Quid Pro Quo: Adventures in £1 DVDs

When I was in Oxford last month, the wonderful Celi, one of the officers of the (Somewhat Un)official Shashi Kapoor Fan Club on Facebook , took a break from working on her PhD to hang out with me for a day. She sent me home with five DVDs she purchased at Poundland , a chain of "everything costs £1" shops that must be truly magical if you can find foreign films there (I don't think I've ever seen anything from a country other than China at the $1 stores I've been to). We agreed that such a boon provided a great opportunity to discuss whether price and easy availability relate at all to the quality of a film - and before you answer, note that last year she also got me a copy of my beloved Merchant-Ivory Shakespeare-Wallah at Poundland. That should also answer your question about whether these are legal/official DVDs. I'm also curious if there's any rhyme or reason to what ends up in the £1 bin. On the surface, Poonam Dhillon appears to be a