Intense direction (Pekinpah) coupled with assured acting (McQueen).

Sartorially dated certainly, but still powerful, disturbing and raw.

Way Of The Dragon is memorable purely for its final Coliseum-set showdown between Lee and Chuck Norris (at the time the holder of countless US and World Karate championships). This is the film that provides just about the best combat sequence ever shot.

It may not consistently stay the distance, but the sublimely funny moments make up for an awful lot of misfires.

With some of the best costumes since the musicals of the '50s and one of the '70s funkiest scores, it's quite rudimentary on most levels - it's no Shaft.

The gorgeous backdrop of the film makes the violence and darkness even more disturbing - but this is more than just a horror film. There's real substance in themes, performances and John Boorman's superb direction.

Not as affecting as Ozu's classic Tokyo Story, Late Spring still charms with it's similar theme of development of the parental bond as the children mature and become more independent. Although well acted, the visual are equally arresting but when the themes are so similar a new approach is required to keep it interesting.

Keeping the dialogue minimal and the action high on the agenda, life in Paris' underworld proves to be surprisingly yet suitably violent and threatening.

Wringing the last drops out of the idea, it strains to stay on-side, but it remains true enough to the spirit of the series to get it over the line.

With Redford giving one of his best comedic performances, helped by a Oscar winning script, The Candidate is witty and charming, while looking good and proving quite memorable, like Redford's lawyer.

Hitchcock's penultimate film deals with many of his previous themes with typical grim comedy and insight into a psychopathic killer's mind.

For exploitation-enthusiasts and Scorsese completists only.

Pollack does right to put his faith in one man and a whole lot of mountains. The result is impressive.

Woody's neuroses are still gloriously present, and the whole thing is made accessible by Herbert Ross' dynamic direction.

John Waters was way ahead of his time with this corruscating '70s vision of small-town Americana.

Weird, but kind of cool.

Thoughtful, moving tale which places its spectacular effects within a humane, elegiac story.

Trying too hard and generally too trying. Seek out Howard Hawke's Bringing up Baby instead and be done with it.

It stands as a hugely enjoyable, occasionally chilling, musical.

After several successful films where he plays the tough-as-nails cowboy, Wayne wasn't about to break the pattern now. Playing the only character he knows, he gives several inspiring speeches to an unlikely group of kids who turn from boys to men.

It is also, of course, quite unrelentingly cool.

Ethical screed aside, what does A Clockwork Orange have to offer beyond its curiosity value and a crash course in humanism? Well, for a start there's Kubrick's dazzling visual style which, rather in the manner that Trainspotting did 25 years later, translates the substance of an "unfilmable" book into the language of cinema. And at the dramatic core of the film is a simply astonishing performance by Malcolm MacDowell as Alex. It also features an orgy sequence that would have had Von Stroheim laughing his jackboots off — you'll certainly never listen to the William Tell Overture in quite the same way again. And as for Singin' In The Rain...

Connery has a ball with great stunts, snappy dialogue and a bevy of typically Bondish beauties.

Like Lansbury, the film has aged well and retains almost all of it's magic.

A lengthy, visually impressive period piece with little in the way of new material or fresh spins on history to distinguish it.

A made-for-TV movie that proved so remarkable it received a theatrical release (first in Europe, then 10 years later in the US), Spielberg's calling card is as distinctive a piece of visual storytelling as you're ever likely to see.

The Man With No Name faces a whole lot of pain in Clint's thrilling directorial debut.

It still stands up as an upbeat portrait of pre-revolutionary Russia, and will have you whistling If I Were A Rich Man for days.

Bogdanovich’s perfect recreation of the sense of time and place, and his ability to mix wit with poignancy that make this such a charming, timeless film.

Friedkin's hand-held documentary style was the perfect vehicle for the film's pumped-up verite.

It's not the plot that disappoints, it's the poor dialogue between action sequences. Sadly another film to file under not as good as the book.

Whatever the moral perspective, it keeps you gripped right to the end.

This is not a film about narrative but loneliness and life on the road, which it captures with a mysterious brilliance.

