jens-rentals's - Rented List

Westminster and Whitehall clash again as the Rt Hon James Hacker, the Minister for Administrative Affairs, locks horns with his Permanent Secretary Sir Humphrey Appleby.

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A sweeping tale of ill-fated romance and cross-channel relationships. Jean-Pierre Leaud plays Claude, a young Parisian who meets two English girls - Anne, a sculptress, and Muriel, a schoolteacher - on a turn-of-the-century trip to Wales.

This meeting will spark a menage-a-trois spanning over 20 years, during which time alliances will be formed, broken, rearranged and reassembled in a tumultuous yet humorous portrait of human interconnectivity.

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Adapted from a Simenon novel and written in collaboration with legendary screenwriters Aurenche and Bost, The Watchmaker Of St. Paul was Tavernier's debut feature.

An ordinary man, the watchmaker of the title, finds his well ordered life blown apart by the discovery that his son is wanted for murder. Deeply shocked, The Watchmaker is forced to explore his own actions and ideals in a search for answers. His journey leads him to question old relationships, as well as forging new ones, as a wary understanding begins to form between him and the police inspector investigating the crime.

Epic story of love and memory that begins in 1953 and journeys across the world and the great realm of history to the present day. Willem Dafoe stars as an American filmmaker of Greek descent making a film about his mother's (Irene Jacob), extraordinary quest to reunite with her husband in America.

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The Compassionate Society
The brand new St Edward's Hospital has been open for 15 months with 350 administrators and 150 ancillary staff. But it has no patients...
Doing the Honours

"It's the only hold we have over Civil Servants. I can't stop their pay rises, I can't prevent their promotion, don't even write their reports - but I can withhold their honours".
The Death List
The Minister's stance on covert surveillance during his opposition days comes back to bug him when he realises his department buys the phone tapping equipment.
The Greasy Pole
Plans for a new chemical factory hinge on the outcome of an independent report. But Jim discovers even science can be open to manipulation - when the PM takes an interest.
The Devil You Know
A cabinet reshuffle coincides with Hacker's appointment in Brussels... "One day you're out of the office - the next day you're OUT of the office..."
The Quality of Life
The sanctity of the environment is Jim's latest vote-winner. But the city farm he has vowed to keep open is being turned into a car park for Inland Revenue inspectors. How come Sir Humphrey is so smug about the whole affair?
A Question of Loyalty
Hacker has declared war on waste and he is going to "teach the world a lesson". Then a select committee tests the Minister's loyalty in his own department...

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Laura (Penelope Cruz) and her children travel from Buenos Aires to the small Spanish village where she was born to attend her sister's wedding. Unexpected events soon lead to a crisis that exposes the family's hidden past.

Suspicions mount, loved ones begin to turn on one another, and dark secrets long hidden threaten to come to light, revealing shocking truths.

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All seven episodes of the classic BBC sitcom. In 'Open Government', the Rt Hon Jim Hacker (Paul Eddington), newly appointed Minister for Administrative Affairs, finds his idealism challenged from the start.

'The Official Visit' has Jim receiving an African President who turns out to be a friend from his university days. 'The Economy Drive' sees Jim attempt to initiate an economy drive within the Civil Service. 'Big Brother' finds Sir Humphrey (Nigel Hawthorne) concerned about a new National Integrated Database. 'The Writing on the Wall' has Jim consider the introduction of identity cards. 'The Right to Know' sees Sir Humphrey bothered by the controversy surrounding an endangered badger colony. Finally, in 'Jobs for the Boys', Jim seeks help from a banker when a pet project seems near to collapse.

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From acclaimed writer/director Sofia Coppola comes an atmospheric thriller that unfolds at a secluded girls' boarding school in Civil War-era Virginia.

When a wounded Union soldier, Corporal McBumey (Colin Farrell), is found near the school he's taken in by its headmistress, Miss Martha (Nicole Kidman). As the young women provide refuge and tend to his wounds, the house is taken over with sexual tension and dangerous rivalries when McBumey seduces several of the girls. Taboos are broken and events take an unexpected turn in this gripping and haunting thriller also starring Kirsten Dunst and Elle Fanning.

