The film season on Film 4 to accompany this series as per the Film 4 site:
Orphans Of The Storm
Monday 5th September, 12.50am and on Thursday 8th September, 11am
Lillian and Dorothy Gish are innocents caught up in the French Revolution in this silent drama by the director of Birth Of A Nation, DW Griffith, built around touching performances by the Gish sisters, some spectacular action sequences, and Griffith's own love of a rattling good yarn.
Ordet
Monday 12th September, 1.30am and on Thursday 15th September, 11am
In a remote Danish farming community a young man believes he's Jesus and appears to have miraculous powers. Danish drama written and directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer, this is a sombre exploration of religious faith in all its various guises, directed by Dreyer with a quiet but deep seated compassion for his characters.
The Battleship Potemkin
Monday 19th September, 12.10am and on Thursday 22nd September, 11am
Eisenstein's celebrated documentary style re-creation of the 1905 anti-Tsarist uprising by Russian sailors is a meticulous exercise in montage, stirring visuals - and propaganda. Although burdened by its reputation for greatness, The Battleship Potemkin remains startlingly beautiful.
La Regle Du Jeu
Monday 26th September, 1.30am and on Thursday 29th September, 11am
Masterpiece from Jean Renoir that satirises French class distinctions to sharp, witty and timeless effect. Yet another commercial flop that now stands as one of cinema's greatest achievements, Renoir's satire is a sharp dissection of human nature and a glorious piece of art that lives up to its restored reputation.
A Matter Of Life And Death
Monday 3rd October, 1.50am and on Thursday 6th October, 11am
Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's beautifully conceived and magically realised film about a pilot who tries to cheat death in the name of love is a classic romantic-fantasy. Some people say it's the greatest British film of the 1940s. And very smart people they are too.
Pather Panchali
Monday 10th October, 1.15am and on Thursday 13th October, 11am
First instalment in the acclaimed Apu trilogy, a series of films that follows events in the life of a poor Bengali family. Massive both in influence and scope, the trilogy not only redefined Indian cinema but remains a standout in the history of cinema thanks to its universal themes.
L'Avventura
Monday 17th October, 1.20am and on Thursday 20th October, 11am
When a woman goes missing, the ensuing search brings her fiance and her best friend together. Right from its ironic title, Michelangelo Antonioni's breakout film, an 'adventure' without event, is modernist classic about the dangers of modernism.
Black God, White Devil
Monday 12th October, time TBC
A fictionalised account of the escapades of hired gunman Antonio Das Mortes which draws Brazilian myth and folklore, Black God White Devil was the first major film of Glauber Rocha, the leading figure of Brazil's cinema novo in the 1960s.
Killer Of Sheep + The Exiles
Monday 31st October, time TBC (double bill)
Charles Burnett's landmark 1977 drama has a unique mystique. Centring on a blue-collar worker who struggles to survive on less than minimum wage working in a local abattoir, Burnett's film captures poverty and despair in the Los Angeles ghetto with a rare poeticism. A seminal American independent movie.
Xala (TBC)
Monday 6th November, time tbc
Smart, satirical sex comedy about a prominent businessman who decides to take a third wife. Set in the recently independent state of Senegal, Xala was directed by Ousmane Semene, who was widely regarded as "the father of African film".
Monday 14th November
TBC
The Long Day Closes + My Beautiful Laundrette
Monday 21st November, time tbc (double bill)
The Long Day Closes
Peerlessly evocative, family album cinema. Terence Davies remembers growing up in the magic and mire of post-war Liverpool, in what is arguably his greatest achievement in cinema to date.
My Beautiful Laundrette
This tale of a young Asian Londoner determined to make a success out of a run-down laundrette received an Oscar nomination for writer Hanif Kureishi and launched the career of Daniel Day-Lewis. Expertly acted, with a consistently comic touch, this remains a definitive snapshot of British life in the 1980s.
Dancer In The Dark
Monday 28th November, time tbc
In her first film role, Bjork stars alongside Catherine Deneuve as a Czech immigrant in 50s America who has a tendency to retreat into musical fantasy, in this typically innovative Cannes prize-winning musical from Danish filmmaker Lars Von Trier.
William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet
Monday 5th December, time tbc
Baz Luhrmann transfers Verona to Verona Beach in this iconoclastic, sexy rendering of the bard's classic tale of love and tragedy. The result is a sexy, innovative and memorable sumptuous feast for eye and ear.
The Death of Mr Lazarescu
Monday 12th December, time tbc
Romanian writer-director Cristi Puiu's magnificent second feature is a tragi-comedy set in contemporary Bucharest, which charts the final hours of the dying pensioner Lazarescu. A remarkable achievement, The Death Of Mr Lazarescu is notable for its impressively naturalistic performances, its formal assurance, and a genuine compassion for its central character's suffering.
