This is a special year for our society - 50 years offering the people of Bracknell and district movies not usually available at the local cinema.

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"Cabaret" is an Academy Award-winning American musical film.

The first musical ever to be given an X certificate, Bob Fosse's brilliant movie launched Liza Minnelli into Hollywood superstardom and reinvented the musical for the Age of Aquarius.

Following in the wake of the radical sexual politics of the 60s, Fosse's adaptation of Christopher Isherwood's autobiographical "Berlin Stories" focuses on singer-dancer Sally Bowles (Minnelli) as she struts her stuff on the stage of the Kit-Kat club - a place where absolutely anything goes.

Hitchcock's first Hollywood feature is a stylish and suitably disturbing retelling of Daphne Du Maurier's melodramatic bestseller.

The first of four collaborations between Alfred Hitchcock and David O. Selznick was the setting for a clash of two egos.

The film is still appealing today, with the beautifully photographed cars, clothing and scenery providing a handsome evocation of a lost era, in addition to the timeless quality of the excellent storytelling. Unusually for a Hitchcock film, the screenplay sticks closely to the source novel. This is no bad thing as the story is so good and already provides plenty of opportunity for Hitchcock's particular brand of dark psychological exploration and steadily cranked tension. The young wife (Fontaine) of Maxim De Winter (Olivier), the handsome, rich and temperamental owner of the huge stately home Manderley, is struggling to come to terms with her new life. She's haunted by the legacy of Maxim's deceased first wife Rebecca and intimidated by her housekeeper, the icy and terrifying Mrs Danvers (Anderson). She's totally unaware of Rebecca's true nature, however, and that Maxim is concealing a secret that has the potential to destroy him.

Laurence Olivier imbues his character with great natural warmth, ensuring our sympathy, no matter how great his crimes seem to be. Olivier's chemistry with Joan Fontaine sets the screen alight.

Hitchcock is said to have teased the young ingénue Fontaine (she was just 21) mercilessly, while encouraging the rest of the cast to treat her coldly. The tactic led to a performance that strikes just the right tone of diffidence, nervousness and downright terror.

The biggest acting credit has to go to Judith Anderson, however, whose steel-faced spectral Mrs Danvers casts a dark shadow in every scene she appears in and has quite rightly become a cinema icon.

There's crisp black-and-white cinematography, a script loaded with morbid humour and sharp dialogue as well and a terrific score used with Hitchcock's usual precision to create a delicious sense of suspense and unease. It all combines to create an atmospheric gem, that's as enjoyable as it is impressive. Captivating from its famous opening lines to its pyrotechnic finale, this is one of Hitchcock's finest.

John Salisbury MA - film educator, Chair Ventnor Film Society

Immediately after WWII, when cinema audiences were higher than they've ever been before or since, and the world was looking at a brighter and more secure future, Hollywood produced some of its most violent, cynical, downbeat, subversive (and enduring) work. John Salisbury walks those mean streets to find out why.

Illustrated with clips and slides this entertaining talk about the flip side of the all-American success story is followed at 3.30pm by a classic of the genre.

GUN CRAZY

By the time this film was made film makers had years of experience of using black and white film. They were apt at creating atmosphere. The list of 'gangster moll' beautiful, seductive women is long. Ava Gardner, Marilyn Monroe, Hedy Lamarr, Rita Hayworth and many more were wonderfully captured on monochrome negative stock.

In a squalid South American oil town, four desperate men sign on for a suicide mission to drive trucks loaded with nitroglycerin over a treacherous mountain route. As they ferry their explosive cargo to a faraway oil fire, each bump and jolt tests their courage, their friendship, and their nerves. The result is one of the greatest thrillers ever committed to celluloid, a white-knuckle ride from France’s legendary master of suspense, Henri-Georges Clouzot.

Filming began on 27 August 1951 and was scheduled to run for nine weeks. Numerous problems plagued the production, however. The south of France had an unusually rainy season that year, causing vehicles to bog down, cranes to fall over and sets to be ruined. The Director broke his ankle. Véra Clouzot fell ill. The production was 50 million francs over budget. By the end of November, only half the film was completed. With the days growing short in winter, production shut down for six months. The second half of the film was finally completed in the summer of 1952.