The Sand Pebbles

The year is 1926, just before one of the many Chinese revolutions. Jake Holman (Steve McQueen) is a ship's engineer who has been transferred to a small run-down gunship named the San Pablo, or the Sand Pebble to her crew. Aboard the Pebble, Holman causes tension amongst the already tight-knit yet divided crew, which doesn't help when the Chinese public attempt to instigate a war with the US.

The 39 Steps

Richard Hannay (Robert Donat), a Canadian man visiting London, thinks nothing of assisting a strange woman (Lucie Mannheim) to escape a theatre riot, especially when, after the melee, she requests he take her home with him. She seems rather odd, with an indistinguishable European accent and clearly fake name, hiding from the windows and the reflection of the mirror, scared of a ringing telephone, and it turns out she's being pursued by a gunman over some business involving a secret being smuggled out of the country. Hannay of course is sceptical, until she winds up dead on his living room floor, a knife in her back and a map in her hand, with Scotland's Alt-na-Shellach circled. Hannay suddenly finds himself in the frame for murder, and must flee up north if he hopes to clear his name and save the secrets.

The Barbarian Invasions

Remy (Remy Girard), a college professor with a womanising history, is mere days away from death. His wife (Dorothee Berryman), from whom he separated fifteen years ago when he refused to give up his philandering ways, summons their son, Sebastien (Stephane Rousseau) to see him. Sebastien and his father have never been close, with the son playing the father for destroying the family, and the father being disappointed his son never became a cultured intellectual, even though he is now a fantastically wealthy international businessman. Sebastien uses his fathers last days to reconnect with his old man, and make his remaining time happy, by contacting his father's old friends, disrupting the Canadian health system to get him a better room, and making an arrangement with a heroine addict (Marie-Josee Croze) to make his father more comfortable before the inevitable happens.

Strangers on a Train

You know how the weirdo on the train always ends up sat next to you? The smelly guy, the raging drunk or the raving lunatic? Well any of these would be preferable to Bruno Antony (Robert Walker), a wealthy but evidently psychotic passenger sat across the aisle from Guy Haines (Farley Granger), a promising semi-professional tennis player with political aspirations. You see, Bruno has a plan for the perfect murder, or rather, murders, and wouldn't you know it but he not only has someone in his life whom he'd like disposed of (his overbearing father, Jonathan Hale), but he also knows Guy is in a similar position with his separated wife, Miriam (Kasey Rogers). Bruno's plan is for the two of them to swap murders, as that way there'd be no clear motive for their crimes, and whilst Guy forgets all about this after departing the train, Bruno evidently means to carry out his plot, and its not long before Miriam has been slain, and Bruno is hounding Guy to take care of his side of the deal.

Lincoln

Four Years into the American Civil War, Abraham Lincoln (Daniel Day-Lewis), the 16th King of the United States of America, has his eyes set on not just ending the conflict, but abolishing slavery - over which the war is being predominantly fought - in the process. In order to do this he must pass the 13th amendment to the United States House of Parliament, which would outlaw involuntary servitude, but there's two problems. One, he's twenty votes short, and two, he needs to pass it before the war ends, or else it may never happen. And on top of this he's got some familial woes too - a nutty wife and bull-headed son who wants to go off and fight for his beliefs.

Safe

Carol (Julianne Moore) is a bored housewife, sorry, homemaker, in the San Fernando Valley. Her husband Greg (Xander Berkeley) is a successful businessman, and the pair live in a lavish home with Greg's son Rory (Chauncey Leopardi). Carol has many friends and an active social life, attending various parties and gym classes. There's nothing wrong in Carol's life, other than her new sofa being delivered in black rather than teal, yet she suddenly finds herself becoming ill, which she soon believes to be caused by the "chemicals" found in modern life. But is she suffering from a real sickness, or is it all in her head? Maybe moving to the secluded, desert-based Wrenwood Centre, a "chemical-free facility", will result in a cure.

The Wicker Man

Devout Christian police officer Sergeant Howie (Edward Woodward) receives an anonymous letter telling him that a young girl, 12 year old Rowan Morrison, went missing a year ago and hasn't been seen since. Armed only with the letter, a photo and his unbreakable religious beliefs, Howie sets out to the secluded island of Summerisle, where he is met by hostility from the locals, who do not approve of a mainlander on their soil, and all deny any knowledge of Rowan's existence. As Howie investigates further, he is met by obstructions at every turn, and discovers the islands inhabitant's rituals and ideology may have a more sinister cause for Rowan's disappearance than the policeman could ever have imagined.

