The first part of Bergman's trilogy (followed by Winter Light) about God's silence. His deeply melancholic views on the human condition are reflected thru' this tale of four Swedes geographically isolated, in a summer home on a holiday island, and emotionally separated from each other in a society, rooted in Lutheran Protestanism, in which self-expression is taboo and feelings suppressed. As one of them descends into insanity the others can only gaze helplessly on. Much to be admired in Bergman' find out more...

When a Woman Ascends the Stairs might be Japanese filmmaker Mikio Naruse's finest hour, a delicate, devastating study of a woman, Keiko, played heartbreakingly by Hideko Takamine, who works as a bar hostess in Tokyo's very modern post-war Ginza district. Sly, resourceful, but trapped, Keiko comes to embody the conflicts and struggles of a woman trying to establish her independence in a male-dominated society. A profoundly moving masterpiece. find out more...

Saucy sex trilogy which won the 1963 Oscar for best foreign film. La Loren plays three vastly different characters in three rib-tickling shorts; a permanently pregnant street trader, a spoiled but faithless wife, and a hooker who takes a vow of chastity to the disgust of her best customer. find out more...