DVDs

We stock all available kinds of DVD and have over 8,000 titles available and up to 100 new titles every month!

Films

We stock films of any and every type; all certificates: U, PG, 12, 15, and 18. Films for adults and for children.
Films for every taste and occasion: drama, westerns, horror, science fiction, comedies, romances, war, epics, crime…

We also look out for less mainstream films from the USA and the UK. Often not released at British cinemas, or only with a very limited release.

We receive new titles every week, some of them are classics, most are enjoyable, and many will be new, but if you like film then we can supply a lifetime of entertainment.

Hobbies and interests

We go beyond films and have a large range of instructional DVDs for any subject or interest.
Keep-fit, travel, languages, fishing, trains, history, playing musical instruments, painting and drawing, just about anything for your hobbies and interests.

The Arts

We support the arts. Hampshire libraries have a wide range of DVDs showing opera, ballet, theatre [from Shakespeare to Gilbert & Sullivan], fine arts [paintings, sculpture, etc]. Not just the “classic” arts either, we have no problem with the latest music DVDs or documentaries on any contemporary artist.

Foreign Language

We pride ourselves on obtaining films from around the world. We buy most non-English language films that are released - we have films in languages from Aramaic to Zulu by way of Mongolian, Hebrew, and Norwegian!. At the moment we have films spoken in over fifty languages. As a rule about the only new titles we don’t buy are some of the more extreme horror films, and if we had a request we would look favourably at getting some.

Television

Television series and programmes are stocked. Drama: from the classics; Austen, Bronte, and Dickens, to the latest hits such as Prime Suspect or The West Wing. Comedy: From Faulty Towers to The office. Science-fiction: from Doctor Who to Battlestar Gallactica via Buffy and Lost. Documentaries: from wildlife to history and genealogy. Children’s: Thomas the Tank Engine and Postman Pat and Angelina Ballerina and Peppa Pig and Bratz…

We try to support education with DVDs to back up virtually any study with dramatisations of set books, courses of study, language tuition and even driving skills.

We are always happy to receive recommendations or requests for specific films that we may have missed. You can check our catalogue to see what we have and reserve a DVD on-line if you like.

August's DVD Choice

Virgin territory. Cert. 15
14th century Italy and a beautiful princess is left penniless and alone after her wealthy parents perish during an outbreak of plague. Seizing on this opportunity the evil Gerbino de la Ratta pressures her to marry him as an escape from financial ruin. The fate of the Princess now rests with a mysterious stranger, Lorenzo, a travelling rogue who swears to win her affection and overthrow his long-time nemesis, the brutal de la Ratta.  

In Bruges. Cert. 18
After a difficult job in London, Ray and Ken, a two-man hit team, are ordered by their boss Harry to cool their heels in Bruges. Very much out of their comfort zones, the men find themselves drawn into increasingly dangerous entanglements with locals, tourists, and a film shoot. When their stay in Bruges takes a turn for the worst, Ray and Ken realize Harry may have plans for them other than a simple vacation...

Nim’s island. Cert. U
A feisty young girl called Nim lives on a wild tropical island with her father and her best friends Silkie the seal, the crazy iguana Fred and Galileo the plucky pelican. Inspired by ancient legends and her favourite books written by the reclusive author Alexandra Rover, Nim leads a wild and exciting life. When Nim's father is lost at sea and her island paradise is thrown into peril Nim reaches out to book hero Alex Rover for help.

Leatherheads. Cert. PG
A romantic comedy set against the backdrop of America's pro-football league in 1925.Dodge Connolly is a charming, brash football hero who is determined to guide his team from bar brawls to packed stadiums. But after the players lose their sponsor and the entire league faces certain collapse, Dodge convinces a college football star to join his ragtag ranks. Welcome to the team Carter Rutherford, America's favourite son. A golden-boy war hero who single-handedly forced multiple German soldiers to surrender in WWI, Carter has dashing good looks and unparalleled speed on the field. This new champ is almost too good to be true.

July's film choice

There will be blood. Cert.15
There Will Be Blood is a masterly, unflinching examination of a consummately evil man. Daniel Plainview is an oil man: he finds it, he drills for it and he makes money from it. Following a tip from a visitor named Paul Sunday, whose family sits atop a veritable ocean of oil, Plainview travels to California with his young son. Sunday's preacher brother Eli grudgingly accepts Plainview's ambitions under the condition that he help fund the town church. As Plainview's plans come to fruition, a series of events begins to fracture the insular world he has constructed for himself, pitting Plainview against Sunday and forcing him to become even more vindictive and ruthless.

