When Jean, as an outsider and a city-dweller at that, inherits a smallholding, the locals will not help him, and his struggle, against both nature and humans and their tragic consequences, is riveting and compulsive. Depardieu's performance, all towering strength and heartbreaking pathos, supplies the heart and soul of this beautiful saga of greed and resentment. And you'll want to watch the sequel, "Manon De Sources", immediately. find out more...

China in the turmoil of Japanese occupation is the evocative setting for this unusual and visually stunning tale. Recruited before she is truly aware of her purpose, a young woman is groomed to become an irresistible siren, an icon of contemporary eroticism to ensnare a collaborator who has wreaked havoc amongst her people. Ang Lee's stunning follow up to "Broke Back Mountain" is in essence a thriller but as with all his films it is the richness and depth of the characters that really drive the find out more...

The sequel to Jean De Florette (which should be seen first). Jean's daughter remains in the hills to herd goats and to finally serve the tight-lipped villagers with their just desserts. This part is less tragic but even more heartwrenching than the first, and the two must be seen! find out more...

Ulysses, Delmar and Pete have just escaped a chain gang and are high tailing it across the country to recover a fortune in hidden treasure. There is only one flaw in this otherwise faultless plan......they're clueless. 'O Brother Where Art Thou' is loosely based on Homer's Odyssey (when I say loose I mean like the jumper that you don't know whether to wear, or peg out as a tent) and is a rip-roaring comedy adventure, with all the quirky charm that you expect from the Coen brothers. The sound tra find out more...

Leone's superb all-encompassing epic portraying the death of the mythical 'Wild West'. A superb cast, the collaborations of Bertolucci and Argento, and Morricone's brilliantly atmospheric score all add to the incredible style and weight of Leone's creation. A true cinematic masterpiece! A candidate for greatest movie ever made, if you haven't... then you must. 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...

The best of the spaghetti westerns as our three heroes form short lived alliances to try and find some hidden gold during the Civil War. The music, those long low angled shots and the tall silent men - wonderful! find out more...

Josey Wales is a peaceful Missouri farmer in the days near the end of the Civil War. After his home is burned and his family murdered, he hardens into a human bullet, dedicated to destroying the renegades who took his "life." He joins a band of unreconstructed rebel guerilla fighters, who continue to fight the Union even after the official surrender of the Confederacy, an action which makes them, legally, outlaws. Josey is driven by vengeance, but, after a while, that's not enough. Back before h find out more...

The blind masseur Zatoichi wanders the countryside of 19th Century Japan, a perpetual drifter. Taking respite in a small town riven by gang power struggles, the initially unassuming Zatoichi soon finds reason to unleash the most lethal of skills, his peerless abilities with the sword. Zatoichi is a remarkable mix and match of genres; historical drama, morality tale, action movie and comedy, an often surreal but hugely entertaining slice of Japanese cinema from the director of Hana Bi and Violent find out more...