Somerset Maugham introduces four of his tales in this anthology film: "The Facts of Life," "The Alien Corn," "The Kite," and "The Colonel's Lady."
Fumiko, mother of two children and wife of an unfaithful man, shares her family life with her budding vocation as a poet. The beginning of her successful literary career coincides with her divorce and her breast cancer diagnosis. In the last stage of her life, she meets a young journalist from Tokyo who wants to write a story on her life.
乳房よ永遠なれ
1955
7
The story of John Wilmot, a.k.a. the Earl of Rochester, a 17th century poet who famously drank and debauched his way to an early grave, only to earn posthumous critical acclaim for his life's work.
The Libertine
2004
5
Pianist David Helfgott, driven by his father and teachers, has a breakdown. Years later he returns to the piano, to popular if not critical acclaim.
Shine
1996
7
An affair between a pianist and a teacher begins to disintegrate when girls from her school turn up missing.
Desire
2000
3
Lyrical biography of the classical composer, depicted as a romantic hero, an accursed artist.
Un grand amour de Beethoven
1937
6
A troubled Southern man talks to his suicidal sister's psychiatrist about their family history and falls in love with her (and New York City) in the process.
The Prince of Tides
1991
6
New York gangster Ben 'Bugsy' Siegel takes a brief business trip to Los Angeles. A sharp-dressing womanizer with a foul temper, Siegel doesn't hesitate to kill or maim anyone crossing him. In L.A. the life, the movies, and most of all strong-willed Virginia Hill detain him while his family wait back home. Then a trip to a run-down gambling joint at a spot in the desert known as Las Vegas gives him his big idea.
Bugsy
1991
6
A depressed man moves back in with his parents following a recent heartbreak and finds himself with two women.
Two Lovers
2008
6
An old gangster is advised that Freddie Mays would leave jail after thirty years in prison. His mood changes and he recalls when he was a young punk and who joined Freddie's gang—a man he both envied and ultimately betrayed.
Gangster No. 1
2000
6
A young reformed gambler must return to playing big stakes poker to help a friend pay off loan sharks.
Rounders
1998
7
The true story of pianist Władysław Szpilman's experiences in Warsaw during the Nazi occupation. When the Jews of the city find themselves forced into a ghetto, Szpilman finds work playing in a café; and when his family is deported in 1942, he stays behind, works for a while as a laborer, and eventually goes into hiding in the ruins of the war-torn city.
The Pianist
2002
8
Ben Sanderson, an alcoholic Hollywood screenwriter who lost everything because of his drinking, arrives in Las Vegas to drink himself to death. There, he meets and forms an uneasy friendship and non-interference pact with prostitute Sera.
Leaving Las Vegas
1995
7
In early-1970s Las Vegas, Sam "Ace" Rothstein gets tapped by his bosses to head the Tangiers Casino. At first, he's a great success in the job, but over the years, problems with his loose-cannon enforcer Nicky Santoro, his ex-hustler wife Ginger, her con-artist ex Lester Diamond and a handful of corrupt politicians put Sam in ever-increasing danger.
Casino
1995
7
Four different women discuss life, love and marriage with people from their past and present during the course of one day at a café in Seoul.
더 테이블
2017
7
A ruthless real estate agent discovers a passion for piano and auditions with help from a young virtuoso, but the pressures of his corrupt career threaten to derail his musical aspirations.
De battre mon cœur s'est arrêté
2005
6
Born on a sharecropping plantation in Northern Florida, Ray Charles went blind at seven. Inspired by a fiercely independent mom who insisted he make his own way, He found his calling and his gift behind a piano keyboard. Touring across the Southern musical circuit, the soulful singer gained a reputation and then exploded with worldwide fame when he pioneered coupling gospel and country together.
Ray
2004
7
The 'Farmer Poet' Robert Burns, after a bad romance, pens "Auld Lang Syne" to much fanfare and courts high society at the expense of his blossoming relationship with beautiful Jean Armour. Soon a marriage is arranged for Jean, and Robby must race to her side before she is married off.
The Romance Of Robert Burns
1937
5
A beautiful temptress re-kindles an old romance while trying to escape her past during a tension-packed train journey.
Shanghai Express
1932
6
The love story of an abused English girl and a Chinese Buddhist in a time when London was a brutal and harsh place to live.
Broken Blossoms
1919
6
Lulu is a young woman so beautiful and alluring that few can resist her siren charms. The men drawn into her web include respectable newspaper publisher Dr. Ludwig Schön, his musical producer son Alwa, circus performer Rodrigo Quast, and seedy old Schigolch. When Lulu's charms inevitably lead to tragedy, the downward spiral encompasses them all.
Die Büchse der Pandora
1929
7