The trailer actually does it some justice (until the obligatory voice-over kicks in.) Peter Fonda is mesmerising in it.

You can pick up a region 2 for £79.95 (used) - bargain!

"Last night" by Don McKellar. It's set on the last night of Earth and follows three people.
One guy who is trying to do everything s3xual he's ever thought about (including pumping his primary school teacher!!); another chap who is going to spend his last night alone because he doesn't want to spend the last night on Earth being annoyed by his family and the final person is a lady trying to make it home to her husband, to perform a suicide pact.

All the people on Earth have known about the end of the world for 6 months, so there's no panic just lost of folk doing what's important to them. It's really moving, funny and has the best ending of any film I've ever seen. Can't recommend it enough.

The Quiet Earth

or

A Boy And His Dog (just for the great little twist at the end)

On no, wait, it's actually the worst

Stunning to look at and first time I heard (the blessed) Nyman.
Daft story about coping with death, decay, loss.
I was in full on 'artwank' mode first time I saw it so, it was very 'deep'.
Watched recently and, ocht!
I still love it.

The Station Agent.

It sounds bloody awful. It isn't, it's great.

The cultured folk in the Massive might have heard of Alan Bleasdale's classic black comedy but nobody I've talked to has ever heard of it.

The blackest comedy I've ever seen but also one of the funniest.

As a rule, I tend to avoid films with Jennifer Aniston in them, but this is absolutely brilliant

As is this

One of Scorcese's lesser mentioned films. By no means perfect, but I really like it. Think Griffin Dunne is really underrated.

An Australian film about a Sanitary worker with some of the funniest lines ever in a film

" There's a smell in here that will outlast religion"

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0822389/

..."It's Night of the Living Dead 2" W. Connolly

but mesmeric: Nostalgia, by Andrei Tarkovsky

Imagine pitching this: Air Doll, it's about a blow-up sex toy that comes to life. Quite a tear-jerker..

Saw this once many moons ago (at an impressionable age) in an all night film show, thought it was pretty cool (in a Barbarella kind of way) tho' the trailer makes it look pretty cheesy now. But hey...

I saw this film in 1971 when it was called S.W.A.L.K. - starring Mark Lester, Jack Wild and Tracy Hyde.

It's only just come out on DVD and I watched for the first time since 1971 this week - it was just as good as I remembered it!

Great music by The Bee Gees and also a Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young track - Teach Your Children.

It's a beautiful film - produced by David Puttnam, written by Alan Parker - a feel-good snapshot of a 1960s/70s childhood. I don't know why it didn't do well here, but I would recommend it.

It might look like one thing, but it becomes something else entirely and worth repeated viewings.

Lovely little Italian comedy from 1991 about a group of WW2 soldiers who get marooned on a seemingly deserted Greek island in 1941. Their ship is sunk, and their radio is broken, so they lose all contact with the outside world. Then they discover that the island is far from deserted - all the men have been taken away by the Germans but the women and children are still around, they were just in hiding...

(Trailer is in Forrin, but you get the idea)

1986 Aussie film starring Colin Friels as Malcolm, a reclusive and aspergic mechanical genius who gets involved with a couple of losers who have big ideas about a life of crime. Knew nothing about it (it's a favourite of my wife, who is also an Aussie), but found it sheer joy from start to finish - funny and touching.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091464/

Also have fond memories of a 1973 film called Steelyard Blues, about Donald Sutherland, Peter Boyle and Jane Fonda trying to rebuild an old flying boat against the clock and fly away to freedom. Haven't seen it since, though, so it may not hold up. Nice bluesy soundtrack too.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070731/

'Primer' is a film with a science fiction theme, although it would be wrong to call it sci-fi because the budget was only $7000. It deals with the logic of time travel in a very intelligent way, and is genuinely creepy. The opening minutes are pretty non-descript; 4 guys sitting around talking about their project, with not much really happening. Then something truly spine-tingling happens....

Another (Spanish) film with a similar theme is 'Timecrimes', also well worth watching.

(No capturing involved)

Like comedies?
Like Australian comedies?
Then you'll love The Castle. And it's *finally* getting a UK DVD release!

A French comedy I saw many, many years ago on BBC2. Can't remember much about it, other than it featured an old corrupt copper who has to team up with a younger, more idealistic policeman.

I do remember laughing a lot, but have never seen it screened since.

Burt Lancaster, in bathing trunks, drops in on some neighbours who are having an afternoon party in air-conditioned-nightmare late 60s California.

