A landmark in the history of the cinema; it was ranked Number 1 in the American Film Institute's 100 greatest films of all time in two polls (1998 and 2007) of more than 1,500 film industry movers and shakers and again by UK directors in a BFI poll. "Citizen Kane" narrates the rise and fall of a newspaper tycoon driven by a childhood obssession and is loosely based round the life of William Randolph Hurst, who tried to have it banned, but incorporates elements from the lives of other fat cats il find out more...

Abandoned by her father and brought up in an orphanage Gabrielle Chanel's early years were not easy ones, but her willful determination, intelligence and obvious gift would see her ultimately rise to iconic status within the world of 20th Century fashion. 'Coco Before Chanel' never glamorises her life, neither the way she looks nor the lovers she takes; a thoughtful understated observation of Chanel's life before fortune finally beckoned. Not a visually sumptuous film, as you might expect, but a find out more...

Based on the real life legend Huo Yuanjia, this brutal martial arts epic focuses on his entrance into an international fighting tournaments for the honour of his motherland. Eventually he is challenged him to take on four foreign champions in a single evening; a British boxer, a German lancer, a Spanish fencer and a Japanese martial artist. However the only way to stop him is by poison, a fact that his honourable Japanese opponent recognises and cedes victory over. Starring Jet Li and choreograp find out more...

While travelling to visit their grandfather two children are told, through three beautifully observed vignettes, of a family curse that has lasted two hundred years. During the Napoleonic Wars a French soldier and a Benedetti fall in love leading to mutual tragedy, but great wealth for the family. 1903; a powerful politician separates his sister from her lover, leading to tragedy. A WW2 resistance effort goes wrong.......tragedy. find out more...

Donat is perfectly cast as the lovable teacher, in this classic British drama, reminiscing about his career and personal life over the decades, his rise from lowly Latin master to headmaster of a public school and the joys and tragedies which moulded his transformation. The film won a staggering seven Academy Awards. Hugely enjoyable. find out more...

A disturbing Danish film, reanacting witchcraft trials from the 15th and 16th on till the early 20th Century. Mixing scenes of reanactment, animation and illustrated slideshows to depict events of alleged real-life events and possessions, we are shown images of extreme cruelty which smack of the experimental edges of medical research. This must have been tantamount to the work of the devil when it first came out. Sick-minds they had back in 1922! The DVD has a choice of soundtracks, the best of find out more...

Letters from Baghdad is the story of a true original. Gertrude Bell, sometimes called the "female" Lawrence of Arabia. The film tells the dramatic story of this British spy, explorer and political powerhouse. Using stunning, never-seen-before footage of the region, the film chronicles her extraordinary journey into both the uncharted Arabian desert and the inner sanctum of British colonial power. The story is told entirely in the words of Gertrude Bell and her contem find out more...

Gabriel Garcia Marquez's dark, brooding, atmospheric, humid, immense novel finally, and inevitably, gets a big screen adaptation and, as with that other great South American period epic ‘House of Ghosts', the overwhelming feeling is…why? Don't get me wrong, this is still a gloriously visualised tale of love and obsession through the ages, but it would take a true genius to direct the novel of a true genius. If you've not read the book then there's much to enjoy, if you have…hold tight to your me find out more...

A biopic expressed by a series of tableaux interpreting Mahler's music with Powell suitably impressive as the composer and Georgina Hale excellent as his wife - on its most serious level the film is about her stifled creativity. Despite the low budget Russell has produced his best work in a long time. find out more...

Painter Modigliani, an Italian Jew, has fallen in love with Jeanne, a beautiful Catholic girl. The couple have an illegitimate child, but Jeanne's bigoted parents send the baby to a faraway convent to be raised by nuns. Distraught by the loss Modigliani vows to find the money to raise his child and with the arrival of Paris's annual art competition he sees, as does his friend and rival Pablo Picasso, his opportunity. An enjoyable, if perhaps slightly imaginative, dramatization of the artist's ri find out more...