Directed by Tareque Masud • 2002 • Bangladesh
Starring Nurul Haque, Russell Farazi, Jayanto Chattopadhyay

Set during the turbulent late-1960s period leading up to Bangladesh’s independence from Pakistan, this lyrical drama tells the story of a family torn apart by religion and war. Anu (Nurul Is...

Directed by Václav Vorlíček • 1973 • Czechoslovakia
Starring Libuše Šafránková, Pavel Trávníček, Carola Braunbock

This enchanting Czech Christmas classic has become a Central European yuletide staple thanks to its perennial presence on television each holiday season. A charming, spirited twist o...

Directed by Charles Chaplin • 1916 • United States

In this two-reel delight, Charlie Chaplin’s havoc-wreaking Little Tramp serves up mayhem while working as a waiter in a posh restaurant (witness his unique, full-body cocktail-mixing skills). However, it’s not until he straps on a pair of skates...

Directed by Jacques Demy • 1972 • United Kingdom, United States
Starring Donovan, Diana Dors, Donald Pleasence

The classic story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin comes to life courtesy of French New Wave magician Jacques Demy. Psych-folk legend Donovan plays the titular, magic-flute-playing troubado...

Directed by Kon Ichikawa • 1962 • Japan
Starring Hirro Suzuki, Fujiko Yamamoto, Eiji Funakoshi

You can say that again! The days leading up to a toddler’s second birthday are seen alternately from the adorable youngster’s point of view and from the perspective of his anxious parents as they navig...

Directed by Terry Gilliam • 1981 • United Kingdom
Starring John Cleese, Sean Connery, Shelley Duvall

In this fantastic voyage through time and space from Terry Gilliam, a boy named Kevin (Craig Warnock) escapes his gadget-obsessed parents to join a band of time-traveling dwarfs. Armed with a map...

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 Jack Arnold • 1954 • United States
Starring Richard Carlson, Julie Adams, Richard Denning

In this pulp-horror classic (originally shot in 3D), American scientists on an Amazon expedition get more than they bargained for when a dark tributary turns up a prehistoric man with gills. Hal...

Directed by David Lean • 1948 • United Kingdom
Starring Robert Newton, Alec Guinness, Kay Walsh

Following the success of GREAT EXPECTATIONS, David Lean applied his sterling craftsmanship to another beloved Charles Dickens classic and once again set the standard for all future screen adaptations....

Directed by Yasujiro Ozu • 1935 • Japan

The final still-extant silent film directed by Yasujiro Ozu is an exquisitely tender portrait of everyday survival in 1930s Japan. Anticipating the neorealist poetry of BICYCLE THIEVES, AN INN IN TOKYO follows unemployed ne’er-do-well Kihachi (Takeshi Saka...

Directed by Satyajit Ray • 1956 • India
Starring Pinaki Sengupta, Kanu Banerjee, Karuna Banerjee

Satyajit Ray had not planned to make a sequel to PATHER PANCHALI, but after the film’s international success, he decided to continue Apu’s narrative. APARAJITO picks up where the first film leaves of...

Directed by Chester Erskine • 1952 • United Kingdom

George Bernard Shaw's breezy, delightful dramatization of this classic fable, about a Christian slave who pulls a thorn from a lion's paw and is spared from death in the Colosseum as a result of his kind act, was written as a meditation on mode...

Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky • 1961 • Soviet Union

When Sasha, a seven-year-old violin protégé, meets Sergei, a steamroller working in his neighborhood, he starts to open up from his strictly imposed routine of practice. Made as a thesis film for the VGIK Soviet film school, this early work by A...

Directed by René Clair • 1935 • United Kingdom
Starring Robert Donat, Jean Parker, Eugene Pallette

An old-world ghost gets a taste of new-world values in this sly supernatural satire. When an ancient Scottish castle is taken down and moved to Florida to be rebuilt brick by brick, the new America...

Directed by Karel Zeman • 1955 • Czechoslovakia
Starring Petr Herrmann, Vladimír Bejval, Josef Lukáš

A beguiling mix of natural history and science fiction, this early feature by Karel Zeman follows four schoolboys on an awe-inspiring expedition back through time, where they behold landscapes an...

Criterion Collection Edition #799

Directed by Charles Chaplin • 1921 • United States
Starring Charles Chaplin, Carl Miller, Jack Coogan

Charlie Chaplin was already an international star when he decided to break out of the short-film format and make his first full-length feature. THE KID doesn't...

Directed by Charles Chaplin • 1931 • United States
Starring Charles Chaplin, Virginia Cherrill, Harry Myers

CITY LIGHTS, the most cherished film by Charlie Chaplin, is also his ultimate Little Tramp chronicle. The writer-director-star achieved new levels of grace, in both physical comedy and dra...

Directed by Anthony Asquith and Leslie Howard • 1938 • United Kingdom
Starring Leslie Howard, Wendy Hiller

Cranky Professor Henry Higgins (Leslie Howard) takes a bet that he can turn Cockney guttersnipe Eliza Doolittle (Wendy Hiller) into a “proper lady” in a mere six months in this delightful c...

Directed by Jafar Panahi • 1995 • Iran
Starring Aida Mohammadkhani, Mohsen Kafili, Fereshteh Sadre Orafaiy

Jafar Panahi’s revelatory debut feature is a child’s-eye adventure in which a young girl’s quest to buy a goldfish leads her on a detour-filled journey through the streets of Tehran on the ...

Directed by Harold Young • 1934 • United Kingdom
Starring Leslie Howard, Merle Oberon, Raymond Massey

Prestige producer Alexander Korda applies his seal of quality to this rip-roaring swashbuckler, a rollickingly entertaining adaptation of the classic novel by Baroness Orczy, which introduced th...

Directed by Ishiro Honda • 1968 • Japan

The original Godzilla team of director Ishiro Honda, special-effects supervisor Eiji Tsuburaya, and composer Akira Ifukube reunited for this kaiju extravaganza, which features no fewer than eleven monsters. Set in the remote future of 1999, when the peop...

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 Martin Rosen • 1978 • United Kingdom
Starring John Hurt, Richard Briers, Michael Graham-Cox

With this passion project, screenwriter-producer-director Martin Rosen brilliantly achieved what had been thought nearly impossible: a faithful big-screen adaptation of Richard Adams’s classic...

Directed by Karel Zeman • 1958 • Czechoslovakia
Starring Lubor Tokoš, Arnošt Navrátil, František Šlégr

This eye-popping escapade revolves around a scientist and his doomsday machine—and the pirates who will stop at nothing to gain possession of it. Freely adapting the fiction of Jules Verne, and...