Bette Davis rose from the ranks of Warner Bros. contract players to become a screen superstar when she was loaned out to RKO to appear in John Cromwell's adaptation of W. Somerset Maugham's Of Human Bondage. Leslie Howard (Gone with the wind) stars as Philip, a British medical student who becomes infatuated with a most unlikely woman: a vulgar waitress named Mildred (Davis). Undeterred by Mildred's obvious contempt of him (and her disgust for his...

A truly independent film of integrity and offhand grace, Zero bridge tells the deeply affecting tale of a student and small-time criminal in Kashmir who develops a crush on an older, college educated woman.

Rudolph Valentino stars as a matador who falls into the clutches of a beautiful, insincere society woman.

Story of a love affair (1950) is the legendary Michelangelo Antonioni's debut feature, a powerful statement on the delusions and violence sparked by a passionate love. This deeply tragic romance already exhibits the astonishing formal control and penetrating insights into the human condition that would later make him famous in films like Il Grido, L'Avventura and Blow-up.

From legendary Oscar-winning director King Vidor (The crowd, Duel in the sun) comes an exotic tale of romance set in gorgeous Polynesia: Bird of paradise. Johnny (Joel McCrea) is an intrepid young sailor traveling the South Seas who falls in love with Luana (Dolores del Rio), the beautiful daughter of an island chief. But Luana is betrothed to a neighboring native prince, and is soon to be married. With little thought to the future, Johnny and Luana...

Based on his own novel Metaphysics, Lech Majewski crafts intimate passion plays and creates "a luminous, highly erotic treatise on art, love and death" (Chicago Reader). When a terminally-ill art historian meets an engineer, it is love and lust at first sight. But their love is threatened by her looming illness. With her remaining days on earth numbered, she chooses to fan the flames of her obsession by taking her lover on a trip to Venice, where...

Alice Guy-Blaché (French, 1873-1968), the world's first woman film director, made films for Gaumont in Paris (1896-1907), then had her own studio, the Solax Company in Fort Lee, New Jersey (1910-1914). After Solax ceased production, she became a director for hire and went to work for The International Film Service, owned by William Randolph Hearst. The plot of The Ocean Waif adheres closely to the Hearst agenda: a romantic story, plenty of pathos...

Ingrid Bergman, in her most famous role of the period, plays Anita Hoffman, an aspiring classical pianist who falls in love with a famed, but married, concert violinist. Their passionate affair has deep and unanticipated consequences for them both.

The seduction of Mimi is a raucous sex comedy that brought international fame to director Lina Wertmuller (Swept Away). Giancarlo Giannini (Love and Anarchy) gives a wonderfully comic performance as the sad sack Mimi, a Sicilian laborer whose refusal to vote for the Mafia's candidate leads him to lose his job, his wife and his home. At rock bottom, he revives his spirits by falling in love with the beautiful, radical Fiorella (Mariangela Melato),...

A hearse driver meets and falls in love with a young, beautiful dancer who is planning an elaborate homegoing celebration for her mother. This love and comedy feature length film follows the suitor as he does everything to win her affection despite the steep oposition from his father-in-law to be who vows that his daughter will not marry a hearse driver.