An award winning film full of baroque splendour. The talented composer Antonio Salieri found himself in competition with Mozart, a genius, and he couldn't understand why God favored such a vulgar creature to be his instrument. Salieri turned into a hate-filled monster, whose aim in life became to ruin his colleague, but he emerges as a tragic and sympathetic character. He alone could appreciate the perfection of Mozart's music and, perhaps, he speaks up for all of us whose talents fall short of find out more...

Lester Burnham (Spacy - giving a sublime performance) is a middle-aged suburbanite lost in a world he doesn't recognise anymore. His job has become meaningless, his wife has turned into a bitch-on-wheels and his rebellious daughter hates his guts. For Lester his only source of enjoyment seems to be choking the chicken in the shower each morning. His lonely existence begins to change, however, when he meets his daughter's friend, Angela and what starts as wishful thinking rapidly ends up with Les find out more...

One of the most spectacular epics of all time, even by the standards of Hollywood, the famous twenty minute chariot race alone took three months to shoot, and, along the way, Ben is given a helping hand and converted by Jesus. An unmissable slice of movie history. Won Best Picture at 1959 Academy Awards. find out more...

A great general, victorious in battle and loved by the Roman people, Maximus finds himself enslaved by the twisted and psychopathic emperor to be, Commodus. The proud General is reduced to a common gladiator, but his extraordinary prowess in the Arena brings him back to Rome and a vengeful showdown with Commodus. Gladiator is an entertaining action epic, with all the grandeur and heroic angst of classics such as "Spartacus" that it seeks to emulate. find out more...

'High Noon' works on many levels; the second-to-none screenplay, the subtle direction, the clock, Gary Cooper's Oscar-winning performance... It's about a small town sheriff who must basically stand alone to defend the people from a wild gang of outlaws, who have just been let out of jail and will arrive on the noon train. Although he does not have to, and the town does not deserve saving, Cooper decides that he will do the job that he was hired to do. A classic amongst Westerns, it strips the ge find out more...

An arrogant bright black Northern homicide detective travelling via a small Mississippi town becomes involved in a murder investigation after a local industrialist is found dead. Engaged in a clash of wills with the local racist cop the two eventually develop a mutual respect. Won Best Picture at 1967 Academy Awards. find out more...

Winner of 8 Oscars, this is the story of a misfit who challenges the power of the tough New York Longshoremen's Union. Steiger plays his brother, caught between divided loyalties, and Eve Marie Saint plays the woman he falls in love with. Highly recommended viewing despite its political premises. NB the special pleading on behalf of informers, deriving presumably from the fact that Kazan and Schulberg named names during the McCarthy witch-hunts. find out more...

The world as a lunatic asylum. Jack Nicholson plays the anarchist determined to challenge the smug system of authority and obedience that rule the roost. The first film by Czech dissident Forman after migrating from Czechoslovakia to the United States, and a superb comment on society! Won Best Picture plus others at 1975 Academy Awards. find out more...

The true story of champion boxer Jake La Motta brought to the screen by De Niro and Scorcese - probably the greatest partnership of the 1980s. De Niro watched innumerable boxing videos and gained 2 stone to put in a performance that won him an Oscar. Voted Best Film of the '80s by the critics. find out more...

It's the off-season at the lonely Beauregard Hotel in Bournemoth, and only the long-term tenants are still in residence. Life is stirred up, however, when the beautiful Ann Shankland arrives to see her alcoholic ex-husband, John Malcolm, who is secretly engaged to Pat Cooper, the woman who runs the hotel. Meanwhile, snobbish Mrs Railton-Bell discovers that the kindly if rather doddering Major Pollock, played by David Niven, who won an Oscar for his performance, a retired officer who likes to find out more...