Brief Encounter

Laura and Alec (Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard) meet every Thursday in town - he after work, and she to do the weekly grocery shopping. At first their regular meetings are nothing more than a newfound friendship, but it is not long before they fall for one another. The problem is, Alec will soon be leaving to work in Africa. Oh, and they're both married, with families at home.

Doctor Zhivago

One of those Sunday afternoon sweeping epics that never seems to be off the TV schedule but before the List I'd never seen before (see also The Sound of Music, Gone With the Wind, The Ten Commandments), Doctor Zhivago was a bit of a disappointment.

For starters, it's well over 3 hours long, but very little of that mammoth runtime left any kind of impression. Other than some striking imagery - a splash of blood in freshly fallen snow, a burst of yellow sunflowers against a dull, beige hallway - and a few admittedly impressive set pieces, there's very little from this film that's been committed to my memory banks.