Directed by Chris Smith • 1999 • United States

It takes a village to make a movie, but when that village is Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin, the results are bizarre, comical, and quintessentially American. With the help of his mother, his eighty-two-year-old uncle, and a local cast of oddballs, DIY f...

Directed by Juzo Itami • 1985 • Japan

The tale of an eccentric band of culinary ronin who guide the widow of a noodle-shop owner on her quest for the perfect recipe, this rapturous "ramen western" by Japanese director Juzo Itami is an entertaining, genre-bending adventure underpinned by a deft...

Directed by Greg Mottola • 1996 • United States
Starring Parker Posey, Hope Davis, Liev Schreiber

With its droll humor and bittersweet emotional heft, the feature debut of writer-director Greg Mottola announced the arrival of an unassumingly sharp-witted new talent on the 1990s indie film scene....

Directed by Federico Fellini • 1973 • France, Italy

This carnivalesque portrait of provincial Italy during the fascist period, the most personal film from Federico Fellini, satirizes the director's youth and turns daily life into a circus of social rituals, adolescent desires, male fantasies, an...

Directed by Richard Lester • 1964 • United Kingdom

Meet the Beatles! Just one month after they exploded onto the U.S. scene with their Ed Sullivan Show appearance, John, Paul, George, and Ringo began working on a project that would bring their revolutionary talent to the big screen. A HARD DAY’S...

Directed by Yasujiro Ozu • 1959 • Japan
Starring Masahiko Shimazu, Koji Shidara, Kuniko Miyake

A lighthearted take on director Yasujiro Ozu’s perennial theme of the challenges of inter­generational relationships, GOOD MORNING tells the story of two young boys who stop speaking in protest after t...

Directed by Pedro Almodóvar • 1990 • Spain
Starring Antonio Banderas, Victoria Abril

Pedro Almodóvar’s colorful and controversial tribute to the pleasures and perils of Stockholm syndrome, TIE ME UP! TIE ME DOWN! is a rambunctious dark comedy starring Antonio Banderas as an unbalanced but alluri...

Directed by Jacques Tati • 1958 • France, Italy
Starring Jacques Tati, Jean-Pierre Zola, Adrienne Servantie

Slapstick prevails again when Jacques Tati’s eccentric, old-fashioned hero, Monsieur Hulot, is set loose in Villa Arpel, the geometric, oppressively ultramodern home of his brother-in-law,...

Directed by Bruce Robinson • 1986 • United Kingdom
Starring Paul McGann, Richard E. Grant, Richard Griffiths

London. The 1960s. Two unemployed actors—acerbic, elegantly wasted Withnail (Richard E. Grant) and the anxiety-ridden “I” (Paul McGann)—drown their frustrations in booze, pills, and light...

Directed by Charles Chaplin • 1936 • United States
Starring Charles Chaplin, Paulette Goddard, Henry Bergman

MODERN TIMES, Charlie Chaplin’s last outing as the Little Tramp, puts the iconic character to work as a giddily inept factory employee who becomes smitten with a gorgeous gamine (Paulette...

Directed by Ronald Neame • 1980 • United States
Starring Walter Matthau, Glenda Jackson, Sam Waterston

The inimitable comic team of Walter Matthau and Glenda Jackson star in this nimble tale of international intrigue from master British filmmaker Ronald Neame. Based on Brian Garfield’s best-sell...

Directed by Peter Medak • 1972 • United Kingdom
Starring Peter O'Toole, Alastair Sim, Arthur Lowe

Peter O’Toole gives a tour-de-force performance as Jack, a man “cured” of believing he’s God—only to become Jack the Ripper incarnate. Based on Peter Barnes's irreverent play, this darkly comic indi...

Directed by Jacques Tati • 1953 • France
Starring Jacques Tati, Nathalie Pascaud

Monsieur Hulot, Jacques Tati’s endearing clown, takes a holiday at a seaside resort, where his presence provokes one catastrophe after another. Tati’s masterpiece of gentle slapstick is a series of effortlessly well...

Directed by Louis Malle • 1960 • France
Starring Catherine Demongeot, Philippe Noiret

A brash and precocious ten-year-old (Catherine Demongeot) comes to Paris for a whirlwind weekend with her rakish uncle (Philippe Noiret); he and the viewer get more than they bargained for, however, in this ana...

Directed by Pietro Germi • 1961 • Italy
Starring Marcello Mastroianni, Stefania Sandrelli, Daniela Rocca

Baron Ferdinando Cefalù (Marcello Mastroianni) longs to marry his nubile young cousin Angela (Stefania Sandrelli), but one obstacle stands in his way: his fatuous and fawning wife, Rosalia (D...

Directed by Juzo Itami • 1987 • Japan
Starring Nobuko Miyamoto, Tsutomu Yamazaki, Masahiko Tsugawa

Certainly the most exuberantly entertaining film ever made about the intricacies of the Japanese tax system, this delightful comedy stars Nobuko Miyamoto as a fiercely dedicated tax collector who g...

Directed by Luis García Berlanga • 1963 • Italy, Spain
Starring Nino Manfredi, Emma Penella, José Isbert

This masterpiece of black humor, beloved in Spain but too little seen elsewhere, threads a scathing critique of Franco-era values through a macabre farce about an undertaker who marries an ex...

Directed by Charles Chaplin • 1952 • United States
Starring Charles Chaplin, Claire Bloom

Charlie Chaplin’s masterful drama about the twilight of a former vaudeville star is among the writer-director’s most touching films. Chaplin plays Calvero, a once beloved musical-comedy performer, now a was...

Directed by Sammo Hung • 1985 • Hong Kong
Starring Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, Yuen Biao

Longtime friends Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, and Yuen Biao—who had worked together since childhood as part of a Beijing opera troupe—join forces for this rollicking blend of action thrills and lunatic humor, which...

Directed by Mario Monicelli • 1958 • Italy
Starring Vittorio Gassman, Renato Salvatori, Memmo Carotenuto

An all-star cast and jazzy score highlight this charming comedy, a deft satire of classic caper films like RIFIFI. BIG DEAL ON MADONNA STREET hilariously details the plight of a sad-sack grou...

Directed by Juzo Itami • 1996 • Japan
Starring Masahiko Tsugawa, Nobuko Miyamoto, Ryunosuke Kaneda

In this vibrant comedy, failing supermarket manager Goro (Masahiko Tsugawa) hires Hanako (Nobuko Miyamoto), an old classmate, to help him compete with the new rival grocery store in town. Soon, Han...

Directed by Charles Chaplin • 1947 • United States
Starring Charles Chaplin, Mady Correll

Charlie Chaplin plays shockingly against type in his most controversial film, a brilliant and bleak black comedy about money, marriage, and murder. Chaplin is a twentieth-century bluebeard, an enigmatic fam...

Directed by Anthony Asquith • 1952 • United Kingdom
Starring Michael Redgrave, Joan Greenwood, Dame Edith Evans

Oscar Wilde’s comic jewel sparkles in Anthony Asquith’s film adaptation of THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST. Featuring brilliantly polished performances by Michael Redgrave, Joan Greenw...

Directed by Ted Wilde • 1928 • United States
Starring Harold Lloyd, Ann Christy, Bert Woodruff

SPEEDY was the last silent feature to star Harold Lloyd—and one of his very best. The slapstick legend reprises his “Glasses Character,” this time as a good-natured but scatterbrained New Yorker who ca...