4DVD RRP: £16.99 F4DVD90003 Certificate: 18 Available 01 June 2009

Three yuppie flatmates advertise for a fourth person to flat share with them in their plush apartment. They end up with a mysterious man who promptly dies of a drug overdose in his new room, leaving a suitcase full of cash under his bed. On finding the body and the money, the three flatmates decide to keep the cash and dispose of the body. This, however, means cutting off the dead man's hands and feet, as well as removing his teeth before burying him in the woods. It's not long before the police, as well as the rightful owners of the money, come knocking at their door...

Shallow Grave (1994) was the first motion picture that Danny Boyle directed, as well as being the film that would make stars of its unknown cast (Kerry Fox, Christopher Eccleston and Ewan McGregor).

I originally saw this film in the cinema (and haven't seen it since) and remember being impressed with it at the time. It was interesting to notice that while the movie's not aged that badly, the flat seems a little tacky compared to how I remembered it - it seems old and drab today compared to the lush accommodation that I remember.

It's still a great story, well acted and directed, with an interesting soundtrack. But I was a little taken aback to see that this was being marketed as a Special Edition release.

Special Edition? I'm scratching my head to think in what way is this Special? By today's standard DVDs this is pretty poor - only having an audio commentary by director Danny Boyle and Digging Your Own Grave (30 min) featurette which is a behind the scenes film shot as the movie was being made. I assume they mean it's special when compared to the original DVD release, which only included the trailer as an extra. But, as you can pick up the original for under £5, would you really pay an extra (£11+ to own this not very special edition?

The movie is easily worthy of 8/10, but as 4DVD insist on treating the buying public with such disrespect there's no way that this package is worth the retail price.

4

Darren Rea