Frenchman's Creek (1944)

Based on the Daphne DuMaurier novel, this rapturous adventure is unapologetic-ally female in its viewpoint. Joan Fontaine plays an English noblewoman neglected by her foolish husband, and stalked by a decadent,womanising lord (the great Basil Rathbone, at his most silky and depraved). Fleeing to her county home in Cornwall, she finds French pirate Arturo De Cordova operating out of a secluded creek on her property - causing an uproar among her neighbours. She tries to stick up for the moral principles of her class,but finds herself so attracted to the philosophical Frenchman and the freedom of his outlaw lifestyle, that she protects him, even joining in his illicit adventures.