Scrooge is a miserly old businessman in 1840's London. One Christmas Eve he is visited by the ghost of Marley, his dead business partner. Marley foretells that Scrooge will be visited by three spirits, each of whom will attempt to show Scrooge the error of his ways. Will Scrooge reform his ways in time to celebrate Christmas?
Well-received version of an extremely familiar morality tale.

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The Italian adventurer and libertine Giovanni Jacopo Casanova lived from 1725 to 1798, but in this six-part series Dennis Potter attempted to find a contemporary relevance through his central themes of sex and religion. He commented that Casanova "was concerned with religious and sexual freedom, and these are the things we have to address ourselves to now." Casanova was imprisoned in Venice in 1755, and Potter used that event as a central device, constantly inter-cutting to contrast Casanova's a find out more...

Bresson's subtle adaption of a Tolstoy story, 'The Forged Coupon', is a masterpiece of directorial understatement. The passing of a forged 500F note by two boys leads, unbeknownst to them, to the decline and fall of an innocent man. His descent into madness is as bleak a portrayal of moral conflict as you will see. find out more...

Victor Hugo's classic novel of a prisoner on the run gets a reworking by Josee Dayan in this 3 hour film version. The highlight of this film (other than the beautiful lack of overblown musical maladies) is the casting. Gerard Depardieu uses his ambiguous persona to great effect as Jean Valjean; the captivating Charlotte Gainsbourg as Fantine; an angelic Virginie Ledoyen as her orphaned daughter and the menacing urbanity of John Malkovich is excellently projected onto Valjean's nemesis Javert. As find out more...

One of two classic Lean adaptations of Charles Dickens. From the opening shot of Oliver's mother struggling through the snow to reach the workhouse. The film brilliantly recreates the feeling of poverty-stricken Victorian England. Look out in particular for Alec Guinness' superb performance as Fagin. find out more...

Alexandre Dumas' celebrated book recounts the adventures of Edmond Dantès, a fabulously wealthy 19th-century French aristocrat, whose charm and generosity hides an obsessive desire for revenge against those who betrayed him many years earlier. This French production has the distinction of being the first filmed version of the newly restored unabridged version of Dumas' classic, and is a lavish recreation of the epic novel. find out more...