Sullivan's Travels

John Lloyd Sullivan (Joel McCrea) is a big time director of screwball Hollywood comedies, but wants to make something real. Something with a message. Something for the common man. The only problem is Sullivan has never experienced life amongst the common men, so he sets out, against the wishes of his producers, disguised as a hobo and with nothing but 10 cents in his pocket, to see how the other half survives.

Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht

As opening shots go, footage of dead, decomposed babies and children, their faces contorted into richtuses of terror and howls of pain is probably one of the clearest projections for the tone of the ensuing film that I've ever come across. Couple this with slow motion shots of bats flying in the dark (used repeatedly throughout the entire film whenever director Werner Herzog takes his fancy, regardless of it's relevance to the plot) and a woman (Isabelle Adjani) waking up screaming to said bat flying around her window and you're left with no uncertainty that this isn't quite your average vampire film.

The Magnificent Seven

A small farming community is being terrorised by a band of thieves and murderers, led by the charismatic but ruthless Calvera (Eli Wallach, previously only known to my girlfriend as the elderly neighbour in The Holiday). He and his gang steal almost everything worth taking from the villagers, leaving them just enough to carry on farming for another year, at which point Calvera will return and repeat the process over again. Sick of this injustice, three villagers head to the nearest saloon and recruit someone to either train or protect them, finding Yul Brynner's Chris as the perfect fit for the role after he volunteers for something that could get him killed, and offers no reward - a situation very similar to that of defending the village. Chris then goes about assembling a team - you can probably guess how many - of similarly minded men based on Chris' previous dealings with them or their reputations. 

Hamlet

There are some films on the List that I've no idea when I'll get to them. These films fall into three categories - the ones I absolutely adore but have no clue how I'll even start writing about them, the ones I desperately do not want to watch (but am too much of an anal completist to ignore) and the really long ones. This four-hour-plus cut of Hamlet obviously falls into the latter, but fortunately for me, my girlfriend opted for Kate Winslet as her Film-Maker of choice, and seeing as I've reached that point in Winslet's career in which she appeared in Hamlet as Ophelia, I can cross off Kenneth Branagh's opus from the Empire 5-Star 500. As for the unspeakable films I don't want to see, whenever LoveFilm drop Salo through my letterbox it shall not be a good day, though I could pull an In The Realm Of The Senses and bottle it when I've taken as much as I can stand.

Casino Royale

With the imminent release of Daniel Craig's third outing as James Bond, Sam Mendes' Skyfall (UK release October 26th), it seems like the perfect time to cross the film ranked 56th greatest film of all time by Empire readers a few years ago, Craig's first Bond outing, Casino Royale.

Now, if you ask me, #56 is pretty high up, especially when you consider that Goldfinger, my favourite Bond movie, is 110 places lower at #166, and no other Bond movies made it onto that list (You Only Live Twice appears in the Empire 5-star 500). Even if you take into account Casino Royale's proximity to the release of the list, made just two years later, it's still pretty damn high. Apparently, it's better than Lawrence of Arabia, Annie Hall, 12 Angry Men, The Great Escape and literally hundreds of other films that, in my opinion, are far superior. But then I didn't compile the list (though I did vote on it, and not for this film), so who am I to voice the opinions of others?

The Manxman

Pete Quillam (Carl Brisson from The Ring) is a penniless fisherman. His best friend, Philip Christian (Malcolm Keen), is a hot-shot lawyer. The two have been inseparable since birth, being raised as essentially brothers despite their wildly different lifestyles. They've even found a way to combine their various career paths, with Philip pushing through a petition that will prevent steam trawlers from encroaching on the fishermen's haul, but when they meet Kate Cregeen (Anny Ondra), the barmaid daughter of the local pub The Manx Fairy, they both instantly fall for her. Pete, the more headstrong and forward of the pair, is the first to make a move, so the loyal Philip hides his feelings for the sake of his pal. But when Pete heads to Africa to make his fortune to win over Kate's father (Randle Ayrton), things get complicated when Philip is asked to look after Kate in his absence. 

Brave

Brave marks something of unchartered territory for animation powerhouse Pixar. It's their first fairytale,, the first set in the past, the first to use magic, and the first to feature a female lead, in Kelly Macdonald's Princess Merida. It's also the Pixar film that I've waited the longest to see since it's cinema release, seeing as it came out here over a month ago, but I only saw it yesterday because of the frankly outrageous 3D scheduling of my cinema (as always, fuck 3D). 

