This justifiably acclaimed epic tells the fascinating story of a well-heeled German Jewish family, Jettel, Walter and 5-year-old Regina, who fled the Nazis in the late 1930s and settled as farmers in Kenya. Here they, as German citizens, eventually face internment, separation, Walter joining the British army, and a detioration in their marriage. find out more...

The definitive gangster-epic; violent? Yes, but never mindless. The Jewish Mafia's coming of age on the Lower East Side in 1923, their rise to wealth during Prohibition, and their fall in 1933, provide the background to a story of friendship and betrayal, love and death. Leone's masterful cinematography evokes both the harshness of the vice-ridden decades before and after Prohibition, but also the philosophy behind it. Splendid performances by De Niro and Woods and a stupendous score by Ennio Mo find out more...

In 1930s North China, a young girl is given to a 50-year-old leper in exchange for a mule, but as she's carried to him through the wilderness she is saved from bandits by a handsome young peasant. Later the leper mysteriously dies and the peasant returns and the pair settle down to make the traditional red sorghum wine. The film shifts from fable to realism when Japanese troops invade the area, destroying the fields with forced labour from the vineyard until the workers revolt against them. find out more...

Sweeping romantic drama of epic proportions. Fiennes's WWII pilot lays badly burned and in the care of an army nurse. As the unnamed, stiff-upper-lipped "English Patient" begins to recover, memories emerge of a past life as an archaeologist/cartographer in the Sahara, and a passionate affair with a married woman, Katharine. Though Anthony Minghella's adaptation of Michael Ondaatje's novel simplifies, jettisons and changes certain elements of the original story, it remains a rich, complex, entran find out more...

Made almost contemporaneously with the 1930s setting, this authentically portrays the poverty and repression of the migrant 'Okies', evicted from their dustbowl farms and treated like slaves in California. Adapted from Steinbeck's book, often called 'THE Great American Novel' and with outstanding performances coming from Henry Fonda (Tom Joad) and John Carradine (John Casey) a preacher with a fondess for vice, but a true heart... fantastic. find out more...

Laughton's only stab at directing, with Mitchum giving a stunning performance as the psychopathic preacher who, whilst in jail for a minor offence, hatches a devious plan to get his hands on the loot stashed by his condemned cell-mate. Set in '30s rural America, the film polarises into a struggle between good and evil for the souls of innocent children. Laughton's deliberately old-fashioned direction throws up a startling array of images: an amalgam of Mark Twain-like exteriors (idyllic riversid find out more...

One of the all-time classic film noirs. Sultry Lana Turner is hypnotic as the bored, beautiful wife whose dreary life takes a dramatic turn when enigmatic drifter Frank walks into the diner she runs. Only her good-natured husband stands in the way of the pair's deadly passion. Superb stuff. find out more...

The famous con man movie in which two Chicago shysters plot an elaborate revenge on the mobster who killed their friend. Brilliant attention to period detail, a superbly put together plot and an overall damn good movie. Won Best Picture at 1973 Academy Awards. Absolutely brilliant. find out more...

Admirably sumptuous film version of Gunter Grass's epic surreal novel. Depicting German history through the eyes of three year old Oskar who decides, through sheer will-power, never to grow up. Bizarre, amusing and frequently grotesque this is deservedly acclaimed as a milestone in modern cinema. find out more...

Al Capone and the Chicago gangsters versus Elliot Ness and the incorruptable men of his special task force, all set against a brilliantly re-created period background. Very much a traditional gangster movie, good guys are very good and the bad guys, especialy De Niro as Capone, are very bad. find out more...