It's a deep film, but also elusive, accepting that some mysteries can never be solved.

Roald Dahl's immortal, sugar-coated morality play finds Gene Wilder as disturbing and fault-ridden but compelling as the book described. Okay, so its pacing may be slightly off (taking nearly 40 minutes to arrive at the factory gates), but this is still a Golden Ticket if ever there was one.

Alan J. Pakula directs with an aptly chilly eye on blue steel and grey walls, favouring whirring tape recorders and silently lurking voyeurs. Sutherland's melancholy title character is constantly challenged and prodded into the background by Fonda's Oscar-winning turn, which takes centre stage until the film becomes more obsessed with probing the riddles of her personality than solving the fairly transparent mystery.

They say that great actors are never knowingly caught acting; Altman's best movies are similarly effortless - experiences to be lived in, rather than simply watched.

The usually reliable thriller-director Lumet falls short. With an irritating score and bizarre performance by Martin Balsam, it's alleviated by a promising performance by a young Christopher Walken.

Poor attempt by Hammer to create their version of Frankenstein, featuring the usually reliable Bates offering a rather irritating performance as the scientist who goes beyond the call of science. Meanwhile before the call of Darth Vader Prowse begins to practice his heavy breathing and ominous walk.

With the potency of the central idea diminishing, Escape still manages the tricky move of carrying on a story that really should have ended with the last film, while setting up the series' mythology and paving the way for future chapters. But it's still a dilution.

Flimsy plot (as usual for Argento) but stunning set pieces and camera work.

Although there are fine homages to Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Eisenstein and Harold Lloyd here, this is a scattershot offering full of apolitical mockery.

Another coming-of-age tale about three boys and their quest to become men, which invariably revolves around having sex and puerile behaviour but then changes tack completely by giving us lush scenery. If the director had remained with one idea then perhaps the end product wouldn't seem so varied.

One of the best Amicus anthology movies, this is an enjoyable affair full of affectionate horror homage.

One of the least famous of Clint's Western this is an enigma of the genre with ambiguity and psychological depth all over the place.

Arguably the best British gangster movie ever made.

Wise (and Crichton) concoct the most absorbing, riveting take on science fiction tempered with science fact.

Downright depressing.

Amusing and imaginative and, of course, beautifully animated, this movie has all the superficial hallmarks of a great Disney picture.

Episodic western with a great performance from Hoffman.

Less melodramatic and earthier than the classic 1939 version with Olivier, Robert Fuest’s take still heaves with passion thanks to Dalton’s fiery chemistry with Anna Calder-Marshall’s Cathy. John Coquillon’s cinematography expertly captures the drabness of the Moors setting, while Michel Legrand offers a haunting score.

Fairly routine western makes a disappointing swansong for Hawks. Still good fun though, if you like this kind of thing.

Violent, visionary, vital.

If Cassavetes' hipster cine-language has lost a little of its age and the innovative improv style won't be for everyone, the themes he tackles, riffed by a masterful group of actors, remain enthralling.

A true evocation of the spirit of the Strand Magazine, this is the best Holmes movie ever made and sorely underrated in the Wilder canon.

A key turn-of-the-decade film, with Nicholson railing against waitresses and barking at noisy dogs as Rafelson observes seedily picturesque roadside America.

A typical older male mentore story...told with sensitivity and perceptiveness.

The life and crimes of Virgil Starkwell, a petty hoodlum who finds love with a laundress, Louise, in between botched blags and stints on a chain gang.

It’s instilled with the bite and bark of Bilko’s capitalist fervour, and has a fun line in cool, snappy dialogue, although never intending to be quite so broadly a comedy.

Not a sequel to the bland film of Jacqueline Susann’s trashy best-seller, this is more like a demented remake, alternating modish psychedelia with deliberately square moralising.

Those with the patience to sit through a slow first half will be rewarded with another gutsy ending.

Straining for significance at every moment, this is one of a wave of late '60s/early '70s Westerns that represent Hollywood's idea of the counterculture in love beads, feathers and picturesque gore.