Talk turns to the fact that, between that house and our hero's home, there are many more swimming pools linking his journey home. He decides he will swim in them all - to "swim home". As he progresses, threads of his life start to emerge through the eyes of friends and neighbours, and the closer he gets to home, the closer he, and we, gets to the truth. I don't know much about Burt Lancaster but he was very good in this.

It had that slightly unsettling atmosphere that you can only find in some corners of late 60s California. A comfortable dread. And if I ever listen to Gene Clark, the song From A Silver Phial from No Other always reminds me of this movie, for some reason.

Fearless with Jeff Bridges. I cried from beginning to end...but then again I am a bubbly bairn!

This is a John Sayles film about a miner's strike in the 1920s, based on a true story. (Matewan is pronounced May-twan).

The miners get paid in company scrip which can only be redeemed at the company store. They have to but their own tools etc. A union organiser comes to town and struggles to get the workers involved, which the mine owners of course won't tolerate.

Its weakness is that the story builds to a climax which is resolved and then, while you're feeling emotionally drained it starts up again building to another climax.

As usual in a Sayles film the acting is first rate. He has to rely on his actors because he runs on a low budget and you're never going to watch a special effects extravaganza.

I dragged my wife along to see it. She was't keen on a film about a miner's strike at all. But afterwards she thought it was stunning.

Mrs Crout and i, love this film.
Underachieving, overweight kindergarten teacher finds a woman who forces him to re-examine his Zen-like system of seduction.

also much overlooked Brit Comedy Party Party, incredibly quoteable film.
"Top on,Top Off" "Can You smell horses ?" etc

A spag western I saw as a birthday treat as a nipper. Briefly there are 5 specialist cowboy guys doing an ambiguous job on the Mexican border (gun fighter, explosives expert, knife throwing guy, strong bloke etc ) which goes awry, with much bang bang action ensuing. Similar to others from the era, it has a moral centre and anti heros,(Magnif 7, Clint, Wild Bunch) and isn't available on DVD tho there are shonky downloads I hear. I'd love to see it again.

Like comedy horror?
Like New Zealand comedy horror?
Then you're bound to like The Frighteners.

Apparently the director Jack Peterson has done some other things since. He peaked with this I reckonses...

Baby born and abandoned on ocean liner is found by stoker and raised below decks.Grows up to become genius pianist Tim Roth who never leaves the ship. Fantastic piano dual between Roth's character and actor playing Jelly Roll Morton just one of the great moments in a truly unique film.Highly recommended!

Directed, written by and starring Steve Buscemi, this is one of those films where you wonder what's happened to the characters once it has finished.

Buscemi plays Tommy, a likeable bloke who lives above the Trees Lounge bar in suburban New York, whose life takes a turn for the worst. Although there are some dark moments, this is often a funny and moving film.

The characters are wonderfully realised and observed, from regulars in the bar to Tommy's friends and family. The acting is great all the way down the cast list and the locations are well-chosen too.

It feels like if you went to that part of New York, you'd meet and hear about exactly those type of people.

Station Agent and The Swimmer are great too.

Two businessmen meet in a hotel in Liverpool. The restaurant is closed. They go looking for food and end up in unexpected surroundings (meeting a third businessman along the way). I won't spoil any more.
It's quiet, low-budget, quirky and pretty funny if you like this kind of thing (which I do).

The whole thing appears to be on youtube:
Pt.1

by Gianni Amelio. So stunning and moving that I saw it twice in the one week it was on release in LA. The story: a bunch of opportunist and dubious Italian businessmen set up a fake enterprise in post-Communist Albania. They need a local on the board to gain access to government funding and recruit an old political prisoner, give him a wash, shave and new suit and entrust him to the youngest on their team. The old boy vanishes and in the course of trying to find him the young guy gets lost in Albania's hinterland, losing every aspect of his identity - cute jeep, smart clothes etc.

Great acting, theme, visuals, everything.

I'd love to see it again.

Disturbing.

Really, really disturbing.

Here's the IMDB plot summary (rather understated IMHO):

Three teenagers are confined to an isolated country estate that could very well be on another planet. The trio spend their days listening to endless homemade tapes that teach them a whole new vocabulary. Any word that comes from beyond their family abode is instantly assigned a new meaning. Hence 'the sea' refers to a large armchair and 'zombies' are little yellow flowers. Having invented a brother whom they claim to have ostracized for his disobedience, the über-controlling parents terrorize their offspring into submission. The father is the only family member who can leave the manicured lawns of their self-inflicted exile, earning their keep by managing a nearby factory, while the only outsider allowed on the premises is his colleague Christina, who is paid to relieve the son of his male urges. Tired of these dutiful acts of carnality, Christina disturbs the domestic balance.

