greatest-ever-made's - Rented List

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Can an aspiring model find happiness on a billboard?! That's what Gladys Glover (Judy Holiday) finds out in this delightful romantic comedy.

Unable to find steady work as a model, Gladys devises an ingenious gimmick: she uses all of her savings to rent a large billboard overlooking New York City's Columbus Circle featuring her name. As it turns out, that billboard is in high demand - Evan Adams III's (Peter Lawford) company wants it for himself. With interest in more than just her career, Adams strikes a deal with Gladys whereby she acquires additional billboard locations. Under the guidance of a slick promoter (Michael O'Shea), Gladys becomes a national celebrity. Then she realises she must decide between her boyfriend (Jack Lemmon) and this exciting new life.

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Richard Wanley (Edward G. Robinson), a middle aged, world-weary, psychology professor, who finds himself suddenly captivated by a portrait of a beautiful young woman in the window of a local gallery.

In a strange twist of fate the woman in the picture (a radiant Joan Bennett) appears before Richard and invites him back to her apartment. Everything seems to be going fine until Wanley is attacked by her possessive boyfriend and ends up murdering him in self-defence. Alice convinces Richard to cover up the crime, but as Richard's district attorney friend (Raymond Massey) investigates and the boyfriend's bodyguard (Dan Duryea) begins to apply pressure to Richard, the walls begin to close in...

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Advertising man Jim Blandings (Cary Grant) and his wife, Muriel (Myrna Loy), harassed by city living, decide to move to the country. Jim goes to Connecticut to look at old houses and is enticed into buying a run-down farm.

It soon becomes apparent that Jim has not only been overcharged, but he has also been sold a lemon. Muriel, loudly seconded by Bill Cole (Melvyn Douglas), Jim's attorney, advises him that the situation is not as bad as it appears. As Jim and Muriel try to decide what needs to be done to the house, and how they should go about making the improvements, the dream house looks more and more like a nightmare. Estimates from the local contractors - whom all advise a quick and merciful death for the collapsing relic - rise higher and higher. Jim discovers that he only owns 31 acres of land, whereas he thought he was buying 50. And to top it all off, he wonders just how fond Bill and Muriel are of each other. Jim refuses to give up hope. The old house swallows more of his time and money than he thought possible, but, through his persistence, Jim finally gets his dream house.

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Nervous spinster Charlotte Vale (Bette Davis) is stunted from growing up under the heel of her puritanical Boston Brahmin mother (Gladys Cooper), and remains convinced of her own unworthiness until a kindly psychiatrist (Claude Rains) gives her the confidence to venture out into the world on a

South American cruise. On board, she finds her footing with the help of an unhappily married man (Paul Henreid). Their thwarted love affair may help Charlotte break free of her mother's grip - but will she find fulfillment as well as independence?

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Nick and Nora Charles cordially invite you to bring your own alibi to The Thin Man, the jaunty whodunit that made William Powell and Myrna Loy the champagne elite of sleuthing, Bantering in the boudoir, enjoying walks with beloved dog Asta or matching each other highball for highball and clue for

clue, they combined screwball romance with mystery. The resulting triumph nabbed four Academy Award nominations (including Best Picture) and spawned five sequels. Credit W.S. " Woody" Van Dyke for recognizing that Powell and Loy were ideal together and for getting the studio's okay by promising to shoot this splendid adaptation of Dashiell Hammett's novel in three weeks. He took 12 days. They didn't call him "One-Take Woody" for nothing.

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Denigrated by the public, vilified by the critics, re-cut at the insistence of its producers, and finally banned by the French government as 'demoralising' and unpatriotic, La Regle du jeu was a commercial disaster at the time of its original release.

On the surface, a series of interlinked romantic intrigues taking place at a weekend shooting party in a country chateau, the film is in fact a study of the corruption and decay within French society on the eve of the outbreak of World War II.

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When callous thugs beat Mike Hammer (Ralph Meeker) senseless and viciously murder the gorgeous blonde he's been trying to help, the hard-boiled detective retaliates the only way he can: by hitting first and asking questions later.

Cutting a brutal swathe through the city's sleazy underside, Hammer uncovers a mysterious black container whose deadly contents not only solve the murder...but trigger an apocalyptic climax as well!

