greatest-ever-made's - Rented List

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The film that brought Jacques Tati international acclaim also launched his on-screen alter ego: the courteous, well-meaning, eternally accident-prone Monsieur Hulot with whom Tati would from now on be inseparably associated.

As with Jour de fete, Vacances is set in a sleepy French coastal resort which is seasonally disrupted by holidaymakers in energetic pursuit of fun. At the centre of the chaos is the eccentric Hulot, struggling at all times to maintain appearances, but somehow entirely divorced from his immediate surroundings. There is little plot in Tati's beautifully orchestrated 'ballet' of comic action: it's a series of incidents, a seamless succession of gently studies of human absurdity.

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Kitty Foyle (Ginger Rogers) is infatuated by well-to-do Wyn Stafford (Dennis Morgan). But, scared of losing his place in respectable society, Wyn is reluctant to marry Kitty, who lacks the pedigree his family expects.

Distraught, Kitty moves to New York and begins a new romance with decent Dr Mark Eisen (James Craig). But she still yearns for Wyn; when he follows her to the city, she is forced to make a choice that will affect her entire life...

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Yasujiro Ozu's hugely influential award-winning masterpiece, 'Late Spring', is a tender meditation on family politics, sacrifice and the status quo.

Noriko (Setsuko Hara) and her father, Professor Somiya (Chishu Ryu), live together in perfect harmony but old certainties are put at risk when an interfering aunt raises the question of marriage. Introducing Ozu's popular Noriko character, 'Late Spring' poignantly examines the gradual compromise between modernity and tradition.

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One man is a paragon of virtue. The other is a murderous creature of the London night. They are Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. And they are the same person.

Best Actor Academy Award winner Fredric March plays the man/monster in the exoressionistic, pre-Code 1932 version (Side A), morphing before your eyes into a fiend that impacted the look of Creature Features to come. Spencer Tracy headlines the 1941 film of Robert Louis Stevenson's tale of mind and madness (Side B). It's a glossy, star-powered work whose Freudian undercurrents include a dreamscape in which carriage horses whipped by Hyde transform into the women in his life (Ingrid Bergman and Lana Turner). Two of the very beast from horror's archives. Two ways to watch and appease your inner monster!

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In the story of Gilda, Johnny Farrell (Glenn Ford) goes to work for Ballin Mundson (George MacReady), the proprietor of an illegal gambling casino in a South American city, and quickly rises to become Mundson's "main man".

All is well until Mundson returns from a trip with his new bride, Gilda - a woman from Johnny's past. Mundson, unaware of the previous love affair, assigns Farrell the job of ensuring that Gilda is a faithful wife. Fraught with hatred, Gilda does her best to antagonize, intimidate, and instill jealousy in Farrell - until circumstances allow him to get even.

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After a late-night cup of coffee, vaudevillians Jo Hayden and Harry Palmer sit at a piano and work a song. Moments later, Jo realizes she's found exactly what she wasn't looking for: a partner. And with Judy Garland as Jo and Gene Kelly as Harry, the partnership isn't just ideal.

It's a film fan's dream come true. Kelly debuts and Garland dazzles in this Busby Berkeley-directed tale of a song-and-dance pair who take on tank towns, tough times and World War I while struggling for show-biz success. A hit parade of era tunes paces the film, including the wowser "Ballin' the Jack" and the sweetly harmonized title tune. Bursting with vitality and old-fashioned charm, "For Me and My Gal" is for the ages.

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Though she is engaged to a politician (Vincent Price), Ellen (Gene Tierney) lures the handsome Richard (Cornel Wilde) into marriage after knowing him just a few days.

But Richard soon learns from her sister (Jeanne Crain) and mother (Mary Philips) that Ellen's selfish, possessive love has ruined other people's lives. When his own brother drowns while in Ellen's care and she has an accident that kills her unborn child, Richard grows increasingly suspicious of he insatiable devotion.

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When, beset by debt, Madame de...

(Danielle Darrieux) decides to sell a pair of earrings that were a wedding gift from her husband Andre (Charles Boyer), she unwittingly sets in motion a chain of events that will have serious consequences, not only for the Parisian couple but for Andre's mistress and for an Italian Baron (Vittorio De Sica) who purchases the, by then, much-travelled jewellery.

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They say crime doesn't pay. Private detective Philip Marlowe (Dick Powell) knows better.

The fat wad of folding money warming his breast pocket is the kind of thing that keeps him going through thick and thicker as he wades chin deep into a mystery involving a missing necklace and a missing hoodlum's moll named Velma.

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Lieutenant Diamond (Cornel Wilde) is determined to bring down mob boss Mr Brown (Richard Conte), even if it means jeopardising his own career, but the feeling is mutual and the unscrupulous gangster is more than willing to operate outside the law to get his man.

The confrontation escalates, leading to some wince-inducing set-pieces involving such handy props as a radio and a hearing aid.

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McNeil (Sebastian Cabot) is a greedy hotel owner who wants to take control of Prairie City, the Texas town of the title. Keen to drive the local farmers off their land, McNeil hires a gunman, Johnny Crale (Nedrick Young), resulting in the death of a former whaler.

The dead man's son, George Hansen (Sterling Hayden), arrives in town to inherit the farm and set the stage for revenge - armed with only his father's old harpoon...

Melissa McCarthy is masterful in the captivating account - based on a true story - of a down-and-out writer who resorts to lies, deceit and outright crime to get back on top.

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Set in the uncertain years after the Civil War, John Chandler (Alan Ladd) journeys north to seek medical help for his young son who, since witnessing a horrific incident during the war, has been unable to speak.

Chandler finds himself sentenced to 30 days in jail after wrongly being accused of starting a brawl with two brothers from a powerful local ranching family - the Burleighs. A local woman who witnessed the fight, Linnett Moore (Olivia de Havilland) comes to the father and son's rescue and pays the fine in exchange for 30 days work on her farm but it seems Chandler isn't the only one to have had a run-in with the Burleigh family. Linnett's farm borders the Burleigh property and they're going to take her land whatever the cost.

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The controversial subject of evolution versus creation causes two polar opposites to engage in one explosive battle of beliefs.

Attorney Henry Drummond (Spencer Tracy) faces off against fundamentalist leader Matthew Harrison Brady (Frederic March) in a small Tennessee town where a teacher has been brought to trial for teaching Darwinism. Let the trial begin...and watch the sparks fly!

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The morning after Julia Ross (Nina Foch) takes a job in London as secretary to wealthy widow Mrs. Williamson Hughes (Dame May Whitty), she wakes up in a windswept Cornish mansion, having been drugged. Mrs.

Hughes and her volatile son, Ralph (George Macready), attempt to gaslight Julia into believing she is Ralph's wife, Marion. Her belongings have been destroyed, the windows barred and the locals believe that she is mad. Will Julia be able to escape before she falls prey to the Hughes sinister charade? And what happened to the real Marion Hughes?