I loved American Cowboy (aka hearts of The West) when I saw it on the telly years ago. I remember it being charming and funny but Alan Arkin's performance was fantastic. It looked as if the rest of the cast (probably himself included) hadn't a clue what he was going to say next.

And My Favourite Year. Again great performance, this time from Peter O'Toole, and great lines. "He was in Captains From Tortuga." "Captains from crap!"

PS
The Station Agent is fabulous.

Nearly forgot about a couple of great crime flicks.
Charley Varrick

And The Friends of Eddie Coyle

of the play The Cheviot, The Stag and the Black, Black Oil by John McGrath. It's superb.

http://itsonitsgone.wordpress.com/2009/09/28/film-preview-cheviot/

'nother 'stralian film.

On paper, dull as ditchwater ("all about the team supporting the moon landings with their huge satellite dish")

In reality, a lovely "nice" film.

French comedy. No! Come back!

French knight and his serf come forward in time.
High brow sophisticated laughs - none.
Low brow belly laughs - loads.

Sequal wasn't bad as memory serves, and even the obligatory US remake is worth a watch. But start here.

That Sinking Feeling.
Stone
Long Weekend
And many, many more..

but here's a film I liked twenty years ago and now nobody remembers:

Jerry Lewis, Leslie Caron, Oliver Reed, Lee Evans, Oliver Platt and Freddie 'Parrot Face' Davies.

An American comic constantly upstaged by his famous father decamps to Blackpool to find his muse. He comes across a comedy savant, played by Lee Evans, who shows what funny bones really are.

Directed by Peter Chelsom, who directed the equally brilliant 'Hear My Song', it's set in modern times yet Blackpool is covered in a 1950's patina.

The joke buying scenes are absolute gold. Highly recommended (as is Hear My Song)

20 years ago I lived in France - I went to a "Grand Prix de la Jeunesse" all nighter and saw some cracking films. Delicatessen was one. But my favourite was Pierre Jolivet's "Simple Mortel" a zero effects, slow tense sci-fi movie - really high quality hokum that beat the X-files to the punch by a couple of years (remember the x-files was really good at first when it was just a series of one-off stories). An expert in ancient languages finds his car stereo talking to him in a language only he could possibly understand - telling him that unless he does what he's asked the world will be destroyed...

Has at least one moment that had the whole cinema peeling themselves off the ceiling, they'd jumped so high.

Never was released in the UK - in fact I'm not sure there's a subtitled version.

French kick ass film featuring Jean Reno in Japan. Saw it on a plane some years back and really enjoyed it. Drink had been taken mind you.

Starring River Phoenix and Lili Taylor
The tagline is

"The rules of the dogfight were simple: Everyone puts in fifty bucks. And the guy with the ugliest "date" wins"

It sounds heartless, it's anything but

Morbid late-teen early-20s fellow with a suicide fetish (Bud Cort, later a movie industry big-wig) embarks on love affar with 79 year-old Boho lady (the magnificent Ruth Gordon). You'll laugh. You'll cry. You'll feel uplifted, despite the subject-matter. You'll probably fall in love with Ruth Gordon, too. And you'll like the soundtrack of Cat Stevens songs, including two written just for the movie, “Don’t Be Shy” and “If You Want to Sing Out, Sing Out.”

I spent a few weeks working in Sydney. Jetlag meant I wound up watching a number of films late at night that just happened to be on. The two I remember most are:

Unman, Wittering and Zygo where David Hemmings teaches a public school class where pupils are being murdered. It was pretty good

Sonnenallee about a lad growing up on the Communist side of the Berlin Wall in the 70s. I can't remember anything about it except for how enjoyable it was.

Another film from younger days I'll bang on and on about is Pump Up the Volume where Christian Slater plays a geeky kid who happens to be a pirate DJ by night. It's fantastic.

*the* Film for our extended family get togethers. Spoof spy film with Rowan Atkinson. Brilliant in a Roadrunner way. Gags are signposted with huge neon "THERE'S A GAG COMING HERE" flashing signs. Which makes them even funnier when they come along. Strangely underheard off, which is amazing as ITV4 play it regularly.

Plus it has Natalie Imbruglia in it.

[note to self, must think of some pretentious bollocks that I also like...]

There's been a slew of fantastic Spanish horror / scifi films in recent years and not just from Guillermo Del Toro (he's mexicano but a lot of this stuff takes place in Spain). Someone's already mentioned Timecrimes, but I'll give a shoutout to Fermat's Room - wherein 4 mathematicians are lured to a farmhouse and set logic puzzles, thinking they will be rewarded with cash-money; however, every wrong answer causes the walls of the room they are in to close in a metre, and it ain't a large room to begin with. Then they find out that there is a linkage between all of them being there.

