greatest-ever-made's - Rented List
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The Undercover Man (1949)Chicago Story
Frank Warren (Glenn Ford) is a treasury agent assigned to put an end to the activities of a powerful mob crime boss. The agent struggles to put together a case but is frustrated when all he finds are terrified witnesses and corrupt police officers. Although most informants end up dead, Agent Warren gets critical information about the mob from an unlikely source. - Director:
- Joseph H. Lewis
- Cast:
- John Ireland, Glenn Ford, Nina Foch
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May Fools (1990)Milou en mai
This comic excursion from Louis Malle is set in May 1968, concurrent with a series of Parisian student uprisings. After the death of family matriarch Mme. Vieuzac (Paulette Dubost), the survivors converge on the French countryside for her funeral; they include her two sons, Milou (Michel Piccoli) and Georges (Michel Duchaussoy); Camille (Miou-Miou), Milou's daughter; Camille's husband and children; and granddaughter Claire (Dominique Blanc), a lesbian. With the latest news of rebellion from Paris as their soundtrack, the family members argue over property, revive long-simmering arguments, and watch in dismay as an unlikely love affair begins. When the student uprising threatens to spill over into their community, the family heads for the hills, where the great outdoors only intensifies their reunion. - Director:
- Louis Malle
- Cast:
- Miou-Miou, Michel Piccoli, Michel Duchaussoy
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Flesh of the Orchid (1975)La chair de l'orchidée
A emotionally disturbed young woman, Claire is the heir to a great fortune. She is kept prisoner in a château by her aunt who wants her money. The game keeper, her guardian, tries to rape her but she manages to escape. In her flight she meets Louis who is also running away from two killers. He becomes her lover. In a world of grotesque characters, bizarre incidents, brutal murders and incessant driving rain, this dark and erotic thriller is compelling thanks to the incredible performance of Charlotte Rampling. Will Claire be able to make sense of her own identity? - Director:
- Patrice Chéreau
- Cast:
- Charlotte Rampling, Bruno Cremer, Edwige Feuillère
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The most celebrated comedy duo in cinema history, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy formed their decades-long partnership in the late 1920s in a series of silent shorts produced at the Hal Roach Studios. Having developed their on-screen chemistry in the likes of 'Do Detectives Think?', 'Putting Pants on Philip' and 'The Battle of the Century' throughout 1927, Laurel and Hardy forged on as a double act in the last years of the silent era and into the age of talking pictures. This collection brings together the silent Laurel and Hardy shorts produced during 1928, as their partnership began to gather steam: 'Leave 'em Laughing' sees Stan desperately seeking treatment for a toothache; 'You're Darn Tootin' follows the pair as they turn their hand to busking; in 'From Soup to Nuts', the boys are hired as waiters for an upper-class dinner party; and in 'Early to Bed', Ollie gets to enjoy the highlife for himself when he inherits a fortune and buys an opulent mansion...but Stan soon finds ways to lower its market value. This collection also features the first Hal Roach film to officially bill Laurel and Hardy as a duo: 'Should Married Men Go Home?', in which a relaxing trip to the golf course quickly spirals into chaos. - Director:
- Leo McCarey
- Cast:
- Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Vivien Oakland
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Two classic dramas directed by Bernard Vorhaus and Henry Edwards.
The Ghost Camera (1933)When a photograph is taken at the scene of a murder, the camera is tossed out of a castle window to destroy the evidence but lands in the back of a passing car belonging to chemist John Gray. John then becomes an amateur sleuth after developing the film and goes in search of the woman captured by the photograph. This was Ida Lupinos' first full feature.
Juggernaut (1936)
Victor Sartorius (Boris Karloff) is an ailing doctor working in Morocco. He teams up with Lady Yvonne Clifford (Mona Goya) in a plot to poison her husband, Sir Charles Clifford (Morton Selten), so he can collect the 20,000 pounds necessary to save his experiments and his funding. Roger Clifford (Arthur Margetson), the son of Sir Charles has also been marked for death. The only one who can stop the murder plot of Sartorius is Nurse Eve Rowe Goan Wyndham).
