Warner Brothers

The Mad Genius (1931)

The Mad Genius (1931)
Rating: ★★★½
Aug 8, 2000Control Freak Ballet Master
John Barrymore as a ballet master who controls and dominates pupil Marian Marsh. This was clearly made as an attempt to replicate the success that Barrymore had playing more or less exactly the same type of role in the earlier Svengali
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Strangers on a Train (1951)

Strangers on a Train (1951)
Rating: ★★★★
Sep 22, 2014Murder Pact Between Strangers/Psycho-Thriller
One of the most darkly engrossing of Alfred Hitchcock's thrillers, a classic about two strangers who make a murder pact after meeting on a train. Where any other director would have made a straight thriller, Hitchcock lingers on the mordant humour with unnerving effect
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The Crimson Pirate (1952)

The Crimson Pirate (1952)
Rating: ★★★
Dec 8, 2000Pirate Swashbuckler with Anachronistic Inventions
Burt Lancaster-starring pirate swashbuckler that announces it is not taking itself seriously and goes entertainingly over-the-top, eventually adding a series of wildly anachronistic inventions
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The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953)

The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953)
Rating: ★★½
May 26, 1999Atomically-Revived Dinosaur
A classic of the genre for a number of reason - it was the film that kicked off the 1950s fad for atomic monsters, featuring an archetypal story about a dinosaur brought back to life by atomic tests. It also featured among the very first screen credits for both Ray Bradbury and stop-motion animator Ray Harryhausen
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Phantom of the Rue Morgue (1954)

Phantom of the Rue Morgue (1954)
Rating: ★★
Dec 22, 2015Edgar Allan Poe Adaptation/Trained Killer Ape
A version of Edgar Allan Poe's Murders in the Rue Morgue that was made for the original 3D fad. That is to say, it is more a case of some elements of the story having been shuffled around into a new story with Karl Malden as a mad zookeeper using a hypnotised ape to kill women
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The Miracle (1959)

The Miracle (1959)
Rating: ★
Apr 7, 2013Statue of the Virgin Mary Comes to Life/Catholic Historical Romance
A ridiculously melodramatic Catholic historical drama wherein a statue of the Virgin Mary comes to life to take the place of a nun so she can run off and woo a young Roger Moore … A lushly made canvas but otherwise absurdly overwrought piety
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The Devils (1971)

The Devils (1971)
Rating: ★★★★
May 9, 2001Historical Witch Persecution
Ken Russell makes an historical work about the Catholic Church's persecution of a supposed outbreak of possession at a convent in 17th Century France. As to be expected of Russell, this is shocking and outrageous. Oliver Reed gives one of his best performance
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A Clockwork Orange (1971)

A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Rating: ★★★★½
May 3, 2001Future Thugs/Brainwashing
One of the key films by Stanley Kubrick, centred around ultra-violent thugs in a near-future setting. Everybody was outraged at Kubrick choreographing scenes of violence to classical music but the film has a considerable brilliance and very dark sense of humour
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The Terminal Man (1974)

The Terminal Man (1974)
Rating: ★★★
Jul 5, 2001Neurosurgical Experiment Amok/Michael Crichton Adaptation
Adaptation of a Michael Crichton book about an experimental neurological implant that ends up going amok. This adopts the blinding white-on-white look that has chilling effect in the early hospital sections but stifles the drama when it is extended to the real world too
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The Amazing Captain Nemo (1978)

The Amazing Captain Nemo (1978)
Rating: ★★
Jun 8, 1999Captain Nemo's Modern Day Adventures
TV mini-series released as a theatrical film in some parts of the world that resurrects Captain Nemo in the present-day. It is Irwin Allen returning to his tv roots where Captain Nemo’s adventures become a blatant attempt to copy Star Wars
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The Ninth Configuration (1979)

The Ninth Configuration (1979)
Rating: ★★★
Nov 4, 2000Military Asylum Black Comedy
The directorial debut of William Peter Blatty, the writer of The Exorcist, a strange and unclassifiable black comedy set in a military asylum. Imagine One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest directed by Robert Altman
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The Shining (1980)

The Shining (1980)
Rating: ★★★★
Mar 18, 2001Haunted Hotel/Cabin Fever/Stephen King Adaptation
Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of Stephen King's novel throws much of the book out but has duly become a classic. Jack Nicholson goes grandly mad amid Kubrick's stupendous production and unsettling set-pieces
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Altered States (1980)