The bucket list. Cert.15
In The Bucket List, a corporate billionaire (Jack Nicholson) and a working class mechanic (Morgan Freeman) find their lives thrown together when they end up sharing a hospital room. Both at a crossroads in their lives, they come to realise that they have two things in common; a desire to spend the time they have left doing everything they ever wanted and an unrealised need to come to terms with who they are. So before they, as the expression has it, "kick the bucket", the two men will support each other in realising their dreams.

Step up 2: the streets. Cert. PG
Andie is a tough Baltimore teen who grew up dancing and is now part of the 410, the hottest dance crew in the city and reigning champions of the Streets, an underground dance competition. Unable to control Andie's rebellious ways, her guardian, Sarah (Sonja Sohn), has decided to send her to Texas to live with her aunt. But Andie has one last chance to stay with her crew in her beloved Baltimore; the Maryland School of the Arts.

The Spiderwick chronicles. Cert. PG
From the moment the Grace family moves into a secluded old house, peculiar things start to happen. Unable to explain the accidents and strange disappearances, the Grace children--Jared, Simon and Mallory--start to investigate and find the unbelievable truth of the Spiderwick Estate and the amazing creatures that inhabit it.

A very good adaptation of the popular series of books by Holly Black and Tony Diterlizzi, The Spiderwick Chronicles is one of the few family films in recent years to seamlessly integrate magical elements with a potent drama.

The books are also available to borrow - check the library catalogue for details

Blu-Ray

Blu-Ray is the latest disc format to challenge DVDs for home entertainment. With greater capacity on a CD/DVD sized disc allowing for superior sound and picture.

Hampshire Libraries are starting a small collection of Blu-Ray discs, to test the demand for this new format. The collection will be housed at our Petersfield library, but anyone can request any title to be delivered to their local library.

We have started with 30 Blu-Ray titles and we will buy new titles each month. As with DVDs, we are happy to receive requests for titles not in stock.

You can see what we have on the Hampshire Library web catalogue.
Click on the 'Sound and Vision' button, and then keyword search for 'blu' or 'bluray' or 'blu-ray' or do a Title search for the title you want and look for the 'Blu-Ray' note.

Blu-ray discs should be available from 1 May.

Here are some [edited!] technical notes about Blu-Ray:

Blu-ray is the name of a next-generation optical disc format jointly developed by a group of the world's leading consumer electronics, personal computer and media manufacturers (including Apple, Dell, Hitachi, HP, JVC, LG, Mitsubishi, Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, TDK and Thomson). The format was developed to enable recording, rewriting and playback of high-definition video (HD), as well as storing large amounts of data. The format offers more than five times the storage capacity of traditional DVDs and can hold up to 25GB on a single-layer disc and 50GB on a dual-layer disc.

While current optical disc technologies such as DVD, DVD±R, DVD±RW, and DVD-RAM rely on a red laser to read and write data, the new format uses a blue-violet laser instead, hence the name Blu-ray. Despite the different type of lasers used, Blu-ray products can easily be made backwards compatible with CDs and DVDs through the use of a BD/DVD/CD compatible optical pickup unit. The benefit of using a blue-violet laser (405nm) is that it has a shorter wavelength than a red laser (650nm), which makes it possible to focus the laser spot with even greater precision. This allows data to be packed more tightly and stored in less space, so it's possible to fit more data on the disc even though it's the same size as a CD/DVD.

Children's DVDs

All Hampshire libraries and Discovery Centres stock DVDs (and some still have some videos) for children. As with adult DVDs, we have new titles arriving weekly.

As you might expect, we stock all of the big-budget children’s films, from Harry Potter to the latest Disney cartoon. There are DVDs of films as well as television programmes, both latest releases and favourites from the past.

Soon to arrive titles include Disney’s “Enchanted” Cert PG aimed at older children, in fact possibly aimed more at girls with the storyline of a cartoon princess transported in the “real world”. More for the younger viewer is “Alvin and the Chipmunks” a cartoon about a trio of singing chipmunks!. Again, for the older child is the DVD of the hit “The golden compass” based on the Philip Pullman book.

We also have all the old and new favourites from television; Postman Pat, Paddington, Angelina Ballerina, Teletubbies, and many many more. From the United States there are the various Bratz series and Spongebob, High School musical, and a lot more.

Apart from films we also stock instructional programmes to assist in teaching children, for example the Little Einstein series.

We are happy to receive requests for anything we do not have in stock, and if it is available will usually try to get it. If a DVD is in stock at any of our libraries we can send it to your local library for collection.

Our rental charges are very competitive. Most children’s DVDs cost only £1 for a week’s loan. A few more expensive titles from the big studios will cost £3.50 for a week, but the price will go down after it’s been in stock for four months.