The inspiration for Charlie Chaplin's Modern Times, Rene Clair's comic masterpiece was a landmark in the early days of sound production. In A Nous La Liberte Claire employs plenty of clever dialog tricks, comic sound effects, and songs to tell this satirical story of two friends who go from down and out prisoners to wealthy businessmen. When Louis successfully escapes from prison he winds up making a fortune in the phonograph business. Later his friend Emil is released and finds himself employed in Louis' factory. The amazing Bauhaus sets from legendary art director Lazare Meerson add to the satire by paralleling the design of the prison with that of the factory and assembly lines.

Not Only. But Also. was the career-launching comedy showcase for two of the funniest men ever put in front of a camera, Dudley Moore and Peter Cook. This 20th-anniversary collection functions as a time capsule of classic, '60s-era British humor. Better-known shows such as Monty Python's Flying Circus, Mr. Bean, Saturday Night Live, and even Benny Hill certainly owe something to Pete and Dud's off-the-cuff loopiness. [+]

The Oscar®-nominated film Tristana continues a devastating critique of social convention by director Luis Buñuel (Belle de Jour, That Obscure Object of Desire). Beautifully photographed in Toledo, Spain, the story is splendidly acted by Catherine Deneuve (The Last Metro, Belle de Jour) and Fernando Rey (The French Connection), in perhaps their finest roles. Rey is Don Lope, a liberated but hypocritical aristocrat who seduces his beautiful young ward, Tristana (Deneuve). Given the opportunity, she flees with her lover (Franco Nero, Camelot), but illness forces her to return and, later, marry Don Lope. The result is a tense union in which Tristana slowly gains the upper hand.

Huppert is Emma Bovary, the dissatisfied wife of a country doctor who longs to be part of French society. Her ambition and her obsessive affair with an aristocratic young man lead to a tragic end. It's a mixed blessing, but Claude Chabrol's 1991 adaptation of Madame Bovary can at least claim a proper French pedigree in its fidelity to Flaubert's literary classic. It's certainly more faithful than Madame herself, played here with icy determination by Isabelle Huppert. Frustrated, repressed, and desperate for any opportunity to break free of her numbing marital bondage, the wife of Dr. Bovary finds her chance in the affections of Rodolphe Boulanger (Christophe Malavoy), but she is too shallow and too selfish to sense his lack of commitment. And as Flaubert's tale unfolds (along with Chabrol's dryly accurate interpretation), Emma Bovary finds herself caught in a snare of her own design. This tragedy of self-absorption-a universal study of indulgence, ignominy, and fatal discontent-should prove potent for anyone who feels the oppression of an unhappy marriage, but it's also a compelling study of boredom as an internal phenomenon. Huppert conveys exasperation, passion, and self-destruction in equal measure, yet she barely alters her passive, blank expression; her performance is too cold to ignite the resonant themes of Flaubert's novel. All in all, one wonders if Chabrol-seemingly uneasy with costume drama-is being too respectful of Flaubert at the cost of his own directorial mastery. [+]

Little known stateside but long esteemed in Europe, The Crime of Monsieur Lange is simply one of the very greatest films directed by Jean Renoir (it was made a few years before Grand Illusion and Rules of the Game). René Lefèvre (Le Million) takes the title role of a nebbish who clerks for a penny-press publisher by day, and by night writes feverish potboilers about a Western hero named "Arizona Jim. " Lange's encyclopedically venal boss (Jules Berry) discovers his secret and immediately starts exploiting it, as he exploits everybody and everything within range. Life sublimely imitates pulp fiction and vice versa in the brilliant screenplay by Jacques Prévert (who would later write Children of Paradise). The movie blends sociopolitical protest, tender satire, and astonishing poetry without breaking a sweat, and its climax-an amazing synthesis of theme, dramatic emotion, and inspired camerawork-is one of the transcendent moments in screen history. -Richard T. Jameson.

Triumph of the Will is one of the most important films ever made. Not because it documents evil-more watchable examples are being made today. And not as a historical example of blind propaganda-those (much shorter) movies are merely laughable now. No, Riefenstahl's masterpiece-and it is a masterpiece, politics aside-combines the strengths of documentary and propaganda into a single, overwhelmingly powerful visual force. Riefenstahl was hired by the Reich to create an eternal record of the 1934 rally at Nuremberg, and that's exactly what she does. You might not become a Nazi after watching her film, but you will understand too clearly how Germany fell under Hitler's spell. The early crowd scenes remind one of nothing so much as Beatles concert footage (if only their fans were so well behaved!). Like the fascists it monumentalizes, Triumph of the Will overlooks its own weaknesses-at nearly two hours, the speeches tend to drone on, and the repeated visual motifs are a little over-hypnotic, especially for modern viewers. But the occasional iconic vista (banners lining the streets of Nuremberg, Hitler parting a sea of 200,000 party members standing at attention) will electrify anyone into wakefulness. -Grant Balfour.

In his adaptation of the Tristan and Isolde legend, Jean Cocteau modernizes its eternal theme while making his mark as a master of poetic realism. The tragic story of a young man who falls hopelessly in love with his uncle's wife conjures both beauty and agony through intense dramatic performances, romantic Wagnerian music, and imaginative settings.

Beautiful young French people romp on an idyllic country estate in Tender Cousins. The story, set in 1939, centers around Julien, a young adolescent boy in love with his cousin Julia, who is in love with the foppish Charles, who is engaged to be married to Julien's older sister Claire, who. you get the idea. Julien and Julia's little sister Poune, who seems to know what everyone is up to, engage in pranks; a visiting actress puts on a theatrical revue; everyone pursues the new maid; a scientist believes he has isolated the soul, which he captures in balloons; and, when war against Germany is declared, the adult men must go off to war, giving the otherwise lyrical story a sad undercurrent. Flashes of wit, bits of silliness, and a good dose of nudity make Tender Cousins pretty much the definition of its brand of French sex comedy. -Bret Fetzer.