The long delay has added to my already high level of anticipation for the film, seeing as I started reading reviews of my American and New Zealander counterparts months ago when the film was released over there (seriously, why such a long wait for us Brits? Sort it out), and my deep love of most things Pixar (Cars? meh) meant that this film was going to have to do a lot to satisfy me. And unfortunately, it didn't. 

The Farmer's Wife

In the late 1920s, having just wedded Alma Reville, marriage was clearly at the forefront of Alfred Hitchcock's mind as he adapted this play be Eden Phillpotts about a farmer who, after the passing of his wife and the marriage of his daughter, seeks to find a new wife within the small group of eligible women within his village. Farmer Samuel Sweetland (Jameson Thomas) is by and large a good man, though he has difficulty in expressing himself, often fails to see what is directly in front of him and has a heightened ego. Still, he means well. After his wife's death, in which her last words are reminding the maid (Lillian Hall-Davis, returning from The Ring) to air out her master's pants, Minta the maid takes over all of the wife's duties as well as her own. Once the farmer's daughter has been given away, Minta is given one more job to do, help Sweetland find a wife, so the two of them sit down and make a list of the four potential candidates.

Heavenly Creatures

Christchurch, New Zealand, the mid-1950s. Two girls, Pauline (Melanie Lynskey) and Juliet (Kate Winslet) run terrified through the dense forest, the air streaked with their screams and their faces streaked with blood. They burst through the bushes and emerge to the concerned face of a passer-by with the words "It's Mummy! She's terribly hurt!"So begins Peter Jackson's Heavenly Creatures, the true story of two schoolgirls whose problematic home lives forge a bridge between them, a bridge that leads to a fantasy world of princes and princesses, giant butterflies, murder, topiary and unicorns. But when their parents strive to separate the two, the girls hatch a plan to remain together by taking drastic actions.

Seven Brides For Seven Brothers

I'm not normally a huge fan of classic musicals. I quite liked West Side Story, but couldn't abide The Sound Of Music, so my hopes weren' exactly high for this 1954 classic of which I knew very little, other than there were presumably at least fourteen characters. I'm relieved to tell you that not only did I not find this film terrible, I frickin' loved it.

Set in 1850's Oregon, the film predominantly follows Adam Pontipee, the eldest of seven brothers (duh) who all live away from society in a secluded shack, as woodsmen. Whilst visiting town to trade, Adam sets out to find a wife, and somewhat surprisingly the local cook Milly agrees to take the position, and they marry as soon as she finished her chores, before heading back to his house. Once home, Milly discovers the rest of her new husband's clan, whom he'd neglected to tell her about before, and soon finds herself playing Snow White for these seven giants, doing all the cooking and cleaning in their initially disgusting hovel. When the other boys decide they too would like a wife, Milly steps in to see if she can teach them to be gentlemen.

Sophie's Choice

The unfortunately named Stingo (Peter MacNicol) moves from his southern home to be a writer in New York. He rents a room in a house, and so finds himself firm friends with a neighbouring couple, Sophie and Nathan (Meryl Streep & Kevin Kline). Sophie and Nathan have a tumultuous relationship, as she has a tragic past and he has issues of his own, and slowly Stingo learns of their history, and the hardships Sophie has had to endure.

Sense and Sensibility

 Lord Dashwood (Tom Wilkinson) passes away and, unable to split his vast estate between his two families, his wife and three daughters are ousted from their palatial mansion by their half-brother John (James Fleet) and his vile wife Fanny (Harriet Walter), and are forced to considerably downsize their opulent lifestyles. Hope, it seems, arrives in the forms of Fanny's reserved brother Edward (Hugh Grant) and the dashing Mr. Willoughby (Greg Wise), who each take a shining to two of the Dashwood sisters (Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet).

The Ghost and Mrs. Muir

One of the most unusual romantic stories I've ever heard, Joseph L. Mankiewicz's film sees the widowed Mrs. Lucy Muir (the achingly beautiful Gene Tierney) fleeing her haughty, oppressive in-laws and moving to the seaside with her daughter Anna (a young Natalie Wood) and their maid, Martha (Edna Best). Upon arriving at Whitecliff-by-the-Sea, Lucy seeks the assistance of estate agent Mr. Coombe (Robert Coote) in finding a suitable property. She is immediately taken by Gull Cottage, despite the disapproval of Coombe and the warning that no other resident has managed to stay there for even a night. This probably has something to do with Captain Gregg (Rex Harrison), the former owner who passed away there some time ago, and whose spirit still haunts the house. In spite of all this Lucy moves in, and she and the ghost of Gregg form an unusual bond.