paul-b's - Rented List

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Ernest Hemingway s spare, laconic short story about two professional killers and their encounter with a mysteriously unresisting victim was significantly expanded into this all-time film noir classic, which Hemingway said was the first adaptation of his work that he really admired.

As washed-up boxer turned hitman victim Ole 'Swede' Andreson, Burt Lancaster made his screen debut, and was catapulted to instant stardom, not least for the screen chemistry that he showed opposite sultry Ava Gardner, whose Kitty Collins is the very personification of the femme fatale. German émigré Robert Siodmak was one of the filmmakers who helped create film noir, and Elwood Bredell s high-contrast cinematography, all harsh lighting and long shadows, elevates the film far above a conventional crime drama. But even on that level it s a first-rate demonstration of how to maintain narrative tension, with the flashback structure withholding crucial details until almost the very end.

When a ship carrying 50,000 cases of whiskey runs aground, the inhabitants of a Scottish island cannot resist the temptation to replenish their depleted supplies. Only an English Home Guard captain stands in their way.

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Following a prolonged battle with addiction and self-destruction, Krisha (Krisha Fairchild), the black sheep of the family she abandoned, returns for a holiday celebration.

But what begins as a moving testament to the family's capacity to forgive soon spirals into a deluge of emotional bloodletting, as old wounds are torn open, and resentments are laid bare.

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When career thief Gaston Monescu (Herbert Marshall) meets glamorous pickpocket Lily (Miriam Hopkins), their love soon takes on a professional dimension as they initiate a plot to rob beautiful perfume magnate Mariette Colet (Kay Francis).

But as Gaston gets ever closer to his intended prey, his romantic confusion, as well as the threat that his past will catch up with him, throws their plan into jeopardy.

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Marriage, the class system, the church, the state and the frivolous hypocrisy of modern life all come within the firing line of Jimmy Porter, cinema's original angry young man and celebrated playwright John Osborne's most iconic creation.

An absolute landmine of a movie on its original release, 'Look Back in Anger' inspired and shocked audiences with its unrepentant realism, explosive dialogue and frank portrayal of everyday, contemporary British life. Featuring an incredibly intense, breakthrough performance from screen legend Richard Burton, "Look Back in Anger" is often cited as igniting the radical 'Angry Young Men' movement in film and theatre, which ran parallel with America's 'Beat Generation' and formed a gritty, groundbreaking pre-cursor to the sixties 'Kitchen Sink' dramas. By night he drunkenly prowls the local Jazz clubs, by day he runs his own market stall. Disaffected and abusive, Jimmy Porter (Richard Burton) is constantly at odds with his mundane existence, his middle-class wife and their squalid living conditions. But what really lies at the core of his resentful rebellion?

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Before she was Wonder Woman, she was Diana (Gal Gadot), princess of the Amazons, raised on a sheltered island paradise and trained to be an unconquerable warrior.

When an American pilot (Chris Pine) crashes on their shores and tells of a massive conflict raging in the outside world, Diana leaves her home, convinced she can stop the threat. Fighting alongside man in a war to end all wars, Diana will discover her full powers...and her true destiny.

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Three years after her untimely death, an upcoming exhibition celebrating famed war photographer Isabelle Reed brings her eldest son Jonah back to the family home, forcing him to spend more time with his father Gene and withdrawn younger brother Conrad than he has in years.

With the three of them under the same roof, Gene tries desperately to connect with his two sons, but they struggle to reconcile their feelings about the woman they remember so differently.

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It's only a state of mind. Jonathan Pryce stars as Sam Lowry in this surrealistic spectacle about a daydreaming bureaucrat trapped in a future dystopia where love is forbidden from interfering with efficiency.

But with the help of an underground superhero (Robert De Niro) and a beautiful mystery woman (Kim Greist), Sam learns to soar to freedom on the wings of his untamed imagination, or so he thinks.

When estranged twins Maggie (Kristen Wiig) and Milo (Bill Hader) feel that they're at the end of their ropes, an unexpected reunion forces them to confront why their lives went so wrong. As the twins reconnect, they realise the key to fixing their lives may just lie in repairing their relationship.

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'Signs' is the gripping story of an ordinary family as they encounter the possibility that Earth is being invaded by creatures from another planet. When Graham Hess (Mel Gibson) and his family awaken to find a 500-foot crop circle in their backyard, they're told extraterrestrials are responsible.

As they watch with growing dread, news reports tell of similar "signs" suddenly appearing all over the world!

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The remarkable feature film debut of Nir Bergman, Broken Wings tells the story of recently widowed Dafna and her increasingly estranged four children.

Five year old Bar suffers from feelings of abandonment, while 10 year old Ido attempts to break the world record in the free jump - into an empty swimming pool.The teenage son, Yair, refuses to go back to school, preferring to spend his time dressed as a mouse distributing leaflets in the metro.Seventeen yaer old Maya harbours feelings of anger and guilt as she is obliged to take on the role of surrogate mother to the younger children. As the day progresses and the individual stories of the greving family members interwine, an unexpected incident begins to pull them in the same direction, giving them a vestige of hope and a chance to heal their broken hearts and once again brace their broken wings.

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This film is a unique and extraordinary response to the catastrophic events in New York City that shook the world on September 11, 2001.

producer Alain Brigand invited 11 renowned international directors to look towards their own cultures, their own memories, their own stories and their own language, and create a film lasting eleven minutes, nine seconds and one frame - 11'09''O1 - around September 11 and its consequences. The thought-provoking results - made with complete freedom of expression and in a spirit of complete equality - cover a diverse range of sensibilities and viewpoints and testify to the resonance of the event throughout the world

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Liam Neeson stars in this action-packed thriller that will have you on the edge of your seat from start to finish. When his daughter is kidnapped in Paris, a former spy (Neeson) sets out to find her at any cost.

Relying on his special skills, he tracks down the ruthless gang that abducted her and launches a one-man war to bring them to justice and rescue his daughter

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Edward Yang's multi-award-winning film looks at several turbulent weeks in the life of the Jian family. Husband and father NJ (Nien-Jen Wu) is a partner in a failing software company, which might just save itself by teaming up with an innovative Japanese games designer.

Meanwhile his wife Min-Min (Elaine Jin) has gone off to a mountain retreat with a dubious guru, his teenage daughter Ting Ting (Kelly Lee) is getting her first, rough lessons in love, his young son Yang-Yang (Jonathan Chang) is asking difficult questions and getting into trouble at school - and his mother-in-law has suffered a stroke and lies in a coma. In the middle of all the confusion NJ runs into his childhood sweetheart Sherry, the girl he jilted twenty years earlier, and starts to wonder about starting over.

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Ruthless criminals, a dedicated honest cop, sultry women and a gripping plot - all the elements of a classic police action-drama are here in force. Police Sergeant Bannion (Glenn Ford) is investigating the apparent suicide of a corrupt cop, then is suddenly ordered to stop - and The Big Heat is on.

Driven to unravel the mystery, Bannion continues probing until an explosion meant for him, kills his wife. He resigns from he force and soon learns that behind it all is the powerful underworld led by Mike Lagana (Alexander Scourby) and his cold-blooded henchman, Vince Stone (Lee Marvin). When Stone's girl Debby (Gloria Grahame) makes a play for Bannion, Stone disfigures her face and in revenge, she tells all she knows. A life-or-death confrontation between Bannion and Stone brings this classic film noir thriller to a climatic unmissable finale!