Then there's REC and its sequel REC2 - a 2 person TV crew follow firefighters around for the evening, filming them, then they called to a disturbance in a many-levelled apartment block which is then sealed off by the authorities while they and the tennants are trapped inside. Then all manner of horror breaks out. Strange fact - the DVD cover shows the very final scene of the film!

Best of this Iberian (or is Caledonion?!) lot is Intacto - a plane crashes, with one survivor who doesn't have a scratch on him. After appearing on the news, he's then approached by a stranger who informs him that the reason he survived is because he is lucky, and this luck is tradeable and more pertinantly can be bet upon and with. The twosome then start competing in all manner of dangerous betting scenarios, including - and this spoiler is on the front cover - a group of other such characters running full pelt through a pine forest, but blindfolded. Last man not impaled on a branch wins muchos pesos and bus fare home!

And if you're in the mood for summat South American of primo quality, I think the Best Oscar Foreign film of 2009 Secrets In Their Eyes (a murder mystery set to the backdrop of the Argentinian Junta) and from Brazil Elite Squad are fine choices - a political highly kinetic and ballistic action thriller, kinda the flipside of the coin to City Of God. That'll do for nowski!

BR
FT

It's on Lovefilm. Subtitled story of Jewish resistance in Holland. We put it on by mistake and couldn't be bothered to choose anything else. It was truly fantastic. I usually fall asleep during average films, this had me awake until the end at 1.30am.

No not in that way. The Scent of Green Papaya and The Quince Tree Sun. The Quince Tree Sun was a geezer trying to paint a quince tree for two odd hours. Absolutely riveting, seriously, and never on dvd as far as I'm aware.

Gregoire Moulin Against Humanity - a French romantic comedy about a football hating office clerk who ends up having a very unusual night out...I saw it in Plymouth Arts Centre about ten years ago, and loved it. I don't think there's ever been a UK DVD. I used to stare lovingly at the French ones when I was in FNAC, and finally got hold of a subtitled copy from Canada - bless those Quebecois!

He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not - another French movie. Audrey Tatou is a young lady having an affair with a married man. I can't say any more without spoiling it, but it doesn't go anywhere you're expecting. Readily available on UK DVD

The Navigator - emphatically not Flight Of The Navigator! Vincent Ward's first movie, a New Zealand film about a group of Cumbrian villagers during the Black Death who follow a young boy's visions, and dig through the centre of the earth to emerge in 20th Century Auckland. A marvellous, visually fantastic dream of a movie.

Straight Story - fabulous film. Beautiful, gentle, perfectly paced, wonderful acting from Richard Farnsworth and Sissy Spacek. You know - the one about the bloke on the lawn mower - goes to visit his brother who's had a stroke?

Thought not ... you should watch it.

New romantic/NY loft scene/alien invasion classic. Never out on R2 boo. Saw it at the ICA in about 1983. I am betting Lady Gaga has this on repeat at the Haus.

Insanely edited black and white horror - man turns into giant power tool. Classic from Japan, they splashed out on colour for the sequel. Tartan video.

Jeff Bridges again in Cutter's Way. As mentioned above in the bit about The Swimmer, there are quite a few American films from the late 60's to the early 80's, with a weirdly unsettling feeling about them. Night Moves with Gene Hackman's another one. The book Cutter and Bone is fantastic too.

Brilliant brilliant film.

Would have been a hit over here if the English weren't so daft about subtitles.

No-one will have seen this. I've spoken of it before. A low-budget but brilliant ski-bum documentary. Stunning camera work, breathtaking skiing, fantastic soundtrack. It was sponsored by ZTT and features some obscure stuff by Propaganda and Nasty Rox Inc.

... none of the trailers do it any justice whatsoever. One of the best films I've seen in my life, incredibly moving throughout. Probably not for everyone, and not going to cheer you up much. But for those that do get it, unforgettable.

"Mortelle Randonne" - Private Eye chases Isabelle Adjani across europe on a crime spree. On BBC2 one night, never seemingly again though.

Russian film about a company of troops in Afghanistan. Really well done. Apols that the clip doesn't have sub-titles.

The unbearable tension of the speech and the reaction to it.

This Year's Love anyone?

The romances may seem a little contrived (would the same small group of people really be on a romantic merry-go-round in such a big city?) but the relationships are well-drawn and some excellent actors are at the top of their game - Dougray Scott, Kathy Burke, Ian Hart, Douglas Henshall, Catherine McCormack. It's one of the best London films too.

