Already a boys' own classic, Kevin MacDonald's award-winning doc about two foolhardy Brit mountaineers scaling the 21,000ft Andean peak of Peru's Siula Grande is almost hideously gripping. Brilliantly paced, Touching The Void re-enacts the climb—and the descent, more to the point—with actors Brendan Mackey and Nicholas Aaron. But much of the drama lies in the memories of climbers Joe Simpson and Simon Yates, the interviews with whom are candid and vulnerable.

Alex Cox, maverick writer-director of Repo Man and Walker, on a newly extended version of Sergio Leone's epic

Peter Greenaway's period piece concerns a 17th-century draughtsman (Anthony Higgins) who agrees to make a series of drawings of her country estate for an aristocrat's wife (Janet Suzman) in return for sexual favours. Part picture puzzle, part murder mystery, it's undeniably stylish and intriguing, but also totally unerotic and bleakly existential.

Coolly stoned record producer Frances McDormand struggles to be a responsible role model for her uptight son Christian Bale and his sexually frustrated wife Kate Beckinsale, while shagging cheeky Britpop 'star' Alessandro Nivola. Though the music's great (Mercury Rev, T. Rex, Roxy), Lisa Cholodenko's languorous movie is more about the gaps in relationships than the rock'n'roll world.

The Orrible Oo's classic video jukebox rockumentary gets a 25th anniversary makeover

The original Mamet movie, a bravura directorial debut and a punchy manifesto, 1987's...Games pits frigid psychologist Lindsay Crouse against louche confidence trickster Joe Mantegna in the eponymous Chicago poker joint. Crouse is intrigued, Mantegna applies the charm, but soon the cons escalate and, in true Mametian style, the line between 'shark' and 'mark' disintegrates.

From the brief heyday of the Czech new wave, Jiri Menzel's 1968 Oscar winner (Best Foreign Language Film) retains much bawdy charm and a bravely downbeat ending. A young railway station apprentice in a small town, oblivious to the climax of WWII, longs to get laid, finding relief with a comely Resistance fighter. More witty, imaginative and romantic than it sounds.

Possibly Mike Figgis' least-known film, this moody 1991 erotic mystery is like Stormy Monday set in Binghamton, NY. A writer visits his dying mother and uncovers secrets about a 30-year-old murder while shagging his friend's wife. It looks sexy, but the moodiness leads to tedium, and Kim Novak's heinously wasted.

We'll always have Casablanca, thank God. This tale of lost souls waiting out WWII in the doldrums of a Moroccan café may well be the best film ever made—the Epstein brothers' dialogue still crackles, and the central love affair between Bogart and Bergman just keeps on pulling you in. Play it again!

Quirky, intelligent kids movie about a young offenders' prison camp where the inmates have to dig huge holes in the Texas desert each day, since the warden (Sigourney Weaver) is hoping to discover an outlaw's missing gold. A great cast (John Voight, Henry Winkler, Eartha Kitt), and an utter delight.