A lurid gothic gangster psychodrama from Roger Corman, this is Shelley Winters’ finest hour-and-a-half, cast as Arizona Clark ‘Ma’ Barker, a role it would be impossible to overplay.

Scott is simply awesome as the one-of-a-kind General George Patton, the brilliant campaigner and man among men renowned for the rage he directed at the berks in authority and the adulation he inspired in his men.

Shot in a grainy grey and white helps to give the film an amateurish and at the same time realistic feel, particularly as it's based on true events. With standout performances from Lo Bianco and Stoler, this is a forgotten gem that's waiting to be rediscovered.

Dour script but sterling performances from the two male leads, this is basically watchable if you're interested in the subject.

Bitterly funny with perfect set-piece after perfect set-piece.

This is the Bond flick blessed with the best plot, a genuine sense of emotion and a spirit closest to Ian Fleming’s novels.

Emphasis has been placed on extravaganza, when it should really have been placed on getting good performances out of a talented cast.

Like the stranded astronauts, we are forced to sit around for too long in stale air, waiting for something to happen. An overly-long, vacuous foray into space.

Costa-Gravas at his hypocrisy and oppression-fighting best.

Note-perfect performances, a screenplay steeped in both nostalgia and a timely sense of insight, and anti-heroes you can't help but love.

It's a long way from Top Gun, but it's still stirring stuff.

Mind you, Eastwood went on the star with an orang-utan, twice, so this is only his third maddest film. Although, it could be his dullest. Which was one thing no one would of expected of this madcap enterprise, born of a what-the-heck attitude from its macho stars — that it would struggle so hard to be fun.

Once the pop sensibilities are out of the way, this clever foursome becomes more than the sum of its part.

As a metaphor for England at the dawn of the 70s, The Italian Job is a hard one to top.

While you cannot dismiss its place in history, its power is in what it represented rather than what it did.

From The Godfather to Heat, the stamp of The Wild Bunch is self-evident. Italian director Carlo Carlei summed up the debt owed to the film and its director when he said, "There is a chain of inspiration like The Bible... Everything comes from Peckinpah."

Although some say Wayne's Oscar was given out of sympathy instead of his performance, he still acts well as the sheriff who's past his peak. Proving he wasn't always a serious as he was made out to be, he plays the role with aplomb, even pastiching himself in other films.

Superb performances and a compelling script have made this film a strange mix of Oscar-winner and Cult Classic.

An uncompromising documentary which simply lays its subject bare and dares us not be moved by the raw humanity on display.

The first of the silly VW Beetle with a cute personality comedies, is as childish dated and occasionally sweet as the others.

Classic War caper with a few too many plot contrivances but high on adventure.

This has a lot of good ingredients but just doesn't quite manage to pull it off. It's looks dated and Shirley Maclaine doesn't quite capture the sympathies of all audiences.

The film is too long at well over two hours, but the effects are impressive for the time and the musical numbers zippy.

Even if you're not a 'fan' of the musicals, Oliver is so witty, so bright and so endearing that even the iciest viewer should start melting in it's corona.

A garish, gorgeous example of pop art at its finest.

Overlong, it'll most likely try the patience of audiences now accustomed to a bit more bang for their buck, but it's a great deal of fun for those with a penchant for old-style action.

Fleischer mastery of tension and attention to detail make this riveting story a great piece of cinema.

Cheerful, kitsch and camp.

Falls into the "interesting failure" category.

Part of its strength is that it’s not a glossy, predictable Hollywood horror and so it has a grainy, semi-amateur, black and white look which gives it a dread sense of conviction.

For the rare uninitiated, this is a fine introduction to Babs' talents.

It's that smile playing on Rosemary's lips, suggesting that her maternal instinct and the conspirators' hold on this vapid baby doll have prevailed, that provides the biggest chill.

Lemmon and Mathau's finest hour.

Very dated farcical comedy but Peter Sellers is charming despite the anachronistic character-humour.

A film rich with unforgettable imagery, killer lines and physical thrills.

Its faults - sketchy narrative, overblown abstraction - are counterbalanced by its gripping engagement between man and machine, and its rhapsodic wonder at heaven and earth and the infinite beyond.