john-t's - Rented List

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An alien entity inhabits the earthly form of a seductive young woman who combs the Scottish highways in search of the human prey it is here to plunder. It lures its isolated and forsaken male victims into an otherworldly dimension where they are stripped and consumed.

But life in all its complexity starts to change the alien. It begins to see itself as 'she', as human, with tragic and terrifying consequence. 'Under the Skin' is about seeing ourselves through alien eyes.

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The first-ever full-length theatrical 'Lego' movie follows Emmet (voice of Chris Pratt), a perfectly average 'Lego' mini-figure who is mistakenly identified as the most extraordinary person in the world.

He is drafted into an epic quest to stop an evil tyrant and save the world, a journey for which Emmet is hopelessly and hilariously under-prepared.

Academy Award Winners Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts star in the darkly hilarious and deeply touching story of the strong-willed women of the Weston family, whose lives converge when a family crisis brings them back to the Midwest house they grew up in, and to the dysfunctional mother who raised them.

'Locke' is the story of one man's life unravelling in a tension-fuelled race against time. Ivan Locke (Tom Hardy) has the perfect family, his dream job, and tomorrow should be the crowning moment of his career. But one phone call will force him to make a decision that will put it all on the line.

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Marlene Dietrich and James Stewart ride high in this superb comedic western, both a boisterous spoof and a shining example of its genre.

As the brawling, rough-and-tumble saloon singer Frenchy, Dietrich shed her exotic love-goddess image and launched a triumphant career comeback, while Stewart cemented his amiable every-man persona, in his first of many westerns, with a charming turn as a gun-abhorring deputy sheriff who uses his wits to bring law and order to the frontier town of Bottleneck. A sparkling script, a supporting cast of virtuoso character actors, and rollicking musical numbers - delivered with unmatched bravado by the magnetic Dietrich - come together to create an irresistible, oft-imitated marvel of studio-era craftsmanship.

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Trickery. Deceit. Magic. In 'F for Fake', a free-form sort-of documentary by Orson Welles, the legendary filmmaker (and self-described charlatan) gleefully reengages with the central preoccupation of his career: the tenuous lines between illusion and truth, art and lies.

Beginning with portraits of the world-renowned art forger Elmyr de Hory and his equally devious biographer, Clifford Irving, Welles embarks on a dizzying journey that simultaneously exposes and revels in fakery and fakers of all stripes - not the least of whom is Welles himself. Charming and inventive, 'F for Fake' is an inspired prank and a clever examination of the essential duplicity of cinema.

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In 2009, Academy Award-winning director Alex Gibney was hired to make a film about Lance Armstrong's comeback to cycling. The project was shelved when the doping scandal erupted, and re-opened after Armstrong's confession.

'The Armstrong Lie' picks up in 2013 after Armstrong was stripped of his 7 Tour de France titles, and presents a riveting insider's view of the unraveling of the greatest deception in sports history.

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Across two series and over 20 films, the directors of Wonderful London captured some of the most evocative images of the capital in the 1920s.

These simple films contrasted different aspects of city life - East End and West End, poor and rich, natives and immigrants - often looking beyond the stereotype to show suprising views of the city.
As well as the familiar landmarks of London town - the Thames, Big Ben, Tower Bridge and St Paul's - Wonderful London reveals its less well illustrated quarters; the over-populated districts of Clerkenwell, London's original Chinatown and the South Asian and African seamen who worked in the Port of London. We also visit the street markets on a Sunday, and wander down alleys, past pot-bellied pubs, inns of court and the buildings that Dickens knew. All the while we are greeted by generations of Londoners, all now gone but strangely still like the Londoners of today.
This fascinating collection includes six new restorations by the BFI National Archive:
- Barging Through London
- Cosmopolitan London
- London's Sundays
- Flowers of London
- London's Free Shows
- London Off the Track
all of which reintroduce the films' original tinting and toning.

Marlon Brando gives a stunning portrayal of the outlaw turned revolutionary leader. The film also boasts Anthony Quinn's performance as Zapata's brother. Viva Zapata! is one of the classic political movies and a fine example of Brando's genius as a film actor.

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Falling pregnant as a teenager in Ireland in 1952, Philomena Lee (Judi Dench) was sent to the convent to be looked after as a "fallen woman". When a only a toddler, her baby was put up for adoption by nuns and whisked away to America.

Philomena spent the next fifty years searching in vain until she met Martin Sixsmith (Steve Coogan), a journalist as cynical as Philomena was trusting. Together they set off on a hilarious and uplifting journey that would change their lives forever.

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Writer Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson), a former alcoholic, accepts a job as the winter caretaker for a hotel high in the Rocky Mountains, isolating him, his wife (Shelley Duvall) and their psychic young son until spring.

But when the first blizzard blocks the only road out, the hotel's stored energy from evil past deeds begins to drive Jack insane...a and there may be no escape for his family in this haunting story of madness, memory and violence.

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Marlene Dietrich lights up the screen as the Empress Catherine in this historical drama directed by Josef von Sternberg. Young Princess Catherine's dreams are shattered when she's forced into an arranged marriage with Peter (Sam Jaffe), the homely and idiotic Grand Duke of Russia.

Though there is pressure to bear a male heir to the throne, Peter prefers the company of his mistress. Imprisoned in loveless wedlock, his young bride seeks solace in the arms of other men, including a handsome young officer of the guard. Months later, when a son is born, Russia rejoices, while Peter conspires to murder his adulterous wife. But the officer of the guard and Catherine's loyal troops stand by their beloved monarch to save imperial Russia from the hands of this madman.

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Marlene Dietrich stars as Helen, a former nightclub entertainer married to an American scientist, Edward Faraday (Herbert Marshall), who has been diagnosed with radium poisoning.

To earn money for her husband's European cure, Helen returns to the stage billed as "The Blonde Venus" and is an overnight success. She also finds herself powerfully attracted to a dashing politician named Nick Townsend (Cary Grant) who is captivated by her and offers financial support. Townsend moves Helen and her son into a beautiful apartment, and when Edward returns unexpectedly from Europe to find his child and unfaithful wife gone, he demands she relinquish the boy to him. As a woman torn between her husband, her lover, her career and her child, Dietrich turns in a dazzling performance that makes this one of the screen goddess's most popular films.

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Emil Jennings, the quintessential German expressionist actor, stars as Professor Immanuel Rath, the sexually-repressed instructor of a boys prep school.

After learning of the pupils' infatuation with French postcards depicting a local nightclub songstress, he decides to personally investigate the source of such indecency. But as soon as he enters the shadowy Blue Angel nightclub and steals one glimpse of the smoldering Lola-Lola (Marlene Dietrich), commanding the stage in a top hot, stockings and bare thighs, Rath's self-righteous piety is crushed. He finds himself fatefully seduced by the throaty voice of the vulgar siren, singing, "Falling in Love Again". Consumed by desire and tormented by his rigid propriety, Professor Rath allows himself to be dragged down a path of personal degradation. Lola's unrestrained sexuality was a revelation to turn-of-the-decade moviegoers, thrusting Dietrich to the forefront of the sultry international leading ladies, such as Greta Garbo, who were challenging the limits of screen sexuality.

When a father (Bruce Dern) and his adult son (Will Forte) embark on a journey to claim a million-dollar prize, what begins as a fool's errand becomes a search for the road to redemption.