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The backdrop is 1930's Hollywood.... a time when movie moguls ruled the studios and stars do what they're told for the sake of their latest picture.

In this witty, tongue-in-check, musical comedy, Tyrone Power is Jimmy Sutton, the consummate studio publicist who knows how to get headlines - even if he has to make them up. Rudy Vallee is Roger Maxwell, the singing film star who needs all the attention he can get. And Sonja Henie is the Minnesota school teacher who miraculously lands the most coveted role in Consolidated Studio's newest picture Innocent and eager, she has no idea her exciting new "romance" with Roger was dreamed up by Sutton for the maximum news coverage. Snappy dialogue and a wonderful Irving Berlin score make Second Fiddle a charming fictional account of Hollywood in its heyday.

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In this irresistible musical, the legendary dancing duo Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers are at the pinnacle of their art as a feckless gambler and the shrewd dancing instructor in whom he more than meets his match.

Director George Stevens laces their romance with humor and clears the floor for the movies showstopping dance scenes, in which Astaire and Rogers take seemingly effortless flight in a virtuosic fusion of ballroom and tap styles. Buoyed by beloved songs by Dorothy Fields and Derome Kern - including the Oscar-winning classic "The Way You Look Tonight" - 'Swing Time' is an exuberant celebration of its stars' chemistry, grace, and sheer joy in the act of performance.

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In this Oscar-winning farce, Cary Grant (in the role that first defined the Cary Grant persona) and Irene Dunne exude charm, cunning, and artless affection as an urbane couple who, fed up with each others infidelities, resolve to file for divorce.

But try as they might to move on, the mischievous Jerry can't help meddling in Lucy's ill-matched engagement to a corn-fed Oklahoma businessman (Ralph Bellamy), and a mortified Lucy begins to realize that she may be saying goodbye to the only dance partner capable of following her lead. Directed by the versatile Leo McCarey, a master of improvisation and slapstick as well as a keen and sympathetic observer of human folly, 'The Awful Truth' is a warm but unsparing comedy about two people whose flaws only make them more irresistible.

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Swellegant and elegant. Deluxe and delovely. Cole Porter was the most sophisticated name in 20th-century songwriting. And to play him on screen, Hollywood chose debonair icon Cary Grant. Grant stars for the first time in colour in this fanciful biopic.

Alexis Smith plays Linda, whose serendipitous meetings with Cole lead to a meeting at the altar. More than 20 Porter songs grace this tale of triumph and tragedy, with Grant lending his amiable voice to 'You're the Top', 'Night and Day' and more. Monty Woolley, a Yale contemporary of Porter, portrays himself. And Jane Wyman, Mary Martin, Eve Arden and others provide vocals and verve. Lights down. Curtain up. Standards embraced by generations are yours to enjoy 'Night and Day'.

Strolling along 5th Avenue or going on the bum as 'A Couple of Swells', Judy Garland and Fred Astaire lead a parade of music and gotta-dance fun in this never-ending delight...

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The Best Picture of 1945 has lost none of its bite or power in this uncompromising look at the devastating effects of alcoholism.

Ironically, this brilliant Billy Wilder film was almost never released because of poor reaction by preview audiences unaccustomed to such stark realism from Hollywood, but the film has since gone on to be regarded as one of the all-time great dramas in movie history. Ray Milland's haunting portrayal of would-be writer's dissatisfaction with his life leads him on a self-destructive three-day binge.

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Legendary producer Alexander Korda presents the private life and loves of Rembrandt. Following on from the international success of 'The Private Life of Henry VIII', Alexander Korda once again teamed up with Oscar winner Charles Laughton for this stylish biographical production.

Laughton's depiction of the painter is solid throughout, and Vincent Korda meticulously recreates Rembrandt van Rijn's Amsterdam at Denham Studios.

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Safe their picturesque chateau behind the front lines, the French General Staff passes down a direct order to Colonel Dax (Kirk Douglas): take the Ant Hill at any cost. A blatant suicide mission, the attack is doomed to failure.

Covering up their fatal blunder, the Generals order the arrest of three innocent soldiers, charging them with cowardice and mutiny. Dax, a lawyer in civilian life, rises to the men's defense but soon realizes that, unless he can prove that the Generals were to blame, nothing less than a miracle will save his clients from the firing squad.