Frances Barber

Identical twin zoologists lose their wives in a car crash caused by a white swan. They become obsessed with the death and decay of animals, and develop a strange and unusual relationship with the driver of the car, a woman who is now an amputee.

Dir. Peter Greenaway · With Frances Barber, Joss Ackland, Brian Deacon

When the young, attractive Joe Orton meets the older, more introverted Kenneth Halliwell at drama school, he befriends the kindred spirit and they start an affair. As Orton becomes more comfortable with his sexuality and starts to find success with his writing, Halliwell becomes increasingly alienated and jealous, ultimately tapping into a dangerous rage.

Dir. Stephen Frears · With Gary Oldman, Alfred Molina, Vanessa Redgrave

Liverpool, 1978: What starts as a vibrant affair between a legendary femme-fatale, the eccentric Academy Award-winning actress Gloria Grahame, and her young lover, British actor Peter Turner, quickly grows into a deeper relationship, with Turner being the person Gloria turns to for comfort.

Dir. Paul McGuigan · With Annette Bening, Jamie Bell, Julie Walters

Middle-aged Gerald Kingsland advertises in a London paper for a female companion to spend a year with him on a desert island. Young Lucy Irving takes a chance on contacting him, but once on the island, things prove a lot less idyllic than in the movies. Gradually, it becomes clear that it is Lucy who has the desire and the strength to try and see the year through.

Dir. Nicolas Roeg · With Oliver Reed, Amanda Donohoe, Georgina Hale

Set in a small English town in 1959, a woman decides, against polite but ruthless local opposition, to open a bookshop, a decision which becomes a political minefield.

Dir. Isabel Coixet · With Emily Mortimer, Bill Nighy, Patricia Clarkson

He's a low level criminal with no future and just out of prison. She's a low level lawyer never noticed by others, a lost soul without a life. Their anger and hostility makes them serious criminals. Love happens in the strangest of places.

Dir. Hadi Hajaig · With Sam Rockwell, Ben Schwartz, Al Weaver

For years, Andrei Evilenko eluded the obsessive Detective Lesiev and the psychiatric profiler Aron Richter. Spurred on by his rabid fury at the gradual crumbling of his precious Soviet Union, Evilenko is a man who will live, die and kill as a communist.

Dir. David Grieco · With Malcolm McDowell, Marton Csokas, Ronald Pickup

Tempted away from Newcastle United to join Real Madrid, rising star Santiago Munez finds this latest change of fortune the greatest challenge yet - personally as well as professionally. He is reunited with Gavin Harris, though they must compete to be on the team, and estranged from fiancee Roz, whose nursing career keeps her back home.

Dir. Jaume Collet-Serra · With Kuno Becker, Stephen Dillane, Anna Friel