Altered States (1980)
Rating: ★★★★
Dec 8, 1999Drug Trips & The Meaning of Life/Reversion to Caveman
Ken Russell's big studio-backed film about drug trips, the meaning of life and William Hurt reverting to a caveman is a glorious madcap and visually stunning work that reaches for the same cosmological grandeur that 2001: A Space Odyssey does
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Firefox (1982)

Firefox (1982)
Rating: ★★★★
Mar 10, 2004Hi-Tech Fighter Plane Theft/Techno-Thriller
Clint Eastwood directs/stars in a standout thriller about the theft of a hi-tech fighter plane from inside the Soviet Union. The USSR is shown with paranoid effect and there is an exhilarating climax with the plane in flight
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Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983)

Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983)
Rating: ★★
Dec 16, 2000Fantasy Anthology/TV Series Remake
Steven Spielberg, Joe Dante, John Landis and George Miller came together to make this homage to tv's The Twilight Zone. The episodes are variable but the standout is Miller's Nightmare at 20,000 Feet
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Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes (1984)

Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes (1984)
Rating: ★★★★
Aug 17, 2012Revisionist Tarzan Film
Maybe the definitive Tarzan film, one that drops the pulp adventure and recasts the story as British arthouse theatre. Superbly mounted and cast. Christopher Lambert has never better in the title role
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Ladyhawke (1985)

Ladyhawke (1985)
Rating: ★★★★
Apr 7, 2001Mediaeval Fantasy/Lovers Under Animal Transformation Curse
A beautifully made Richard Donner mediaeval fantasy with two lovers suffering a curse that transforms them into animals only able to touch in person for a second at dusk and dawn
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The Spirit (1987)

The Spirit (1987)
Rating: ★★
Nov 27, 2018Comic-Book Superhero
Few people today have an idea of what a huge name comic-book creator Will Eisner was. This was an unsold tv pilot adaptation of Eisner's most famous creation, the masked hero The Spirit. The pilot is not a very successful effort but at least it makes an effort to get many of the details and zany spirit of the comic right
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Body Snatchers (1993)

Body Snatchers (1993)
Rating: ★★★★
Feb 12, 2002Invasion of the Body Snatchers Remake
Abel Ferrara's remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers is an overlooked film that settles in with an undeniable creepiness that is just as effective as the earlier versions. The metaphor for the pod people is more diffuse in this one but that does not mitigate the film's effect
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Falling Down (1993)

Falling Down (1993)
Rating: ★
Nov 18, 1999Man's Shooting Rampage Against the Frustrations of Life
Though many people celebrated this as black comedy about Michael Douglas taking up arms on a shooting rampage against the petty frustrations of modern life, it is a film that is really a single redneck rant against the poor and minorities
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Demolition Man (1993)

Demolition Man (1993)
Rating: ★★★★
Nov 11, 2000Satirical Politically Correct Dystopia/Action
One of Sylvester Stallone's better films, a satirically funny work where he plays a contemporary police officer unfrozen in a future overrun by Political Correctness to chase down criminal Wesley Snipes
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Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993)

Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993)
Rating: ★★★
Feb 23, 2002Comic-Book Superhero/Animation
Theatrically released film based on the 1990s animated Batman tv series. This allows the series to stretch its wings and do things it never could on tv, although the creation of a new super-villain never quite comes off
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The Hudsucker Proxy (1994)

The Hudsucker Proxy (1994)
Rating: ★★★★
Sep 10, 2001Black Comedy/Divine Intervention
One of the Coen Brothers’ strangest films – imagine a homage to a 1940s Howard Hawks film conducted on giant oversized sets like something out of Brazil with a blacker-than-black sense of humour and angels in the mix
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Batman & Robin (1997)

Batman & Robin (1997)
Rating: ★
Sep 30, 2000Comic-Book Superhero
Possibly the worst film ever made on a big studio budget, Joel Schumacher’s follow-up to Tim Buton's standout Batman films where he turns everything into an absurd Day Glo realm with a script for two year-olds, campy puns and badly overacting super-villains
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Contact (1997)

