One of the best, though Wajda obviously had a political agenda in turning a pro-Robespierre play into an anti-Robespierre film! More about Poland in 1982 than about France in 1794. But still a marvelous drama. Bring it out on DVD! Please!!!!!!

Beautiful to look at, as if the characters are all moving within period paintings. Miss Elliot's royalism may get a bit annoying for those who are fonder of the revolutionaries, but the history and detail is spot-on.

The best of all the various Scarlet Pimpernel movies, with an entertaining script, lush production values, and a great cast.

Arguably the best filming of the classic novel. The only film version that really understands the fact that TTC is a serious novel and not a sentimental romance. Plus it's the only version that has grasped that Charles MUST be presented sympathetically or else we don't give a damn if anyone rescues him or not. IMHO, Madame Defarge is horrendously miscast, but the rest of the cast is superb.

Somehow this film gets everything wrong. The script adaptation is botched, nearly every actor is badly miscast (except for Dirk Bogarde, who is excellent as Sydney), and the Revolution, as usual, plunges into the Terror a few days after the Bastille falls. The worst offense is the writing and casting of Charles as a smug, snooty prig; I’d cheer this guy on to the guillotine and keep Sydney.

Creepy but well-presented semifictional account of the ex-Marquis de Sade's stay in the Picpus prison during the last weeks of the Terror. From a French novel that is partly based on Sade's novel "Philosophy in the Boudoir." Daniel Auteuil is always excellent.

Excellent filming of the classic 1960s radical stage production, in which the inhabitants of a lunatic asylum in 1808 re-create the murder of Marat. Scary, creepy, and thrilling.

Haven't gotten around to seeing this one yet, but it sounds . . . interesting.

Ghastly 1950s Hollywood trashing of an intelligent novel. The story, which is just fine as it is, got messed with, the acting (except for Stewart Granger and Mel Ferrer) is mostly awful, and the costumes, hair, and makeup...well, the mind boggles. This is 1789 France from 1950 Hollywood via Disney. This story badly needs a remake! I suggest Adrien Brody as André--Adrien, are you listening?

A grand achievement when it was made in the 1920s, but now it's mostly good for giggles. Every French Rev cliché known to the movies is in this one, and movie buffs will even recognize Lucille LaVerne, who played Mme Defarge's horrible sidekick in the 1935 Tale of Two Cities, playing the exact same character in this flick. Might be a good party movie for a bunch of drunken Rev fans...