Big screen classics
A collection of the best the big screen has to offer.
Tickets for these screenings are only £8
December
Dance, Girl, Dance
Dorothy Arzner’s classic comedy-drama about the rivalry between two dancers is also an astute critique of the male gaze.
Sebastiane
Derek Jarman’s remarkable debut turns the legend of the martyred saint into a reverie about homoerotic desire.
How Green Was My Valley
John Ford’s deeply moving account of the hardships suffered by a Welsh mining family in the late 19th century.
The River
Jean Renoir’s visually beautiful, almost documentary-like drama about an English family living in Bengal towards the end of the Raj.
High Sierra
Bogart and Lupino excel in this classic heist movie about a loner ex-con making mistakes about who to trust.
To Sleep with Anger
This bold, beguiling blend of melodrama, suspense, satire and mysticism is a classic of African-American cinema.
The Magnificent Ambersons
Orson Welles’ elegiac masterpiece charts the decline of a Midwestern dynasty with wit, wisdom and cinematic brilliance.
All About My Mother
Pedro Almodóvar’s touching, stylish and exhilaratingly bold portrait of a woman’s attempts to come to terms with grief.
Still Walking
A delicate, sensitive, but sharply insightful study of a family’s enduring grief and anger at the death of a son.
Wild Strawberries
An ageing academic undertakes an illuminating odyssey – through Southern Sweden and his own past.
35 Shots of Rum
Claire Denis’ wondrously delicate, impressionistic portrait of a father and daughter facing changes in their lives.
All That Heaven Allows
Douglas Sirk’s tale of a ‘controversial’ romance is a scathing attack on American conformism and materialism.
January
Robin and Marian
Sean Connery and Audrey Hepburn star in a mellow and moving interpretation of the Robin Hood tale.
Cutter’s Way
A superb noir thriller about an obsessive Vietnam veteran and a perilous murder mystery.
Le Silence est d’or
Maurice Chevalier is superb in Clair’s classic comedy of sexual manners.
Bright Star
The troubled relationship of John Keats and Fanny Brawne is sensitively and imaginatively explored by Jane Campion and a fine cast.
Rear Window
Hitchcock’s magnificent, multi-layered thriller stars James Stewart and Grace Kelly as a couple investigating a neighbour’s disappearance.
Only Angels Have Wings
Hawks’ evergreen classic about a group of pilots flying perilous missions in the Andes.
Thelma and Louise
Sarandon and Davis are unforgettable in Ridley Scott’s much-loved buddy-movie.
42nd Street
This seminal backstage musical boasts lavish, lurid Busby Berkeley sequences of spectacular, innuendo-laden extravagance.
The Big Lebowski
Jeff Bridges abides as the Dude in the Coens’ inspired updating of the world of Chandler’s Philip Marlowe.
Boyz N the Hood
Singleton’s powerful debut demonstrates the trials and tribulations of growing up in South Central LA in the 80s and 90s.
Matewan
This powerful political drama about a 1920s miners’ strike in West Virginia imaginatively reworks western motifs.
The New World
A visually extraordinary reworking of the Pocahontas story, Malick’s masterpiece is a meditation on love, life and paradises lost and found.
Calendar
25 & under
If you're aged 16 to 25, you can get £3 cinema tickets at BFI Southbank to any film, any time.