Bonus Short Feature: The Haunted Palace (1949)
Shaw Desmond, (1877-1960) Irish novelist, poet, founder of the International Institute for Psychical Research in 1934, and author of many works on the afterlife and several Scientific Romances. In this documentray he as the expert on ghosts, attempts to explain ghostly appearances with reconstructions of allegedly true legends.- Director:
- Bernard Vorhaus
- Cast:
- Henry Kendall, Ida Lupino, John Mills
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The Last Metro (1980)Le Dernier Métro
In Nazi-occupied Paris Marion and her Jewish husband decide to conceal him in the very theatre that they own with the alibi that he has fled abroad. As he hides in the cellar from the Gestapo she must continue her job as lead actress in the play and take on her husband's job as director to hold up the facade. Meanwhile the German oppression continues to increase on both the characters' lives and the play itself. - Director:
- François Truffaut
- Cast:
- Catherine Deneuve, Gérard Depardieu, Jean Poiret
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Edward and Caroline (1951)Édouard et Caroline
Jacques Becker's dark, offbeat comedy about a failing marriage stars Daniel Gelin as Edouard, a poor pianist married to Caroline (Anne Vernon), a beautiful girl from a middle-class family. Caroline's uncle Claude (Jean Galland), a complete snob who looks down on Edouard like the rest of his family, invites the couple to a party at which he is expected to play for his supper in front of Claude's important friends. Add the fact that Claude's son Alain (Jacques Francois) is in love with Caroline and this evening is destined for disaster. - Director:
- Jacques Becker
- Cast:
- Daniel Gélin, Anne Vernon, Elina Labourdette
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The Marseillaise (1938)La Marseillaise
This long-forgotten gem in Renoir's canon is the director's only truly epic film. Made towards the end of France's left wing "Popular Front" government when Europe was on the brink of war, 'The Marseillaise' is a markedly political film about a country in flux. With an innovative new-reel style, the film follows a cross-section of people - from the citizens of Marseilles to Louis XVI - who are affected by the shifting political and social forces in the early days of the French revolution. - Director:
- Jean Renoir
- Cast:
- Lise Delamare, Louis Jouvet, Pierre Renoir
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Port of Shadows (1938)Le Quai Des Brumes
Jean (Jean Gabin), a deserter, arrives in Le Havre and looks for a shelter before leaving the French territory. Housed in a shed on the harbour, at the end of the docks, he meets an eccentric painter and a mysterious and beautiful girl called Nelly (Michèle Morgan)... From then on he will be trapped in a tragic destiny, in spite of his passion for Nelly and his will to live... - Director:
- Marcel Carné
- Cast:
- Jean Gabin, Michel Simon, Michèle Morgan
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The Iron Horse (1924)The Iron Trail
The Iron Horse was John Ford's 50th film and remains his most celebrated of the silent era. Its theme of enterprise and achievement, its open-air locations and setting in a vigorous and pioneering past proved just the subject to stimulate the young director's talent. The sheer scale of the film surpassed all other Westerns of the silent era, and established Ford as one of the leading directors in the industry. The film combines a conventional tale of double-dealing, vengeance and romance with a poetic sense of history, and an epic theme - uniting a nation by building a transcontinental railroad, and a great man's dream realised by the courage, skill and labour of ordinary folk. - Director:
- John Ford
- Cast:
- George O'Brien, Madge Bellamy, Charles Edward Bull
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From director Frank Borzage (Desire) comes 'Little Man, What Now?', a romantic drama starring Margaret Sullavan (The Shop Around the Corner) and Douglass Montgomery (Little Women). In depression-era Germany, Hans (Montgomery) and his pregnant wife Emma (Sullavan) - affectionately known as 'Lammchen' - struggle to keep their heads above water. Their situation is complicated when Hans' boss, who believes him to be a bachelor, demands that he marry his daughter. Based on the best-selling novel by Hans Fallada (Alone in Berlin) that has been adapted on numerous occasions in its native Germany, 'Little Man, What Now?' is a heart-rending tale of life on the margins. - Director:
