Godard's hugely influential debut went on to inspire a new wave of French cinema and this is the film which epitomised the iconoclasm of the early Nouvelle Vague. Belmondo is the hip gangster, modelled on Bogart, whose escapades, including shooting a cop, leave him and his girlfriend on the run from both the cops and his enemies. The insolent casual style and cool moods make this the ultimate film noir.

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A man writes and loves in darkness. Fourteen years ago he was in a car crash where he lost not only his sight but also Lena, the love of his life. He had two names; Harry Caine, a pseudonym with which he still signs his written works, and Mateo Blanco, his real name, with which he signed the film he directed. After the accident, the only way Harry could cope with not being able to make films was to imagine that Mateo died along with his beloved Lena. One night, in conversation with his friend an find out more...

A literally cursed lady and her adopted daughter live in isolation in their small domicile in the breathtaking North Asian Arctic tundra. Always fearsome of contact with 'murderous' fellow humans from an unexplained dystopic external world, they sled, they kayak and they hunt, but their life is thrown into chaos by the discovery of a seriously injured army runaway. 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...

It is 1962 and a young newspaper editor, Chow, is finding his marital partner is rarely around to share his life; Lonely and lost Chow finds friendship with his neighbour, Li-zhen, whose husband is as absent as his wife. Into this increasingly charged relationship comes a discovery that could release the two of them, but may ironically part them forever. In The Mood For Love is a breathtakingly beautiful film, visually and emotionally faultless. find out more...

Resnais's controversial attempt at collaboration with avant garde author Alain Robbe-Grillet. The film sets up a puzzle that is never resolved, a man meets a woman in a rambling hotel and believes he may have had an affair with her the previous year at Marienbad - or did he? Or was it somewhere else? Deliberately scrambling chronology to the point where past, present and future become meaningless, Resnais creates a vaguely unsettling mood by means of stylish composition, long, smooth tracking sh find out more...

A superb study by the brilliant Sayles of a married woman who realises she is gay. She falls in love with Ruth, is shunned by her husband and straight friends, and suffers huge emotional upheaval. Sparkling dialogue, tender characters, superb acting and some real comedy. A touch of directorial genius. find out more...

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Life is crazy. You're crazy, I'm crazy, we're all crazy. We're all a little bit Minnie, and a little bit Moskowitz. Sometimes it does seem best to be sensible...but then what might you be missing out on? You gotta be you. You don't have to park cars and semi-randomly yell at people, but you can't hide yourself behind a veil (or dark sunglasses) and pretend and act like ever 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...