The fifth installment in the ape vs man saga, this is as one would expect, not the best of the bunch. A rather banal script attempts to bring the story full circle by presenting a struggle between vicious gorillas, pacifist chimps and underground mutants while trying to avoid the comic strip philosophy that gave the other films depth and credibility. find out more...

Under the planet of the apes an older civilisation is discovered, living in the ruins of New York, and worshipping an atom bomb. This is the first sequel, and has some of the mystery and invention of the original, but lacks the originality of the plot. Not bad at all, it picks up immediately where Planet left off, the film quickly jettisons Heston (who didn’t want to appear at all, donated his salary to charity, and only agreed to what amounts to a cameo role after the studio agreed to kill off find out more...

Hiding and enslaved in a future Earth, Caesar, the son of Cornelius and Zira, prepares an uprising against his human captors. As with its predecessors Conquest of the Planet of the Apes explores issues such as xenophobia and cruelty. Certainly the darkest of the series, 'Conquest' is also the the most under-rated. The picture features a slave revolt that was specifically based on footage of the 1965 Watts Riots. The 2011 movie Rise of the Planet of the Apes has the same theme but is not offic find out more...

Following the events in "Beneath the Planet of the Apes" Zira and Cornelius use Taylor's repaired spaceship to escape the holocaust on the ape planet and slipping through a bend in time they land on earth circa 1970. Captured by the military and scrutinised at various hearings, the two apes are subjected to the same xenophobic treatment that their human counterparts encountered in the previous ape instalments. As a sequel to a sequel this is a reasonable movie, although like the others the under find out more...

The story of a French actress and a Japanese man's brief affair in Hiroshima, stirring up painful memories for them both, for her wartime 'collaboration' and, for him, the bomb which quite literally destroyed everything he had known. Resnais's film is now seen as revolutionary for its time an a must for film study courses. Sadly haunting. find out more...

A milestone in cinematic history, and the inspiration behind Hollywood hit "12 Monkeys". This classic sci-fi short takes one man on a terrifying journey from the post-apocalyptic world he inhabits, back to his childhood and his one distant memory, the face of a woman at the end of a pier. Stunning. find out more...

'La Jetee' is a milestone in cinematic history, and the inspiration behind Hollywood hit '12 Monkeys'. This classic sci-fi short takes one man on a terrifying journey from the post-apocalyptic world he inhabits, back to his childhood and his one distant memory; the face of a woman at the end of a pier. Stunning. find out more...

Imagine a climax to the cold war after all the buttons were pressed. Only Australia and the American submarine Sawfish seem to have escaped the subsequent apocalypse, but as the wave of fallout drifts ever closer all know that their fate is sealed. On The Beach is an intriguing hypotheses based on a "what would you do with the time left to you" premise. Rather melodramatic, and, perhaps, naive by the standards of today's cinema, but a brave and thoughtful film for its time. find out more...

Two astronauts land on a planet populated by apes, but these chimps are no chumps and the men find themselves imprisoned and at the mercy of their furry captors. The enigma of the planet's history, juggled through Heston's humiliating experience of being studied as an interesting laboratory specimen by his ape captors, right down to his final startling rediscovery of civilisation, is quite beautifully sustained. One interesting fact is that the aristocratic orangutan Dr. Zaius was originally to find out more...

It's the off-season at the lonely Beauregard Hotel in Bournemoth, and only the long-term tenants are still in residence. Life is stirred up, however, when the beautiful Ann Shankland arrives to see her alcoholic ex-husband, John Malcolm, who is secretly engaged to Pat Cooper, the woman who runs the hotel. Meanwhile, snobbish Mrs Railton-Bell discovers that the kindly if rather doddering Major Pollock, played by David Niven, who won an Oscar for his performance, a retired officer who likes to find out more...