No-one who ever stumbled across this on late night television ever forgot it. Happily the whole 33 minutes is on Youtube.

What you want is a pants on head retarded car chase film!

Speedtrap (1977), starring Joe Don Baker and Tyne Daley.

A car thief known as the Roadrunner is nicking cars. And the police are out to stop her. Oh bugger, there goes the plot.

Cheesy, decent soundtrack and of no artistic merit whatsoever. I must've watched it 10 times as a kid.

And since when have policemen ever worn helmets whilst driving cars?

Now The Massive are a cultural bunch, so there are probably many on here that are aware of this film, but for those that aren't...

It is an utterly wonderful, balls out rock n' roll piece of film-making. An exercise in "Fuck it - let's see what we can get away with".

It is hysterically gory, funny, sick (in a good way), kind-hearted, stupid and contains a kung-fu priest. Directed by some bloke called Peter Jackson. Wonder what ever became of him, etc.

Buckets and buckets and buckets of blood and it doesn't take itself at all seriously.

It's a marvel, from Alex Cox.

Great main theme from Iggy Pop, too, as well as some more cracking music on the soundtrack. A spooky tale.

Anthony Quinn and Ingrid Bergman in a little morality play about how we can all be bought.

*WARNING: MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS. AVOID IF YOU ARE EASILY UPSET BY DISCLOSURE OF PLOT ELEMENTS!!!!!*

One of the last great Hammer movies, written and directed by Brian Clemens of The Avengers fame, about a swashbuckling vampire hunter. Stylish, owing something to spaghetti westerns and samurai movies and also featuring the absolutely gorgeous Caroline Munro. The combination of vampires, swordfights and Munro caught the attention of my younger self through movie/horror magazines in the early 80s and didn't disappoint when I caught it on a BBC2 Hammer movie marathon weekend. It's still supremely watchable to my 42 year old self nearly 30 years later. It's cheesy, and creaky too, much like a lot of the Hammer films, but it's sense of style and fun carry it through.

Also, caught on a BBC2 science fiction marathon were Silent Running, which I'm presuming older science fiction fans will recognise the title of at least, and A Boy And His Dog starring a young Don Johnson.

Both films come from the era just before Star Wars, when films were allowed to be dark, nihilistic even.

A Boy And His Dog especially stuck with me. It's a post apocalyptic adventure and the title characters live hand to mouth day to day in a world that influenced the Mad Max films somewhat. Even down to Max scavenging accompanied by a dog.

The dog of the title isn't just any old dog though. This is a post apocalyptic buddy movie, and the dog has the best lines. I'll say no more on the dog. Like a lot of buddy movies a girl comes between them and Don Johnson's character spends a lot of time thinking with Little Don which gets him into some trouble. All comes alright in the end and not even the girl can get between them for long. In fact they end up sharing! Watch it and you'll see what I mean.

All about my mother (Todo sobre mi Madre) by Pedro Almadovar. A description of the story is pointless (and makes it sound weirder than it is) but it is wonderful.
As is the Man in the White suit which cropped up on another topic - Alec Guiness in an Ealing comedy which teaches you a huge amount about the economics of innovation in a capitalist society. Oh, and its very funny.
And if Repo Man is not well known, then probably neither is Singles - a film set in grunge Seattle with a soundtrack by Paul Westerberg. I love it. But it is a Cameron Crowe movie, which some people react to in the same way as a Richard Curtis movie. (Personally I like both, but I know some people hate everything they do).

Paul Giamatti, Thomas Haden Church, Virginia Madsen, Sandra Oh

Egyptian Band got to Israel to play a concert.

Nothing much really happens but it's very good indeed.

... a lot of film vets cut their teeth on this one!

Dark Star

Worthy, tasteful, not well known? Try Europa Europa, the true story of a jewish boy who succesfully avoided being caught up in the holocaust by joining the German Army and succeeding in remaining undetected. Only seen it once, thought it was brilliant.

Insane, nuts, in dubious taste? Try Society. A boy isn't sure that he actually belongs to his family. They are blonde, beautiful and upstandng members of society, he is dark haired, introverted and seeing a shrink. He's under the impression that mightily perverse things are going on just under his nose. Is he deluded? Let's just say that I got that film out on video when I was twelve expecting a fairly standard horror, I got something which David Cronenberg and JG Ballard would have blanched at. I watched it amazed. I was less amazed when my mum and dad watched it later on. They had stern words with me...

Tom Conti in a very funny film as a drunken womanising poet.

