brr's - Rented List
-
Marriage Italian Style (1964)Matrimonio all'italiana
Domenico (Marcello Mastroianni) first meets 17-year-old prostitute Filumena (Sophia Loren) in a Neapolitan brothel in the 2nd World War. After the war they become lovers on and off for 22 years. Domenico eventually rents an apartment for Filumena and even lets her run his shop but is always chasing other women. Finally Filumena asks Domenico to marry her on her deathbed, just before he had planned to marry his young cashier, and admits she had his legitimate child. Dominico uses different subterfuges trying to find which teenager might be his son... - Director:
- Vittorio De Sica
- Cast:
- Sophia Loren, Marcello Mastroianni, Aldo Puglisi
- Formats:
-
-
A Special Day (1977)Una giornata particolare
It's 1938 and Rome comes to a standstill as Hitler visits Mussolini for the first time. Antonietta is left in her tenement home whilst her fascist husband and the rest of her family leave to attend the historic event. The whole building is empty apart from one man, Gabriele, a radio announcer sacked because of his homosexuality and his political views. Unaware of this Antonietta flirts with Gabriele as they meet by chance in the empty building. They strike up a conversation and the rather naive housewife is surprised by his opinions and shocked when she finally realises his sexual orientation. As the day progresses they develop a very special relationship that will radically alter both their outlooks on life forever... - Director:
- Ettore Scola
- Cast:
- Sophia Loren, Marcello Mastroianni, John Vernon
- Formats:
-
-
Four directors tell tales of Eros fit for a 1970's Decameron. Working-class lovers, Renzo (Germano Gilioli) and Luciana (Marisa Solinas), marry but must hide it from her employer; plus, they need a room of their own. A billboard of Anita (Anita Ekberg) provocatively selling milk gives a prudish crusader for public decency more than he can handle. The wife of a count whose escapades with call girls make the front page of the papers decides to work to prove her independence, but what is she qualified to do? A buxom carnival-booth manager who owes back taxes offers herself for one night in a lottery: a nerdy sacristan and a jealous cowboy make for a lovers' triangle. In each, women take charge, but not always happily. - Director:
- Vittorio De Sica
- Cast:
- Anita Ekberg, Sophia Loren, Romy Schneider
- Formats:
-
-
A powerful film about a ruthless journalist and an unscrupulous press agent who'll do anything to achieve success, this fascinating, compelling story crackles with taut direction and whiplash dialogue. Bristling with vivid performances by Curtis and Lancaster, this gutsy expose of big-city corruption is a timeless classic that cuts deep and sends a chilling message. It's late at night in the steamy, neon-lit streets of New York's Times Square, and everything's buzzing with nervous energy. But press agent Sidney Falco (Tony Curtis) is oblivious to the whirlwind of street vendors, call girls and con men bustling around him as he nervously waits for the early edition of The Globe. Whose career did gossip columnist J.J. Hunsecker (Burt Lancaster) launch today… and whose did he destroy? - Director:
- Alexander MacKendrick
- Cast:
- Burt Lancaster, Tony Curtis, Susan Harrison
- Formats:
-
-
Inspired by the 1985 true story of a drug runner's plane crash, missing cocaine, and the black bear that ate it, this wild dark comedy finds an oddball group of cops, criminals, tourists and teens converging in a Georgia forest where a 500-pound apex predator has ingested a staggering amount of cocaine and gone on a coke-fueled rampage for more blow - and blood. - Director:
- Elizabeth Banks
- Cast:
- Keri Russell, Alden Ehrenreich, O'Shea Jackson Jr.
- Formats:
-
-
‘City Lights’ begins with an uproarious skewering of pomp and formality, ends with one of the most famous last shots in movie history and, from start to finish, so completely touches the heart and tickles the funny bone that in 1998 it was named one of the American Film Institute’s Top-100 American Films. Talkies were well entrenched when Charles Chaplin swam against the filmmaking tide with this forever classic that’s silent except for music and sound effects. The story, involving the Tramp’s attempts to get money for an operation that will restore sight to a blind flower girl, provides a star with an ideal framework for sentiment and laughs. The tramp is variously a street sweeper, a boxer, a rich 0poseur, and a rescuer of a suicidal millionaire. His message is unspoken, but universally understood: love is blind. - Director:
- Charles Chaplin
- Cast:
- Charles Chaplin, Virginia Cherrill, Florence Lee
- Formats:
-
-
Richard Widmark delivers an indelible performance as Harry Fabian, a small-time American nightclub tout and desperate dreamer who tries to worm his way into the wrestling rackets of post-war London. In his path lie the formidable obstacles posed by a vengeful club owner (Francis Sullivan) and the racketeer Kristo (Herbert Lorn). The club owner's sultry wife (Googie Withers) schemes with him, and a long-suffering girlfriend (Gene Tierney) does her best to save him. Like many a noir hero before him, Harry thinks he can outrun his fate. He's wrong. Jules Dassin, under suspicion in Hollywood for his political beliefs, made the film at great speed, shooting night scenes in a London still shattered and skeletal from wartime bombings. - Director:
- Jules Dassin
- Cast:
- Richard Widmark, Gene Tierney, Googie Withers
- Formats:
-
-
Kiss Me Deadly (1955)Mickey Spillane's Kiss Me Deadly
