Immaculate costumes, a brilliant script and two star-crossed lovers in a battle of wits in this tale of the unconsummated romance between Thailand's reformist King Mongkut (Rama 4) and Anna Leonowens, his son's English tutor. All this set a backdrop of court intrigue against the still running Rama dynasty. Very good. find out more...

Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch are two taciturn, driven, traveling gunslingers brought in to free the small New Mexico town of Appaloosa from the ruthless grip of murderous rancher Randall Bragg and his gang. The three men have no concept of compromise and a deadly battle of wits ensues between them, with, of course, a lady offering an alternative life style of domestication and emasculation. 'Appaloosa' is a beautifully shot and brooding western, a dark, brutal, moral allegory. find out more...

Not your usual costume drama from the Merchant/Ivory team because it's about working class people and is genuinely tragic. Bella sets off sexual sparks in the placid Victorian family who shelter her when she is found wandering, broke and heavily pregnant, but her past comes back to haunt her. Adapted from a novel by HE Bates. find out more...

Set in the 1890s this adaptation of Harold Brighouse's working class comedy sees a tyrannical bootmaker brought to heel when his plain-speaking daughter marries his down-trodden simple-minded employee and sets up a successful rival business. Keen direction and fine performances make this a great comedy. find out more...

Central India 1893, and the villagers of Champaner have just been informed by the local British commander that the enforced tax (Lagaan) is to be doubled. One young man stands up to colonial authority, pleading that any increase will cripple the community, and the nasty Brit in charge gives him one option, win a game of cricket, which the Indians have never before played, against the colonials and the tax will be scrapped, lose, and it will be tripled. Will the village cripple, the last man in, find out more...

a shameless blending of Pride and Prejudice with Life on Mars - The Telegraph. find out more...

Episode 3; Amanda's hostility to Darcy wanes as she begins to feel that, in Elizabeth's absence, she must 'understudy' for her. She learns that Darcy's sister Georgiana was in love with Wickham, and in response to his rejection of her advances, told Darcy that Wickham had "ravished her". Wickham maintains this falsehood to spare Georgiana's honour, which softens Amanda's hostility towards him. Meanwhile, Bingley is so heartbroken by Jane's marriage to Mr Collins that he has taken to drinking hea find out more...

Cynical Onegin brushes off young beauty Tatyana's advances, but a chance encounter 6 years later leads to a role reversal in this sweeping tale of unfulfilled love, tangled emotions etc, against a 19th Century Russian aristocratic background. A costume drama adapted from the great Russian author Alexander Pushkin's novel "Eugene Onegin". find out more...

Sumptuous adaptation of Edith Wharton's period drama set in the NY high society of the 1880s. Day Lewis plays the gentleman set to be married to May in the wedding of the year, but increasingly fascinated by the beautiful Countess Olenska. Decor reflects and oppresses characters, posture, gesture, glance and witty ironic narration convey not only individual psychology but the ideals of an entire etiquette-obsessed elite. Tragedy awaits. Awesome; one of the best period adaptations ever made, both find out more...

California, 1860, and former gold digger Daniel Dillon is now a wealthy man who owns Kingdom Come, a thriving prospecting town in the icy mountain wilderness of post-Gold Rush northern California, but to expand his burgeoning empire Dillon needs the Central Pacific Railroad to pass by and he has invited their chief surveyor. This coincides with the arrival of his wife and daughter, whom Daniel has not seen for twenty years, and as he attempts to seek some redemption for his dark past, the empire find out more...