Can't get it anywhere mind you.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0084591/

in which the likes of Frank Sinatra, Tony Curtis and Burt Lancaster make heavily disguised cameo appearances, only revealing themselves at the end credits.

Does it count if it has been mentioned on other threads ?

If not then may I raise a flag for The secret of Roan Inish .

Bartleby

and Bagdad Cafe / Rosalie goes Shopping

that i dont think have been mentioned yet.

The Shout -during a village cricket match involving the local asylum Alan Bates begins to tell Tim Curry how he gained the power to kill with a shout. Very reminescent of Nic Roeg.

Another Spanish film: The Baby's Room. young couple with new born move into an old house. They start hearing strange noises on the baby monitor. Hubby sets up a tv monitor to investigate further. Very strange things happen......

A Russian film called Bop (think this means Thief). set in the soviet era it is about a teenage ner do well and his relationship with his violent dodgy geezer dad. Almost like a Russian Scorcese film.

Saw it in an Arthouse cinema when it came out about 12 - 13 years ago. Apart from me, two other people were watching. We all cried.

I habitually mention this film to quizzical looks. A Russian lorry driver crashes in Mongolia. He is taken in by a family who live in a yurt. The husband is not allowed sex with his wife, unless he goes a long way to Ulan Bator to buy condoms....

what could be better?

Loved it when I saw it many years ago.

and Flirting featuring the young Nicole Kidman. Both wonderful, funny and moving films.

is Tampopo by japanese director Juzo Itami.
It's a film about the role food plays in human lives from the cradle to the grave, told in a couple of frame stories about recurrent characters, intermingled with sketch-like scenes about people that only appear in that scene.
The way we are taken from one scene to another is usually from the camera starting to follow a minor character at the end of a scene, walking into another, or following someone running past the cast of the latest scene.
This is one of the funniest films ever (the scene with the dying mothers' last meal! The scene at the French restaurant!!),but it has a little something of everything.
I taped it off the TV-screening many years ago, in the VHS age...I haven't seen if you can get it on DVD (but I haven't been looking, my VHS is still working). When I asked everybody I knew in the following week if they had watched this fantastic film they all said that the TV trailer had put them off - they had focused on the one scene containing sex and food and made the film look almost pornographic apparently...(though this might be a selling point to some of you!)
Here's that restaurant scene:

My obscure, but heartfelt, suggestions (all discovered via DVD and website reviews)

Szinbad by Zoltan Huszarik: often voted (by Hungarians) as the most important Hungarian film of all time but rarely seen in the West. Actually a really great impressionistic film about the confessions of a serial philanderer.

Shohei Imamura's Vengeance is Mine: ostensibly a Japanese thriller, but so much more than that. There is so much more to Japanese cinema that samurai and horror stories.

Deep End (Jerzy Skolimowski 1970). Jane Asher; Bert Kwouk: Cat Stevens; Can; a swimming pool.

... is a disturbing but oddly compelling watch. The young lead guy is great (whatever became of him?) but Jane Asher's East End accent isn't that convincing (her fab yellow Mac makes up for it). Nice sleazy turn by Diana Dors as well. Worth it for the grubby 'feel' of London at the turn of the '60s.

My votes:

Mr. Jealousy (1997) - Eric Stolz's character Lester is so jealous of his girlfriend's ex's he takes things to extremes, joining the group therapy class one of them attends the better to dig into her past. Peter Bogdanovich is the therapist, Dr. Poke. Marianne Jean-Baptiste is a convincing neurotic New Yorker, in fact the entire cast are fantastic - particularly Stolz's best pal, Carlos Jacott, who steals every scene he is in.

Take A Girl Like You (1970) - Oliver Reed spends the entire film trying to 'conquer' Hayley Mills. Another turn-of-the-60s curio with a cast of names in support - Noel Harrison, John Bird, Sheila Hancock, Aimi MacDonald, Penelope Keith, Imogen Hassall and Harmony Grass on the soundtrack.

Myth of Fingerprints (1997): family angst at Thanksgiving. Great cast - Noah Wyle, Julianne Moore, Roy Schieder...

... on here many times in similar threads - "Ben Dover's Anal Spunkfest" is an absolute classic - the acting is so believable - and how many directors actually hold the camera and "act" at the same time?

Judging by these contributions, some of you are clearly into art cinema.

Two gems from the great Polish director, Kieslowski, before his acclaimed "Three Colour" series are "A Short Film About Love" and "A Short Film About Killing". Both of these movies are quite brilliant in their concept, acting and direction.

