daniel-phillips's - Rented List

Sylvia (Anne Raitt) leads a quiet life caring for her sister Hilda (Sarah Stephenson) who has complex care needs. Their lonely suburban existence is accentuated by a social awkwardness that detaches them from the community and fuels a life of seclusion and despair.

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"Trances" (Transes) is a picture unlike any other: a poetic, roving documentary-portrait performance-film based around the Moroccan band Nass El Ghiwane.

In this rare, transformational work, Nass El Ghiwane perform their music at concerts at once fervidly rally-like and suffused with the spontaneity of a mass happening; recount their time working alongside the great chaabi musician Boudjemaa El Ankis in the 1970's; and generally philosophise and reflect upon life. True to its title, 'Trances' is an hypnotic, exhilarating masterwork.

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Audacious cat burglar Grant Henry (David Warbeck) steals more than just wealthy women's diamonds in this riotous 1973 British sex comedy.

The dashing gentleman thief becomes the talk of London, but a pretty insurance investigator (Diane Keen) and breast-obsessed policeman (Michael Armstrong) are hot on his heels.

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Winner of the Silver Bear for Best Documentary at the 2017 Berlin Film Festival, Palestinian filmmaker Raed Andoni's powerful feature is a hybrid of documentary, fiction and experimental film.

Gathering together a group of survivors from the infamous Al-Moscobiya prison, Israel's main interrogation centre, Andoni asks them to recreate the physical space of the jail - a place he was also detained as a teenager. As they build, together they confront their experiences of incarceration and torture. A boldly personal and uncompromisingly political work, 'Ghost Hunting' explores the ethics and meaning of re-enactment, questioning the complicity of both filmmaker and viewer in this provocative and cathartic experiment.

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What happens when an object of suspicion becomes a case of obsession? When detective Hae-joon (Park Hae-il) arrives on the murder scene, he begins to suspect the dead man's wife Seo-rae (Tang Wei) may know more than she initially lets on.

But as he digs deeper into the investigation, Hae-joon finds himself trapped in a web of deception and desire, proving that the darkest mysteries lurk inside the human heart.

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A Tokyo suburb buzzing with gossip is the backdrop to Ozu’s cheerful comedy, 'Good Morning' (1959). Disillusioned with the meaningless talk of their elders, two brothers take a vow of silence when their parents refuse to buy them a TV.

'Good Morning' pokes fun at the silliness of everyday chatter whilst gently acknowledging its fundamental necessity. Also included here is Ozu’s superb early comedy 'I Was Born, But...' (1932) The forerunner of 'Good Morning', this silent masterpiece contains many similar themes but has a darker edge. As brothers Ryoichi and Keiji struggle to outwit the local bully and scale the pecking order in their new neighbourhood they find out that injustice does not end with school.

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Halim (Saleh Bakri) and Mina (Lubna Azabal) run a traditional caftan store in one of Morocco's oldest medinas. The couple have lived for a long time with Halim's secret, his homosexuality, which he has learnt to keep quiet about.

Mina's illness and the arrival of a young apprentice will disturb this equilibrium. United in their love, each will help the other confront their fears.

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Jess Aarons (Josh Hutcherson) is an outsider at school and even in his own family, until he befriends a new girl at school, Leslie Burke (AnnaSophia Robb). Leslie loves to tell stories of fantasy and magic. Jess loves to draw and together they create the secret kingdom of Terabithia.

A magical place that only they can escape to, by swinging on an old rope over a stream in the woods near their homes. There, the friends rule the kingdom, fight the Dark Master and his creatures and plot against the school bullies.

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Gaza. Synonymous to so many with conflict, destruction and despair but to Mohammed Assaf, and his sister Nour, Gaza is their home and their playground. It's where they, along with their best friends Ahmad and Omar, play music, football and dare to dream big.

For Mohammed and Nour, nothing less than playing the world famous Cairo Opera Hall will do. It might take them a lifetime to get there but, as Mohammed will find out, some dreams are worth living for. Mohammed knows he has a rare gift. To make people smile and forget their troubles. And so, in front of him on TV one evening lies an impossible dream: the auditions for Arab Idol, the most popular show in the Arab world, are taking place in Cairo. The borders are closed. There is no way out. Somehow, he finds a way and makes it in front of the judges in Egypt. From there, destiny awaits, a chance to change his life and give a voiceless people the greatest feeling of all: the freedom to love, live and feel free.

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Winner of numerous festival prizes all over the world, 'When I Saw You' is the second film from the Jordan-based Palestinian film-maker Annemarie Jacir, (and Palestine's 2012 Oscar' entry) and is set in 1967 when thousands of Palestinian refugees fled to camps in Jordan in the wake of the June War.

The 11 year-old Tarek, along with his mother Ghaydaa, has been separated from his father in the general chaos. Stifled and bored in the refugee camp, Tarek goes in search of his father in the forest around and ends up with a group of fedayeen who adopt him as a kind of mascot. Soon his mother arrives too, and they try to make their way home, leaving behind victimhood with a new-found sense of hope and freedom.

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Omar is accustomed to dodging surveillance bullets as be crosses the separation wall every bay to visit his secret love Nadia. But occupied Palestine knows neither simple love nor clear-cut war.

To prove himself to Nadia's family, the sensitive young baker becomes a freedom fighter and must soon face painful choices about life and manhood. When he is captured after a deadly act of resistance, he falls into a cat-and-mouse game with the military police. Suspicion and betrayal jeopardise his longtime trust with friends and accomplices and Omar's feelings become as torn apart as the Palestinian landscape.

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A festival favourite with critics and audiences in 2013 - and winner of Best Film at Edinburgh - 'A World Not Ours' is an intimate, humorous portrait of three generations in exile in the refugee camp of Ein el-Helweh in southern Lebanon.

Based on a wealth of personal recordings, family archives, and historical footage, the film is a sensitive and illuminating study of belonging, friendship and family.

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Judy Garland stars in a timeless tale of family, captured with warmth and emotion by director Vincente Minnelli. The enduring popularity of Meet Me in St Louis comes from a terrific blend of music, romance and humour.

Starring Judy Garland, together with Margaret O'Brien (as 1944's outstanding child actress) and Mary Astor, and featuring the musical classics "Meet Me in St. Louis, Louis", "The Trolley Song" and "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas".

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In a small, woodsy Oregon town, a group of friends - sensitive Gordie (Wil Wheaton), tough guy Chris (River Phoenix), flamboyant Teddy (Corey Feldman), and scaredy-cat Vern (Jerry O'connell) - are in search of a missing teenager's body.

Wanting to be heroes in each other's and their hometown's eyes, they set out on an unforgettable two-day trek that turns into an odyssey of self-discovery. They sneak smokes, tell tall tales, cuss 'cause it's cool and band together when the going gets tough. When they encounter the town's knife-wielding hoods who are also after the body, the boys discover a strength they never knew they had.

A treasure trove of fun awaits when a Caribbean beauty (Judy Garland) with a mad crush on a legendary pirate meets a vagabond actor (Gene Kelly) who poses as the scoundrel. Vincente Minnelli directs, bringing his uncanny skill with color and design to this joyous romp set to Cole Porter tunes.