When callous thugs beat Mike Hammer (Ralph Meeker) senseless and viciously murder the gorgeous blonde he's been trying to help, the hard-boiled detective retaliates the only way he can: by hitting first and asking questions later. Cutting a brutal swathe through the city's sleazy underside, Hammer uncovers a mysterious black container whose deadly contents not only solve the murder...but trigger an apocalyptic climax as well! - Director:
- Robert Aldrich
- Cast:
- Nat 'King' Cole, Ralph Meeker, Albert Dekker
- Formats:
-
-
Barbara Stanwyck sizzles, Henry Fonda bumbles, and Preston Sturges runs riot in one of the all-time great screwballs, a pitch-perfect blend of comic zing and swoonworthy romance. Aboard a cruise liner sailing up the coast of South America, Stanwyck's conniving card sharp sets her sights on Fonda's nerdy snake researcher, who happens to be the heir to a brewery fortune. But when the con artist falls for her mark, her grift becomes a game of hearts - and she is determined to win it all. One in a string of matchless comedic marvels that Sturges wrote and directed as part of a dazzling 1940s run, this gender-flipped battle-of-wits farce is perhaps his most emotionally satisfying work, tempering its sparkling humor with a streak of tender poignancy supplied by the sensational Stanwyck at her peak. - Director:
- Preston Sturges
- Cast:
- Barbara Stanwyck, Henry Fonda, Charles Coburn
- Formats:
-
-
Dana Andrews stars as Mark Dixon, a corrupt cop, in this gritty noir thriller shot on the rain-slicked streets of New York. Already in trouble for his brutal methods, alienated from his colleagues, he pursues a gang leader with vindictive zeal and accidentally kills a possible murder suspect. His guilt deepens when he falls in love with the dead man's wife and her father, an innocent cab driver, finds himself accused of the murder. Dixon finds the ultimate redemption - at a price. Otto Preminger brings a welcome sympathy and complexity to every character on-screen, from the nervous police informer through to the cocky mobster, the exasperated police chief, and Dixon himself, burdened with self-hatred as the son of a thief. Joseph LaShelle's photography lends a seedy glamour to the run-down lodging houses, cheap cafe's and night-time exteriors. - Director:
- Otto Preminger
- Cast:
- Dana Andrews, Charles Tannen, Gene Tierney
- Formats:
-
-
The Mechanic (1972)Killer of Killers
Arthur Bishop (Charles Bronson) is a mob hit man who operates in a world of his own, an uncompromising world where conventional rules of morality don't apply and where one wrong move could cost him his life! He's always worked alone, but as age catches up with him, Bishop takes on a competent and ruthless apprentice (Jan-Michael Vincent) and teaches him everything he knows. Together they become an unmatchable team of globetrotting killers...until the pupil's ruthlessness puts him on a collision course with his teacher! - Director:
- Michael Winner
- Cast:
- Charles Bronson, Jan-Michael Vincent, Keenan Wynn
- Formats:
-
-
A young reporter, Mike Ward (John McGuire) stumbles upon a murder victim and identifies a nervous cabbie (Elisha Cook Jr) as the person he saw previously arguing with the dead man. On the strength of Mike's testimony, the cabbie is convicted. Mike however is haunted by the knowledge that he may have sent an innocent man to the electric chair for murder and that means the real maniac is still on the loose! Things take a turn for the worse when another murder is committed, a murder which may point, ironically enough, back to Mike... - Director:
- Boris Ingster
- Cast:
- Peter Lorre, John McGuire, Margaret Tallichet
- Formats:
-
-
Living (2022)Ikiru
London, 1953. Mr. Williams, played by Bill Nighy, is a veteran civil servant, a cog in the city's stifling bureaucracy as it struggles to rebuild following WWII. After a shattering health diagnosis, it dawns on him he has not been living his life to the full. Amidst the fog of his paperwork, and his loneliness at home, he yearns to find fulfilment before it's too late. He is encouraged in his search by two younger colleagues - the vibrant Margaret (Aimee Lou Wood) and idealistic new recruit Peter (Alex Sharp) - and a hedonistic stranger, Sutherland (Tom Burke), encountered during a desperate trip to the seaside. - Director:
- Oliver Hermanus
- Cast:
- Bill Nighy, Aimee Lou Wood, Alex Sharp
- Formats:
-
-
Rome, Open City (1945)Roma, città aperta
One of the greatest foreign language films ever made, Roberto Rossellini "Rome, Open City" was filmed in the direct aftermath of World War II on the war-ravaged streets of Italy. Based on real events that took place in the Nazi-occupied Italy in 1944, it examines the choices that people are forced to make in wartime. Centring on the Resistance and its members, this is a tragic and emotional exploration of human spirit and the effects of war. - Director:
- Roberto Rossellini
- Cast:
- Anna Magnani, Aldo Fabrizi, Marcello Pagliero
- Formats:
-
-
Dr. Alithea Binnie (Tilda Swinton) is an academic - content with life and a creature of reason. While in Istanbul attending a conference, she happens to encounter a Djinn (Idris Elba) who offers her three wishes in exchange for his freedom. This presents two problems. First, she doubts that he is real and second, because she is a scholar of story and mythology, she knows all the cautionary tales of wishes gone wrong. The Djinn pleads his case by telling her fantastical stories of his past. Eventually she is beguiled and makes a wish that surprises them both. - Director:
- George Miller
- Cast:
- Tilda Swinton, Idris Elba, Erdil Yasaroglu
- Formats:
-