Gabriel Garcia Marquez's dark, brooding, atmospheric, humid, immense novel finally, and inevitably, gets a big screen adaptation and, as with that other great South American period epic ‘House of Ghosts', the overwhelming feeling is…why? Don't get me wrong, this is still a gloriously visualised tale of love and obsession through the ages, but it would take a true genius to direct the novel of a true genius. If you've not read the book then there's much to enjoy, if you have…hold tight to your me find out more...

Adapted from Bruce Chatwin's book and very much 'Thomas Hardy does Wales'. We follow four generations, in particular the intense relationship of two identical twin brothers, Ben and Lewis, of a Welsh hill-farming family. Visionary direction and ravishing scenery, our countryside at its very best. find out more...

A mesmerizing deconstruction of the man, his life, his loves, his humanity and their influence on a painter who stands not only as a genius but as the greatest artist of the twentieth century. Covering Picasso's early childhood in Spain towards the end of the nineteenth century up to his death in the South of France in the 1970's this is the definitive film biography of the great man. find out more...

An epic family drama spanning three generations of a Jewish family, who moved from a rural village to the city, became wealthy, respected, bourgeois and/or radicalised and Hungarianised, set against a backdrop of the final days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, World War 1, the rise of fascism, the Holocaust and the Communist era. A tour-de-force performance by Ralph Fiennes in various reincarnations, especially as the character who won a fencing gold medal for Hungary in the 1936 Olympics, in th find out more...

This truly exhaustive journey from the dawn of the medium through to the late sixties documents the rise and rise of Hollywood. Martin Scorsese guides us through his personal favourites and a vast selection of cult classics and recognised masterpieces. find out more...

Spielberg's aclaimed adaptation of Alice Walker's novel of a poor black girl, raped and rejected by her father, separated from her beloved sister and given into a life of domestic servitude and virtual imprisonment to her farmer husband. A bleak tale of hope and eventual liberation warmly told. find out more...

A biography of Aisin-Gioro "Henry" Pu Yi, who at the age of three was named the Emperor of China and died as a gardener at the Botanical Gardens of Peking. Told in an interesting flashback/flashforward style, we learn of Pu Yi's childhood, the time he spent in the Forbidden City, his term as the emperor of Japan's Manchukuo, his imprisonment by the Communists and his eventual release back to public life in 1959. A true epic with a cast of millions. find out more...

Based on David Low's cartoon character, Major General Clive Wynne-Candy, VC, we back-track over his life, drawing us into sympathy with the prime virtues of honour and chivalry which have transformed him from dashing young spark of the 1890s into crusty old buffer of World War II. Roger Livesey gives us not just a great performance, but a man's whole life, losing his only love (Deborah Kerr) to the German officer (Walbrook) with whom he fought a duel in pre-WWI Berlin, then becoming the latter's find out more...

Frank Gibbons has just been released from the army at the end of WW1 and, along with his extended family, he moves out to Clapham. At first life seems good but, with the arrival of the General Strike, the Gibbons and their friends and neighbours find life has plenty in store to test their resilience and good will. This Happy Breed is adapted from a Noel Coward play by David Lean and is a fine family saga in the best tradition of early British cinema. find out more...

Back in 1914 the young Ida Dalsar fell in love with an ardent young socialist, the future Fascist leader Benito Mussolini. She sold her shop to finance his career, possibly married him, had his child, got dumped, but kept coming back for more before being incarcerated in a mental institution. In other words this is the story of a girl who fell for the wrong man (and a country that fell for the wrong politics).
Particularly well received in France this was considered a serious contender fo find out more...