Robert Carlyle and Jonny Lee Miller star as the gentlemen highwaymen Plunkett and Macleane. They steal from the disgustingly rich and develop something of a reputation with the ladies along the way. This is a glossy looking film with great costumes and a techno soundtrack that tries to be as far removed from a period drama as possible. find out more...

The Marquis de Sade has been locked away in a mental asylum, but he refuses to lie down and accept his fate. With the help of a laundry maid the Marquis continues to find an outlet for his writing and it is only with the arrival of the malevolent Dr Royer-Collard that the grim stink of desperation becomes apparent. The film cultivates an air of sardonic detachment beneath a lascivious leer, it pokes at sexual taboos - it's pretty subversive, considering - but sexuality and creativity are inde find out more...

An ambitious but competently-handled Civil War epic from versatile director Ang Lee . A fairly heavyweight historical drama, it focuses on the Bushwackers, a rebel southern militia group headed by Maguire, Ulrich and Rhys-Meyers, who're conducting a guerilla war, and black scout Jeffrey Wright, who's forced to fight for the pro-slavery cause. Worthy and well-crafted, but light entertainment it ain't. find out more...

The original and the best screen adaptation of John Buchan's jingoistic thriller of German plots and dashing Englishmen. Considered by the director as one of his very best this launched the theme of the innocent man on the run from both the law and the villians. Excellent. find out more...

Based on David Low's cartoon character, Major General Clive Wynne-Candy, VC, we back-track over his life, drawing us into sympathy with the prime virtues of honour and chivalry which have transformed him from dashing young spark of the 1890s into crusty old buffer of World War II. Roger Livesey gives us not just a great performance, but a man's whole life, losing his only love (Deborah Kerr) to the German officer (Walbrook) with whom he fought a duel in pre-WWI Berlin, then becoming the latter's find out more...

Laughton's only stab at directing, with Mitchum giving a stunning performance as the psychopathic preacher who, whilst in jail for a minor offence, hatches a devious plan to get his hands on the loot stashed by his condemned cell-mate. Set in '30s rural America, the film polarises into a struggle between good and evil for the souls of innocent children. Laughton's deliberately old-fashioned direction throws up a startling array of images: an amalgam of Mark Twain-like exteriors (idyllic riversid find out more...

Flighty upper class Londoner Kitty is desperate to escape her repressive family life and accepts the marriage proposal of uptight Shanghai based bacteriologist Walter. Quickly bored she instigates her husband's hatred by having an affair with promiscuous diplomat Charlie and, as if in revenge, Walter drags her off to work in a mountainous cholera infected province in rural China. Some couples grew apart, some together....highly recommended. find out more...

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...