- Frank Borzage
- Cast:
- Margaret Sullavan, Douglass Montgomery, Alan Hale
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L'Argent (1928)Money
Business tycoons Saccard and Gunderman lock horns when the former tries to raise capital for his faltering bank. To inflate his stock, Saccard concocts a duplicitous publicity stunt involving the unwitting aviator Hamelin and a flight across the Atlantic, much to the dismay of his wife Line. The Hamelins become pawns in a high-stakes chess game played out by unscrupulous speculators. - Director:
- Marcel L'Herbier
- Cast:
- Brigitte Helm, Marie Glory, Yvette Guilbert
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Lady with a Sword (1971)Feng Fei Fei
When her sister is attacked and murdered, swordswoman Feng Fei-fei (Lily Ho) knows just what to do - find the culprits and slice 'em up. But her righteous vengeance is compromised when she learns just who her target is: the man her parents have arranged for her to marry... Strikingly directed by Kao Pao-shu - notable as one of the few women who handled martial arts movies - 'Lady With a Sword' has an emotional power to match its outstanding fight scenes, as justice, family loyalties and inflexible tradition all collide. - Director:
- Pao-Shu Kao
- Cast:
- Lily Ho, James Nam, Hsieh Wang
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Harry Callahan is a tough, streetwise San Francisco cop whom they call Dirty Harry. In this action classic, you'll see why - and also why Clint Eastwood's reputation as a premier film star and movie maker is secure. A rooftop sniper (Andy Robinson) calling himself Scorpio has killed twice and holds the city ransom with the threat of killing again. Harry will nail him... one way or the other - no matter what the 'system' prescribes. Filming on location, director Don Siegel made the City by the Bay a vital part of 'Dirty Harry', a practice continued in its four sequels. The original remains one of the most gripping police thrillers ever made. - Director:
- Don Siegel
- Cast:
- Clint Eastwood, Andrew Robinson, Harry Guardino
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Sirk in Germany 1934-1935 (1935)Seine Durchlaucht, Herr Müller/ Das Mädchen vom Moorhof / Stützen der Gesellschaft
An undisputed master of melodrama, director Douglas Sirk is best known for the lavish, sweeping romances he made during the last decade of his career, including Magnificent Obsession. All That Heaven Allows. Written on the Wind and Imitation of Life. But by the time Sirk - born Hans Detlef Sierck - arrived in Hollywood, he had already made several films in his native Germany. The Masters Of Cinema series is honoured to present this collection of Sirk's earliest films, all of which established a blueprint for his later work: April Fool! (April! April!). The Girl from Marsh Croft (Das Madchen vom Moorhof) and Pillars of Society (Stiitzen der Gesellschaff). In Sirk's directorial debut - the comedy April Fool!-a businessman and shameless social climber. Julius Lampe (Erhard Siedel). is subjected to a cruel April Fools' Day prank when he is led to believe a noble prince (Albrecht Schoenhals) intends to personally inspect his pasta factory. Then, in Sirk's first melodrama The Girl from Marsh Croft, farmer Karsten Dittmar (Kurt Fischer-Fehling) falls in love with the disreputable young maid Helga Christmann (Hansi Knoteck) - much to the dismay of his Fiancee Gertrud Gerhart (Ellen Frank). Finally, in Pillars of Society, wealthy Norwegian shipbuilder Consul Karsten Bernick (Heinrich George) must face up to a lifetime of corruption and deceit when farmer Johann Tonnessen (Albrecht Schoenhals) returns to Norway after a twenty-year absence and discovers that Bernick has smeared his good name. Presented alongside Sirk's shorts Two Greyhounds (Zwei Windhunde). Three Times Before (DreimalFhe) and The Imaginary Invalid (Der eingebildeteKranke). these three features - all released in 1935 - showcase the burgeoning talents of a filmmaker who would go on to become one of the most important figures in the history of Hollywood cinema. Sirk's early works are presented here on Blu-ray for the first time in the UK from brand-new restorations by the Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation. - Director:
- Douglas Sirk
- Cast:
- Erhard Siedel, Lina Carstens, Charlott Daudert
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