The prolific Steven Soderbergh has said Side Effects would be his last theatrical film and the HBO film Behind the Candelabra his last movie, period. The fifty-year-old chameleon writer, producer and director has made all kinds of films over the course of a nearly thirty year career, often acting as his own cinematographer and editor under pseudonyms. Far from riding off into the sunset he is now at work on a new mini-series about New York’s Knickerbocker Hospital in the early part of the Twentieth Century. Let’s hope his announced retirement turns out to be more a sabbatical than an actual retirement.

While Soderbergh has made numerous suspense films over the years, Side Effects comes closest to finding him in Hitchcock territory. It’s a pity the material isn’t better.

There are several problems with the film beginning with the title. It leaves you to believe that the mystery will center around the side effects of a new psychiatric drug when it’s plain to anyone familiar with the mechanics of mystery writing early on that it’s just a red herring. More problematic, though, is that none of the characters in the film are very interesting.

Jude Law plays an overworked psychiatrist who prescribes a drug to a patient that he is being paid to promote, and although neither he nor the drug is responsible for the murder that takes place, he is not totally blameless. Rooney Mara, in a Razzie worthy performance as his mopey-dopey patient, is obviously faking it, but why? Catherine Zeta-Jones as her tight-lipped former shrink is even worse, but thankfully doesn’t have that much screen time to wear your patience thin. Channing Tatum is a vacuum as Mara’s husband who has just been released from a four year prison term for securities fraud. Ann Dowd frowns a lot as his mother.

The film does have some nice shot in New York scenes. The film’s cinematographer was Peter Andrews, its editor Mary Ann Bernard. Both are pseudonyms for Soderbergh.

Side Effects is available on both Blu-ray and standard DVD.

Mystery and suspense novels and filmed murder mysteries have always been among my favorites. A good antidote to the disappointment of Side Effects can be found in the many British TV series mysteries now available on DVD including the newly released George Gently, Series Five.

Known as Inspector George Gently in the U.K., the series which first aired in 2007 dropped the first word of its title for its U.S. airings on PBS. This is in marked contrast to Lewis which became Inspector Lewis in its cross-Atlantic travels.

While most modern British TV mystery series, like their U.S. counterparts, take place contemporaneously, there are several significant exceptions. George Gently is unique in that it takes place in the 1960s with Inspector Gently taking a more modern live and let live approach to life with his Detective Sergeant John Bacchus taking a staunch narrow-minded 60s approach. Not to fear, however, Bacchus usually has his consciousness raised during the course of each two-hour or thereabouts episode.

These episodes are really infrequently broadcast films that stand on their own as do the individual episodes of most of the British TV mystery series of the last thirty years or so. Martin Shaw, who plays Gently, is a veteran of numerous British series, mini-series and telefilms. He was previously best known to U.S. audiences as P.D. James’ Inspector Adam Dagliesh in the 2003-2004 revivals of her works in Death in Holy Orders and The Murder Room.

The entire George Gently series released to date is available on both Blu-ray and standard DVD.

Other modern British mystery series of note include A Touch of Frost; Midsomer Murders; Foyle’s War and Inspector Morse and its sequel, the aforementioned Inspector Lewis.

The granddaddy of the modern thinking man’s British detective is Inspector Morse, a series that began in 1982 with the enigmatic John Thaw as the detective inspector in charge of investigating murders in the town of Oxford including murders which take place in the numerous colleges that make up the prestigious university. It ran until 2000. Five years later, Kevin Whately, who played Frost’s loyal Detective Sergeant Lewis, was promoted to Detective Inspector and got his own series covering the same setting with Laurence Fox earning equal billing as Detective Sergeant Hathaway. In the last episode a disillusioned Hathaway gave up his badge. Hopefully he will reconsider. Fox, son of James Fox, nephew of Edward Fox, both of whom have guested in the series, is the finest actor since Thaw to star in a police procedural on either side of the Atlantic.

The entire catalogue of Inspector Morse is available on standard DVD as are the first five sets of Inspector Lewis. Set six is available for pre-order on Blu-ray and standard DVD in the U.S. It has already been released as Lewis – Set 7 in the U.K., where not only is the title different, but so is the numbering sequence.

A Touch of Frost, which ran from 1992 to 2010, featured veteran actor David Jason as an old school copper who always got his man – or woman. The series featured some truly heartrending, often heartbreaking, episodes which is probably what accounts for its long run.

All episodes of A Touch of Frost are available on standard DVD.

Midsomer Murders, which has been airing since 1997, is the lightest of the lot. It wisely takes its title from the fictitious county in which all the murders occur instead of the name of Chief Inspector Barnaby so that it can continue on indefinitely with other lead coppers. Indeed, the original Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby retired in 2011, leaving his cousin, Chief Inspector John Barnaby, to carry on in his stead.

In his fifteen years as star of the series, John Nettles as Tom Barnaby had three assistants played, in order, by Daniel Casey as Sgt. Gavin Troy; John Hopkins as Sergeant Dan Scott and Jason Hughes as DS Ben Jones. Both Casey and Hopkins left the show to pursue other career opportunities. Casey’s Troy was given a big send-off when he left the series, but Hopkins’ Scott disappeared without comment. At the start of the 2005-2006 season it was announced that Hopkins’ character had called in ill, allowing Barnaby to temporary draft Constable Jones. By the next episode, Jones was his full-fledged assistant and Scott was never mentioned again. After Tom’s retirement, Jones became John Barnaby’s assistant. John is played by Neil Dudgeon who played a different character in a much earlier episode.

What sets this series apart is that with one or two exceptions, there are multiple murders in every episode. Half the fun is in guessing who will be murdered next. The other half is in guessing the reasons why as well as the identity of the killer or killers. I’ve watched nearly all 100 episodes of the series and returned to many of them just a few years after seeing them for the first time and couldn’t remember who the next murder victim would be, who the killer was or why the killings took place in most of them.

All of Tom Barnaby’s episodes are available on DVD. The first John Barnaby episodes of Midsomer Murders are available on Blu-ray as well as standard DVD, with the next set available for pre-order. More up to date episodes may be found for sale in the U.K. U.S. airings and their subsequent DVD releases are often delayed by a year or more.

Taking place during World War II, the original series of Foyle’s War ran from October, 2002 through March, 2008 but proved so popular that several post-war episodes were broadcast in 2010 and several more in 2012. The series’ hero, another country copper, is portrayed by Michael Kitchen in this highly acclaimed series.

Sets 1-6 of Foyle’s War are available on standard DVD. Set 7, already out in the U.K., is available for pre-order on both Blu-ray and standard DVD in the U.S.

This week’s new releases include A Good Day to Die Hard on both Blu-ray and standard DVD and the Blu-ray upgrade of Earthquake.