Two families, abolitionist Northerners the Stonemans and Southern landowners the Camerons, intertwine. When Confederate colonel Ben Cameron is captured in battle, nurse Elsie Stoneman petitions for his pardon. In Reconstruction-era South Carolina, Cameron founds the Ku Klux Klan, battling Elsie's congressman father and his African-American protégé, Silas Lynch.
In 1798, a feral boy is discovered outside the town of Aveyron, France. Diagnosed as mentally impaired, he is relegated to an asylum. A young doctor named Jean Itard becomes convinced that the boy has normal mental capacity, but that his development was hindered by lack of contact with society. He brings the boy home and begins an arduous attempt at education over several years.
A lottery win of $5,000 forever changes the lives of a miner turned dentist and his wife.
Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, born in the stench of 18th century Paris, develops a superior olfactory sense, which he uses to create the world's finest perfumes. However, his work takes a dark turn as he tries to preserve scents in the search for the ultimate perfume.
Disciplined Italian composer Antonio Salieri becomes consumed by jealousy and resentment towards the hedonistic and remarkably talented young Viennese composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
A semi-documentary experimental 1930 German silent film created by amateurs with a small budget. With authentic scenes of the metropolis city of Berlin, it's the first film from the later famous screenwriters/directors Billy Wilder and Fred Zinnemann.
In 18th century France, Marquise de Merteuil asks her ex-lover Vicomte de Valmont to seduce the future wife of another ex-lover of hers in return for one last night with her. Yet things don’t go as planned.
In this partially lost silent film, a man working as a motion picture extra in Hollywood westerns impresses a visiting sheikh with his boxing skills and is engaged to go to Arabia, where he becomes involved in warring and falls in love with a beautiful princess.
An adaptation of the novel by Leo Tolstoy. Anna Karenina is having an extramarital affair that causes her grave consequences.
Russian emigré Dimitri Kirsanoff’s film, alternatively titled Death of A Stag and Une chasse à courre, is a post-war study of a traditional stag hunt. The pursuit of the animal finds a cross-cutting parallel in the felling of a tree in the forest.
A classic of the silent age, this film tells the story of the doomed but ultimately canonized 15th-century teenage warrior. On trial for claiming she'd spoken to God, Jeanne d'Arc is subjected to inhumane treatment and scare tactics at the hands of church court officials. Initially bullied into changing her story, Jeanne eventually opts for what she sees as the truth. Her punishment, a famously brutal execution, earns her perpetual martyrdom.
After proving himself on the field of battle in the French and Indian War, Benjamin Martin wants nothing more to do with such things, preferring the simple life of a farmer. But when his son Gabriel enlists in the army to defend their new nation, America, against the British, Benjamin reluctantly returns to his old life to protect his son.
The retelling of France’s iconic but ill-fated queen, Marie Antoinette. From her betrothal and marriage to Louis XVI at 15 to her reign as queen at 19 and ultimately the fall of Versailles.
A man is framed for the murder of his uncle, a bank president, and sentenced to hang. His sister and a mail clerk who's helping her discover information that may clear him, but they have to get to the governor in time to present their new evidence and get a stay of execution.
Brought to Versailles as the companion of courtier D'Aigullon, former street waif Madame du Barry charms her way into the heart of gouty King Louis XV.
An overview of the works of French film pioneers Louis and Auguste Lumière from 1895 to 1897.
A motherless child has a tumultuous existence, but she eventually becomes a famous international opera singer. Past and present meet when she performs in her original home town.
In Qing Dynasty, Chen Xiang and Liuli became maids and friends in the imperial palace. Liuli wanted to be famous whereas Chen Xiang just wanted to live a normal life. Liuli attempted to change her life by knowing the prince, even at the cost of betraying Chen Xiang.
A dramatized account of a great Russian naval mutiny and a resultant public demonstration, showing support, which brought on a police massacre. The film had an incredible impact on the development of cinema and is a masterful example of montage editing.
This pioneering documentary film depicts the lives of the indigenous Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. Although the production contains some fictional elements, it vividly shows how its resourceful subjects survive in such a harsh climate, revealing how they construct their igloo homes and find food by hunting and fishing. The film also captures the beautiful, if unforgiving, frozen landscape of the Great White North, far removed from conventional civilization.