French silent film pioneer Abel Gance directs this 1935 classic about Lucrezia Borgia, her brother, Cesare. and her father, Pope Alexander VI -- one of history's most ruthless and ambitious crime families.
Social & External
The people behind it
Edwige Feuillère
Lucrezia Borgia
Gabriel Gabrio
César Borgia
Maurice Escande
Jean Borgia, Duke of Gandie
Roger Karl
Rodrigo Borgia, Pope Alexander VI
Aimé Clariond
Niccollo Machiavelli
Philippe Hériat
Filippo, sculptor-lover
Jacques Dumesnil
Giannino Sforza, Duke of Milano
Max Michel
Alfonse de Aragon
Louis Eymond
Capt. Mario, officer-lover
Jean Fay
Tybald
In 1500, Duke Cesare Borgia hopes to marry his sister to the heir apparent of Ferrara, which impedes his conquest of central Italy. On this delicate mission he sends Andrea Orsini, his sister's lover and nearly as unscrupulous as himself. En route, Orsini meets Camilla Verano, wife of the count of Citta' del Monte, and sentiment threatens to turn him against his deadly master, whom no one betrays twice...
The incredible story of Lucrezia Borgia (1480-1519), daughter of Pope Alexander VI (1431-1503), deliberately used politically by her powerful family and historically slandered as a poisoner and incestuous femme fatale. But who was the real Lucrezia?
In the early 16th century, Italy is ruled by the powerful Borgia family, led by César Borgia and his sister Lucrèce. In a ruthless power play, César plots to have his sister’s husband murdered. But without her brother’s knowledge, Lucrèce has taken a strong lover who will challenge the Borgias.
The tiny independent duchy of Ferrara is located between Casare Borgia's Rome and Venice, and Borgia has plans to conquer Venice via Ferrara. He murders his sister's husband and makes it appear that Alfonso D'Este of Ferrara was behind the killing. To avenge herself against Ferrara and D'Este, Lucretia Borgia marries D'Este and intends to poison him. But...she falls in love with him.
Gennaro, the son of Lucretia Borgia, lives unaware of the identity of his mother, who has married the Duke of Ferrara. After Lucretia's brother is killed by five conspirators, the fathers of Gennaro's dearest friends, Lucretia tortures the old men to death. Later, Gennaro and his companions journey to Lucretia's domain, and she sees her son for the first time. The Duke, who believes him to be her lover, poisons him, but Lucretia administers the antidote in time and saves his life. Then she schemes to poison her sons' five friends for their fathers' mistake.
This loose adaptation of the Victor Hugo classic shifts the story to Italy and back in time, with the deformed protagonist meeting Lucrezia Borgia instead of Queen Anne. Also, Gwynplaine is renamed Angelo (Jean Sorel) with his disfigurement represented by a single broad slash across his mouth, crude yet convincing. The story (not credited to Hugo) is a swashbuckler pitting the disfigured acrobat against the henchmen of the Borgias.
A playwright descended from the Borgia family becomes a murder suspect.
In the winter of 1943, deep in the frozen waste of German occupied Yugoslavia, a lone parachute drifts from the snowy skies, falling ever closer to earth and a waiting German patrol car. Suddenly shots ring out from a hidden sniper, the Germans are killed, and the parachutist scurries away into the forest. The sniper is a woman, the number one partisan terrorist on the German hit list, and her adversary is the German number one exterminator sent direct from berlin to eliminate her. The battle is on, orders from high command - capture her… alive. Both are professional, but now the hunter becomes the hunted.
Paul, a non-believer in life on other planets, late one night discovers a crash-landed and wounded alien. He rescues the being and is initiated into a psycho-sexual metamorphosis.
A European countess, after being betrayed by her lover, goes to live in small town Middle America with her cousins and causes havoc among the rather puritanical community members.
The story of twenty-one American POWs who, after the Korean War ended, chose to live in China instead of returning the USA.
A haphazard party-ride to Mexico evolves into an enigma with a fugitive alien at the helm.
For eight weeks, Esther becomes a foster parent, taking in an 8-year-old boy who has come to France, exhausted, to undergo open-heart surgery. This experience will turn her life upside down and affect her relationships with those around her, including her brother, her teenage son, and her work as an architect.
Harvey, an old man from Scotland lives with his young son and daughter in an isolated house in Patagonia. Upon arrival of the emissaries of a development corporation he promptly stands against them by building a large fence (alambrado). A debut rich with sensibility and violent physicality, an unusual film of wind, isolation, loneliness, desolation ... and madness.
An allegory of the Golem, a Jewish mythical creature personifying displacement and exile, this film tells the story of a woman (similar to the biblical Ruth) and her sisters, who are forced into exile after the death of their husbands. It is set in 1990s Paris, where the director was living in self-imposed exile following the ban on his 1982 documentary in Israel. The recurring theme of the film is migrations and unrooting, like the legendary Golem.
Directed by Caradog W. James and based on the play 'Flesh and Blood' by Helen Griffin, 'Little White Lies' deals with the paranoia of racism, the politics of hate and how these things threaten to tear one family apart. The father is an armchair politician who never leaves the house, the daughter has a new boyfriend that she won't bring home to meet her parents and the son has just become an active member of the BNP. The only person in the family trying to hold it all together is the mother, who just wants everyone to get along.