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Jia Zhangke's eighth feature is an intimate yet epic drama spanning several decades which charts the impact of China's move towards capitalism on the lives of one family.

Divided into three parts (set in 1999, 2014 and Australia in 2025), 'Mountains May Depart' follows the life of Shen Tao (played by Jia's regular collaborator Zhao Tao) and her family through 26 tumultuous years. Perhaps his most ambitious film yet, Jia's film is an astute, humane study of how the emergent culture of capitalist materialism and the forces of globalisation have impacted on Chinese society and family life.

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Ambitious, award-winning German series, 'Babylon Berlin' is thrilling crime period drama.

Opening in the fall of 1929 Berlin, during the tumultuous weeks before Black Friday's stock market crash, the third series sees Inspector Gereon Rath (Volker Bruch) and Charlotte Ritter (Liv Lisa Fries) assigned to investigate the death of an actress, only to realise that the film industry is as rotten as the underworld. In the meantime, the Black Reichswehr are regathering their forces for their next attempt to bring down democracy and provoke more clashes with the Communists.

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Under the stark white lights of an empty Broadway theatre, a stream of hopefuls audition before Zach (Michael Douglas), the harsh and critical director of a new musical.

There is tension in the air as sixteen are singled out for further auditioning, and as the director and his assistant put the dancers through their paces, they begin to relay their lives into word and song. Suddenly an unexpected latecomer arrives. It is Cassie (Alyson Reed), a beautiful and talented dancer who used to be a star, returned to ask Zach, her former lover, for a job. Passions run high, but he allows her to audition. Over the course of the day, the dancers, all desperate for the job, reveal more and more about themselves to the ever watchful director, as he searches for his chosen Chorus Line.

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Berlin, 1929: a metropolis in turmoil. Speculation and inflation are tearing away at the foundations of the young Weimar Republic. Growing poverty and unemployment stand in stark contrast to the excesses and indulgence of the city's night life and its overflowing creative energy.

Gereon Rath (Volker Bruch), a young police inspector from Cologne, is transferred to Berlin. Together with stenotypist Charlotte Ritter (Liv Lisa Fries) and his partner Bruno Wolter (Peter Kurth), Rath is confronted with a tangled web of corruption, forcing him into an existential conflict as he is torn between loyalty and uncovering the truth. With the political unrest and rising National Socialism, even an institution like the 'Rote Burg', Berlin's police headquarters is increasingly becoming the melting pot of a democracy whose days are numbered. This is 'Babylon Berlin'.

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She was one of Venice's most intriguing women - a celebrated poet and courtesan - Veronica Franco (Catherine McCormack) defied convention and lived for love.

A young and innocent Veronica falls in love with the handsome nobleman Marco Venier (Rufus Sewell) but because of her station, she knows they can never be married. Veronica's mother (Jacqueline Bisset) offers her an alternative - a life as a courtesan. She is suddenly exposed to a world of sensuality, luxury, and a place where most women are not allowed - the center of Venetian culture. Her beauty, intelligence and conviction make her one of the most revered - and reviled - women in Venice. But as the Inquisition, war and the plague creep into the city, Veronica is forced to stand trial in front of a court made up of men... many of whom had once shared her bed!

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Roy Marsden stars as Adam Dalgliesh, the shrewd yet cool thinking man's detective...A corpse is found floating in a dinghy at sea and turns out to be the body of crime writer Maurice Seton (Arthur Blake).

As the case takes its hold, Dalgliesh's dedication to duty threatens a rekindled love affair and puts his girlfriend's life at risk. Finally, trapped in raging flood waters with the insane killer, Dalgliesh has to fight for his own survival.

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Isabelle Huppert stars as Ann. a gifted and brilliant musician whose sense of security falls to pieces when she witnesses her husband kissing another woman.

Without hesitation, she abandons him and takes a headlong rush into a new beginning, embarking on a transnational journey that ultimately takes her to an isolated island villa and into the arms of local woman Giulia. with whom Ann begins to explore a whole new facet of life.