Way ahead of its time, this is a Western with a difference! There's gun-totting women (including the brilliant Joan Crawford) fighting over the men that they love and leading the men into action. Then there's the anaemic looking Sterling Hayden as the male lead in this classic that tramples stereotypes with a memorable result! The 'Lie to me...' speech is guaranteed to give you chills. find out more...

Balian's a blacksmith, his mum's dead, as is his young wife and until a knight on the way to the crusades comes clip clopping along he's had no idea who his dad is either. Invited to join the crusades, Balian, after a disagreement with the church, decides to join his new found father and so begins legend. Settled in the Holy Land, Balian swiftly proves himself a fierce warrior and a man of integrity, earning the respect of not only his men but his Moslem foes…and the love of a princess. Surroun find out more...

Ran, Kurosawa's last great epic, is a Jidaigeki (Japanese period drama) depicting the fall of Hidetora Ichimonj, an ageing Sengoku-era warlord who abdicates as ruler in favor of his three sons. His kingdom slowly disintegrates as the sons struggle for power, murdering rivals and laying waste to the land, and Hidetora goes insane after watching his retainers slaughtered in an epic massacre, the centrepiece of the film. As the kingdom crumbles and rival warlords move in for the kill, the Ichimonji find out more...

In Persia in the 11th Century, a surgeon's apprentice disguises himself as a Jew to study at a school that does not admit Christians.

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Crusading frontier policeman Captain Stanley captures the fugitive Burns brothers, Charley and Mikey, at the scene of a bloody rape and murder. Informing Charley that he must kill his older brother, Arthur, in order to avoid the execution of Mikey, Stanley retreats to an old jailhouse and awaits the bloody outcome. Director John Hillcoat's second collaboration with Nick Cave (here contributing the film's screenplay and soundtrack), is a taut and often brutal character study of desperation ami find out more...

Jimmy Stewart plays the good brother whose sharp shootin' wins him the eponymous, and often fetishised, rifle in a riveting contest. The episodic story that follows tracks the rifle as it changes hands, from brother to brother, arms trader to Indian warrior, encouraging the viewer to realise that the true star of the film (and indeed the battle for the West) is the rifle. The actors, including a young Rock Hudson, seem to play their characters in the knowledge that they are very much in the back find out more...