Second half of the 19th century. In a small town in South Bohemia, fifth-former Jan Ratkin is living through the confusions of first love together with his classmates.
A delightfully classic French comedy of high sophistication and light hearted wit, that in the end suffers for it. This is immensely watchable simply for the presence of Maria De Medeiros, the central two of the film are captivating. What spoils it is the stereotypical and under developed second characters and an overly wistful outlook. But I defy any man watching this film not to fall madly for Aimee and everyone will cherish the scenes between Aimee and Maurice.
A teenage girl makes a new friend at her school who tells her that she has the ability to travel between worlds.
A French widower and WWI veteran returns home after the war to raise his newborn daughter.
As the only legitimate heir of England's King William, teenage Victoria gets caught up in the political machinations of her own family. Victoria's mother wants her to sign a regency order, while her Belgian uncle schemes to arrange a marriage between the future monarch and Prince Albert, the man who will become the love of her life.
Jean and Otto, a French newspaperman and a young German Francophile, are fighting for peace in Europe. Jean’s daughter, Corinne, is launching a brilliant acting career in the film world, but war breaks out and France is occupied. The two friends have a major role to play in this new France. Jean becomes a big press baron and an ardent advocate of collaboration with the occupying forces, while Otto becomes the Reich’s ambassador in Paris. Corinne, meanwhile, finds herself thrown into the lion’s pit.
A philosophy professor has an illicit affair with one of his students, a bright yet troubled girl who lives alone.
In 1857, at the height of his fame and fortune, novelist and social critic Charles Dickens meets and falls in love with teenage stage actress Nelly Ternan. As she becomes the focus of his heart and mind, as well as his muse, painful secrecy is the price both must pay.
A failed novelist's inability to pay the bills strains relations with his wife and leads him to work at an escort service, where he becomes entwined with a wealthy woman whose husband is a successful writer.
Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria clashes with his father, Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria, over implementing progressive policies for their country. Rudolf soon feels he is a man born at the wrong time in a country that doesn't realize the need for social reform. The Prince of Wales, later to become Britain's King Edward VII, provides comic relief. Rudolf finds refuge from a loveless marriage with Princess Stéphanie by taking a mistress, Baroness Maria Vetsera. Their untimely demise at Mayerling, the imperial family's hunting lodge, is cloaked in mystery.
An expat PI is hired to investigate a suspicious death in Crete, Greece, where jealousies run deep amongst the victim's powerful family.
The true-life story of Christian music star Jeremy Camp and his journey of love and loss that looks to prove there is always hope.
A tough, street-smart kid serving a sentence in a state youth reformatory meets a beautiful, innocent girl studying at a nearby convent. When forbidden love blossoms between them, they must fight the prison authorities, their parents and the law.
Captives of the very relationships that define and sustain them, nine women resiliently meet the travails and disappointments of life.
A World War II prisoner returns home to his childhood sweetheart. However, back home, he discovers that he has to compete to win her love.
A car accident and shifting affections test the bond between a married couple.
February 1927. The funeral of Marcel Péricourt, the most powerful banker in Paris. His daughter Madeleine must take the helm of the financial empire of which she is the heiress. But she has a son, Paul, who with an unexpected and tragic gesture will place her on the path to ruin.
When the Welsh poet Dylan Thomas and his flirtatious wife Caitlin sweep into war-torn London, the last thing they expect is to bump into Dylan's childhood sweetheart Vera. Despite her joy at seeing Dylan after so many years, Vera is swept off her feet by a dashing officer, William Killick, and finds herself torn between the open adoration of her new found beau and the wily charms of the exotic Welshman.
Pregnant out of wedlock, an educated young woman is pressured by her father into an arranged marriage with a lonely farmer in this drama set during WWII.
Based on the true story of First Sergeant Charles Monroe King, a soldier deployed to Iraq begins to keep a journal of love and advice for his infant son. Back at home, senior New York Times editor Dana Canedy revisits the story of her unlikely, life-altering relationship with King and his enduring devotion to her and their child.
A novelist is blinded in a car crash that killed his wife and several years later rediscovers his passion for life and writing when he embarks on an affair with the neglected wife of an indicted businessman.
Four erotic tales from various historical eras. The first, 'The Tide', is set in the present day, and concerns a student and his young female cousin stranded on the beach by the tide, secluded from prying eyes. 'Therese Philosophe' is set in the nineteenth century, and concerns a girl being locked in her bedroom, where she contemplates the erotic potential of the objects contained within it. 'Erzsebet Bathory' is a portrait of the sixteenth-century countess who allegedly bathed in the blood of virgins, while 'Lucrezia Borgia' concerns an incestuous fifteenth-century orgy involving Lucrezia, her brother, and her father the Pope.
18-year-old Noah moves from America to London, with her mother who's recently fallen in love with William, a wealthy British businessman. Noah meets William’s son, bad-boy Nick, and soon discovers there is an attraction between them neither can avoid. As Noah spends the summer adjusting to her new life, her devastating past will catch up with her while falling in love for the first time.