When it comes to car chase cult movies, I'd suggest

"Vanishing Point" (Barry Newman outdriving cops in a White Dodge challenger")
"Duel" (Dennis Weaver being chased and drive round the bend - literally - by a truck. An early Spielberg masterpiece),
"The Driver" (Ryan O'Neal as a getaway driver involved in a battle of wits with a cop, Bruce Dern".

Enjoy!

Jerry Stiller's King Of The B Movies. Really funny fake bio-pic of a Russ Meyer/Ed Wood type director.

Curiously, there are only German dubbed clips on YouTube but here you are anyway

[video:youtube][/video]

13 Tzameti. French film: by reading a letter meant for someone else a guy accidentally gets involved in a deadly betting game.

Does anyone else remember the Spanish film Lovers of the Artic Circle? An elliptical romance with lovely imagery.

Agree with "13 Tzameti" - absolutely rivetting stuff. Russian roulette taken to extremes. not for the fainthearted.

"Baise Moi" - a sort of extreme version of Thelma and Louise.

"Irreversible" - mind blowing revenge story featuring no holds barred brutality ie Monica Belluci raped in a subway.

Anything from the Austrian director Michael Haneke who seems to relish the perverse darker side of human nature: "Funny Games" (which is far from funny) and "Hidden" (featuring the divine Juliette Binoche and Daniel Auteul).

Gonzalez Inarritu's work: the sublime "Amore Perrios" and, my favourite of his movies, "21 Grams" with the excellent Sean Penn and always watchable Naomi Watts.

I also got into Korean cinema a few years back and recommend "Oldboy" and "Lady Vengeance". They don't make movies like this in corporate popcorn friendly Hollywood.

The original Cape Fear (not the De Niro piece of crap).

Or 'Seksmisja' in its original Polish.

Saw this on late-night telly once about 25 years ago but it has stuck with me ever since. Two male scientists emerge from suspended animation to find that World War 3 has wiped out all life on Earth's surface, leaving only an underground society consisting entirely of women.

Not at all the soft porn-fest you might expect, although there's definitely 'some nudity'. If memory serves, it was more of a dryly comic satire with shades of Sleeper or THX-1138.

Doubtless not as good as I recall it being, but at the time my early teenage brain thought it was brilliant.

Excellent French thriller/mystery from 2006 based on the Harlan Coben novel. Nail-biting and really quite moving. See IMDb for more, but I heartily recommend it.

I've always loved "Celine and Julie Go Boating" (Celine et Julie Vont en Bateau).
A tale of two women who discover a tableau being played out in a suburban Parisian family house in a hallucinatory parallel reality. They take turns to enter this world to try and prevent a tragedy. Sounds fanciful and very much of it's time, but a beautiful film.
It has an Alice In Wonderland dreamlike quality and the line between fiction and reality is extremely blurred. Leaves you with a warm glow at its end.

Also very under-rated - 'Blow Out' with (a surprisingly good) John Travolta as a sound man who witnesses and records a Chappaquiddick-like incident, and rather like Gene Hackman in 'The Conversation' plays it over and over, discovering more as he delves deeper.

Three losers decide to improve their situations by embarking on a life of crime.They do their research by watching a film called Armoured Car Robbery! This got a general release about 15 yrs ago and I saw it a mainstream cinema in Edinburgh.It seems to have disappeared into a black hole since.

Milos Forman's first American film was a flop, but is actually a wry outsider's take on US hippy culture. European directors fell to pieces trying to film the 'underground' (see Zabriskie Point/ Skidoo), but this one actually works, perhaps because it's really about being displaced in the west. It's best known for the pot-smoking session below, but I like the bit (not online) when Buck Henry tries to sing 'Strangers in Paradise' to his daughter. I actually prefer this to his later blockbusters.

(this is a thread that keeps on giving)

A classic - William Peter Blatty wrote and directed this brilliant film. I was unaware of it until listening to Mayo / Kermode one day and the "Good Doctor" mentioned it - apparently it's the real follow up to the Exorcist (which it's nothing like!)and continues the theme of faith. Stacy Keach has never been better - Shutter Island was a complete rip off of this.