Contact (1997)
Rating: ★★★½
May 25, 2009Communications from Space
Carl Sagan's novel about SETI is inflated into a big budget film determined to impress even though the story did not need it. Sagan's interesting debate about religion and science is emasculated so as not to offend any religious groups
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Batman and Mr Freeze: SubZero (1997)

Batman and Mr Freeze: SubZero (1997)
Rating: ★★★
Sep 30, 2000Comic-Book Superhero/Animation
The second of the animated Batman films, a Mr Freeze story timed to come out at the same time as Joel Schumacher's Batman & Robin atrocity. This treats the Mr Freeze story with far more respect than that film
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The Matrix (1999)

The Matrix (1999)
Rating: ★★★★★
May 11, 1999Virtual Reality
A film that was as groundbreaking when it came out as Star Wars was in its day. The Wachowskis create a defining work on Virtual Reality themes and do so with a sublime cool and a series of breathtaking action moves that blew everybody away
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Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures (2001)

Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures (2001)
Rating: ★★★★
May 2, 2001Genre Director Documentary
Documentary about the life of Stanley Kubrick made by his brother-in-law that lifts the veil on the mystique that surrounded Kubrick in his later years and gives a good deal of insight into his working processes
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A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) (2001)

A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) (2001)
Rating: ★★★★½
Jun 29, 2001Android Boy’s Quest
Steven Spielberg directs an unfinished Stanley Kubrick project about an android boy's quest. The result is a beautiful and intelligent SF film where the sensibilities of either director merge with magnificent results
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The Adventures of Pluto Nash (2002)

The Adventures of Pluto Nash (2002)
Rating: ★★
Apr 1, 2003Lunar Comedy-Thriller
Huge flop comedy for Eddie Murphy in which he plays a nightclub owner on The Moon. There is an almost good SF film hiding inside and depiction of a surprisingly detailed Lunar culture but the unnfunny comedy elements kill it
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The Matrix Reloaded (2003)

The Matrix Reloaded (2003)
Rating: ★★★
May 23, 2003Virtual Reality
The first of the sequels to The Matrix inevitably disappointed on the massive build-up. The Wachowskis leave more questions than answers, while the new action scenes are often jaw-dropping they also feel boiler-plated on
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The Matrix Revolutions (2003)

The Matrix Revolutions (2003)
Rating: ★★★
Nov 11, 2003Virtual Reality
Third of The Matrix sequels and the weakest of the series. This offers one showstopping effects sequence, on the other hand it also leaves a host of unanswered questions dangling
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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005)

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005)
Rating: ★★
Sep 16, 2005Gonzo Children's Film/Fantastical Candy Factory
Tim Burton's remake of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is a peculiarly lifeless confection that fails to find any of the zaniness of the original, something that one would have thought would have been Burton's forte
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Superman Returns (2006)

Superman Returns (2006)
Rating: ★★★★
Jun 21, 2006Comic-Book Superhero
This has a bad reputation but Bryan Singer does a wonderful job in bringing Superman back to the screen in a version surprisingly reliant on the Christopher Reeve films. The superheroics soar and Kevin Spacey makes for the best screen Lex Luthor ever
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Lady in the Water (2006)

Lady in the Water (2006)
Rating: ★★★
Nov 10, 2006Water Nymph, Predestination and Myth
For all its descent into loopy ideas at times, this is a decidedly interesting M. Night Shyamalan film about myth featuring Bryce Dallas Howard as a water nymph who appears out of an apartment pool
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V for Vendetta (2006)

V for Vendetta (2006)
Rating: ★★★★
Apr 2, 2006Graphic Novel Adaptation/Totalitarian Future England
Adaptation of the Alan Moore graphic novel with a script from The Wachowskis. Moore's repudiation aside, this is a fine and literate work that retells the story of an anarchist trickster and potently politicises it for the era of the George W. Bush.
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Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007)

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007)
Rating: ★★
Feb 3, 2008Murderous Barber Musical
Tim Burton takes on the film version of the Stephen Sondhiem musical about a murderous barber, featuring Johnny Depp in the title role. But disappointingly, Burton still makes the same film he always does
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Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)
Rating: ★★★½
Jul 11, 2007Young Wizard
The fifth and in my opinion the best of the Harry Potter films. It is the first film where we see the darkening of emotions and the children growing up as storm clouds gather. Much of the show is stolen by Imelda Staunton
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