TOP 500 LETTERBOXD

Part-time model Valentine unexpectedly befriends a retired judge after she runs over his dog. At first, the grumpy man shows no concern about the dog, and Valentine decides to keep it. But the two form a bond when she returns to his house and catches him listening to his neighbors’ phone calls.

1968 film by Miklós Jancsó

In an industrializing Italian town, a married woman, rendered mentally unstable after a traffic accident, drifts into an affair with a friend of her husband.

Headstrong Thomas Dunson starts a thriving Texas cattle ranch with the help of his faithful trail hand, Groot, and his protégé, Matthew Garth, an orphan Dunson took under his wing when Matt was a boy. In need of money following the Civil War, Dunson and Matt lead a cattle drive to Missouri, where they will get a better price than locally, but the crotchety older man and his willful young partner begin to butt heads on the exhausting journey.

1948 film by Emeric Pressburger, Michael Powell

An assistant professor at a medical college balances her roles as a professional, a mother and a teacher. Her life changes once she witnesses an unexpected incident involving a female student.

Beautiful young manicurist Carole suffers from androphobia (the pathological fear of interaction with men). When her sister and roommate, Helen, leaves their London flat to go on an Italian holiday with her married boyfriend, Carole withdraws into her apartment. She begins to experience frightful hallucinations, her fear gradually mutating into madness.

On a scorching summer day in Rio de Janeiro, five impoverished black boys venture out of their favela to peddle peanuts throughout the bustling city. As they navigate the various districts of Rio, they bear witness to a series of unfortunate events and encounters, unfolding a vivid tapestry of urban life in Rio de Janeiro during that period. These true misadventures shed light on the gritty reality of the city, unveiling its vibrant urban tapestry.

A small-town sheriff in the American West enlists the help of a disabled man, a drunk, and a young gunfighter in his efforts to hold in jail the brother of the local bad guy.

Director Jean Renoir’s entrancing first color feature—shot entirely on location in India—is a visual tour de force. Based on the novel by Rumer Godden, the film eloquently contrasts the growing pains of three young women with the immutability of the Bengal river around which their daily lives unfold. Enriched by Renoir’s subtle understanding and appreciation for India and its people, The River gracefully explores the fragile connections between transitory emotions and everlasting creation.

A young man develops severe neck pain after swimming in a polluted river for a movie shoot, but nobody can provide him any relief.

1960 film by Luchino Visconti

2018 film directed by Alfonso Cuarón

In WWII-era Rome, underground resistance leader Manfredi attempts to evade the Gestapo by enlisting the help of Pina, the fiancée of a fellow member of the resistance, and Don Pietro, the priest due to oversee her marriage. But it’s not long before the Nazis and the local police find him.

A young couple, Rosemary and Guy, moves into an infamous New York apartment building, known by frightening legends and mysterious events, with the purpose of starting a family.

1939 film by Jean Renoir

Carol White, a Los Angeles housewife in the late 1980s, comes down with a debilitating illness with no clear diagnosis.

Sol Svanetij (Salt for Svanetia) was made in 1929 about a remote Ukraine primitive Northern isolated area of the Ukraine where the people are poor, preyed upon and severely lack salt (animals lick blood, urine to find the precious commodity). Religion is one of the people's curses ... they donate their few coins to the Church that doesn't do much to relieve the populace suffering. Wonderful photography in the highly edited Russian style. Highly recommended

1962 Italian film by Francesco Rosi