Have always liked this Jonathan Demme road movie. Also could be filed alongside (the already mentioned) After Hours in the "Yuppies in Peril" sub genre!

a documentary on teenage love and sex featuring US government information films and movies of the 50's and 60's interspersed with people like David Byrne, Ginsberg, William Burroughs, Laurie Anderson and Sarah Bernhard interviewed about their teenage love life. Very funny and poignant

Bonkers 1981 'horror' film starring the peerless Isabelle Adjani. Just released this year on DVD.

from IMdB:
In France, the lonely and reclusive tailor Mr. Hire is an antisocial middle-age man that does not like people. When the young Pierrette is found murdered in his neighborhood, Mr. Hire becomes the prime suspect of the detective assigned to investigate the case. Mr. Hire usually stalks his neighbor Alice from his window during the night and sees her encounters with her boyfriend Emile. When Alice accidentally sees Mr. Hire, she surprisingly visits him and he discloses that he is in love with her. Further, he tells that he had witnessed Emile killing Pierrette, but he had not told the police since she would be considered accomplice of the murder. Mr. Hire invites Alice to travel with him to Lausanne, Switzerland, and leave Emile behind.

it's got some Nyman going on too, so it's gotta be good

French film. Mock documentary about two people who've met through a contact mag. Strangely moving.

Soylent Green, a really thought provoking sci-fi drama staring Charlton Heston. Very dystopian, wonderful depiction of over crowded New York with food shortages and massive disparity of wealth. Blue Collar, a really dark film about union corruption and corporate negligence with Richard Prior in his best role. It also has a really good soundtrack.

A Disney film from the 80's starring Meredith Salenger as Natty

Set during the depression a single father takes a job leaving his teenage daughter in a boarding house in Chicago. Everyone tells her she's been abandoned but she doesn't beleive it and sets off cross country to find her dad.

During her quest Natty is befriended at various times by a wolf and a very young John Cusack.

I heartily recommend it for teenage girls.

... Unheard of, but I love The Man Who Knew Too Little with Bill Murray. Fortunately it seems to be on TV over here every couple of months.

It's a daft spy spoof with Murray bumbling his way through what he thinks is an episode of "Life Theatre" but in reality British & Soviet bureaucrats have contrived to bring back the Cold War. Hilarity ensues. And Joanne Whalley is in it.

http://m.youtube.com/index?desktop_uri=%2F&gl=US#/watch?v=VcGgKhVjYIc

A weird, extremely foul-mouthed, very, very dark little movie set in the South Wales valleys. Pitch-black comedy, some rather nasty and disturbing violence, car theft and chases and heavy drug-taking, all amongst small-town mundanity. It also has a great cameo by Martin Ace, bass-player of legendary Welsh space-rockers Man, as "The Rocking Sikh" and an hilarious scene with Keith Allen as a local farmer off his face after being spiked with magic mushrooms.

A taster.

Of it's time but a very interesting film.

I also really like 'Wonderland', the one with Gina Mckee and the Michael Nyman soundtrack. A classic 'London' film.

Bill Douglas is one of the finest directors Britain ever produced, highly respected in Europe, but only ever made two films (one was technically a trilogy of shorts). I suspect most people have never heard of him.

My brother introduced me to his trilogy My Childhood, My Ain Folk and My Way Home - three largely autobiographical films about his upbringing in post-war poverty of Lothian's mining community. It doesn't wallow in gratuitous misery, it doesn't preach, it just carefully captures the deprivation, minor triumphs, setbacks and redemptions of being growing up an outcast within your own family.

It's not for everyone - it's shot in black and white (with the exception of one brief, but unforgettable scene), dialogue is sparse and in broad Scots, the actors are almost entirely non-professional and the pace is best described as 'careful'. It owes far more to the situationally-aware Italian neo-realist cinema than to the UK's own dialogue-heavy kitchen-sink realist dramas of the 1960s and perhaps that is why it seems to endure.

Douglas' only other cinema outing was Comrades - a self-described 'poor man's epic' telling the story of the first trade union, the Tolpuddle Martyrs. This feature almost bankrupted Channel 4's film division back in the 80s and was met with tepid praise from critics at the time. In retrospect, the body of opinion has very much swung back in its favour and the film is rightly viewed as a modern classic.

There are one or two YouTube clips of Douglas' work, but the recent documentary which accompanies the DVD/Blu-Ray release of the Trilogy is a great place to start if you're interested. Thankfully it is on YouTube in its entirety:

but still worth highlighting for those that haven't seen it, is Southern Comfort, a Walter Hill movie from the late seventies / early eighties. A group of National Guardsmen are on exercises in the swamps of Louisiana, and they manage to piss off the local Cajuns, with serious consequences...you can read it as Vietnam allegory, or just take it as a really really good thriller, with one of the tensest final sequences I can remember.

A French animation from couple of years back, it is beautiful beyond words and had me hooting with delight when I watched it. I shouted joyfully at the screen from time to time. Just as well I was watching on DVD. It is set partly in Edinburgh and features lots of little places I know. Very memorable is a poignant scene outside the pawnbrokers at the junction of Frederick Street and Queen Street.