A jazz trumpeter tries to woo a fellow musician in mourning for her dead lover, and sets up a band in an attempt to bring them closer together. Covering a quarter-century of American "syncopated"music (ragtime, jazz, swing, blues, and boogie boogie), Syncopation features music from the turn of the 20th century through prohibition, the Great Depression, and the outbreak of WWII. Featuring jazz greats Benny Goodman, Charlie Barnett, Gene Krupa, Harry James, and more.

John Conroy, chief of a special investigating committee, is appointed to get rid of a $200,000,000 crime octopus that thas taken control of his community. To help him in his huge task, he enlists the aid of his boyhood pal, Jerry McKibben, a cynical, but conscientious newspaper man. Jerry is reluctant at first, but than decides to help his friend, perhaps because he is attracted to Amanda Waycross, Conroy's beautiful "girl Friday". At first Amanda resents Jerry's participation, but when she ralizes that he has Conroy's interest at heart, her attitude changes and soon she and Jerry fall in love. In no time at all, Jerry unearths the fact that Conroy's father, Matt, a city policeman, is associated with local businessman Eichelberger who is, in reality, the brain and nerves of the entire syndicate.

Kismet: Turkish, from Arabic qismah, Fate. In a single magical day, in eleventh century Baghdad, a beggar-poet rises from poverty to become emir, defeats an evil vizier, saves and kingdom and helps two lovers come together. It could be luck... the result of masterful plotting... or it could be Kismet. The legendary Marlene Dietrich stars in this film that tells the story of the love between the daughter of a beggar and Baghdad's young caliph, a despotic vizier, and of the wazir's wife's lust for the wily poet.

Before Bogart and Huston created the most enduring film version of Dashiell Hammett's detective novel The Maltese Falcon, this Bette Davis rendition brought the thriller to the screen in a somewhat comedic style, telling the twisting tale of a detective who is caught between a lying seductress and a lady jewel thief. Detective Ted Shayne (Warren William) is hired by Valerie Purvis (Davis) to find a woman named Madame Barrabas (Alison Skipworth). But Valerie has a secret that endangers Ted's life, while a valuable jewel-encrusted ram's horn serves as the key to the whole affair.

Douglas Fairbanks Jr. and Nancy Carroll star as Russian aristocrats who flee to Constantinople and pose as commoners to escape the Bolshevik Revolution. But the Baron Nikita Krasnoff (Fairbanks--The Prisoner of Zenda) cannot adjust to his new life of poverty and obscurity and soon begins an affair with a devious woman and a life of crime as a con artist. Nearly losing everything, and being exposed as frauds, the married couple eventually must again rely on each other escape with their very lives in this towering romantic epic.

Two officers ... One woman ... A volunteer needed for a desperate suicide mission. Errol Flynn stars in an unabashedly romantic adventure as a dashing young pilot in love with his commanding officer's wife. Now, as one of only two men qualified to fly a vital mission, will he live to see Another Dawn? Julia Ashton's (Kay Francis) heart belongs to a pilot who died years ago, but when British Colonel John Wister (Ian Hunter) falls in love with her, she agrees to marriage--even though she does not love him. But when Captain Denny Roark (Errol Flynn) joins Colonel Wister's command, Julia's heart melts and she once again feels love--but not for the man to whom she is married. Now, when a pilot is needed to fly a vital, one-way mission the only two men qualified are Julia's husband and the man she loves.

Cornel Wilde plays Omar Khayyam, the legendary Persian soldier, mathematician, astronomer, poet, and one of history's most famous military strategists. Using his knowledge of chemistry, geology, and ancient Greek warfare devices, Khayyam crushes a monstrous conspiracy against the Shah and the Empire by setting loose the forces of nature in a spectacular highlight of the film.

Arthur Winant (Don DeFore), a stranger in Chicago, commits suicide after losing $5,000, which did not belong to him, in a crooked card game. The group of gamblers, of which Danny Haley (Charlton Heston) is a member, worries about the dangers of cashing the $5,000 cashier’s check, but this is the least of their worries when one of the group (Ed Begley) is found hanged, and Police Captain Garvey (Dean Jagger) starts an investigation. Then it becomes known that Arthur had a mentally deranged brother, Sidney (Mike Mazurki) who is out to get the gamblers who fleeced Arthur.

One man claimed the land. Two men claimed the woman who lived there. Elizabeth Taylor, Peter Finch, and Dana Andrews star in this action-packed drama set in Ceylon. Taylor plays a newlywed who accompanies Finch to his sprawling tea plantation called Elephant Walk...and falls for overseer Andrews. But this love triangle is soon dwarfed by other events. A cholera epidemic breaks out, drought blights the land and herds of thirst-maddened elephants devastate the plantation in a thundering stampede. This famed sequence is a triumph of moviemaking. The palatial "bungalow" is reduced to rubble as onrushing elephants pound across polished floors, rip walls from their foundations and knock over kerosene drums to ignite a terrifying inferno. You have to see it to believe it!

Clothes make the woman, as ravishing Kay Francis dazzles David Manners in her Warner Bros. debut, a stylish Pre-Code romance co-starring Una Merkel and Andy Devine. The hard-driving editor of The '400' Magazine, Lois Ames (Francis) is a married workaholic, as loyal to her husband as she is to her job. So when she fires her secretary for refusing to work late, Lois impulsively hires Tom Sherman (Manners), a handsome sporting goods salesman, to take her place. Rising fast in the company, Tom grows to love his work and his boss even more, a situation his jealous fiancée (Merkel) threatens to expose by telling what she suspects goes on behind closed office doors.

After years of unemployment, John Phillips (Humphrey Bogart) finally lands a job. He's on top of the world, until he runs into James O'Malley (Pat O'Brien), a by-the-book cop so rigid he calls his loving ma a litterer for feeding the birds. O'Malley cites Phillips for a busted muffler, although he knows it will lose the man his job. Soon the desperate Phillips loses his freedom as well when he robs a pawnshop and lands in the slammer. But when O'Malley meets Phillips' crippled daughter (the Warner studio's Shirley Temple-like tot Sybil Jason), he begins to realize he should temper justice with mercy. A new man, O'Malley falls for Barbara's lovely teacher (Ann Sheridan) while he strives to undo the wrong he's done to the moppet's dad. Directed by William Dieterle (The Life of Emile Zola), this quintessential Depression-era blend of grit and sentiment marks the second of four films Bogart and O'Brien made together.

William Powell and Kay Francis share more than a love of jewelry in this sparkling romantic comedy directed with a Lubitsch-like touch by William Dieterle. Bored of her marriage to a rich but dull Baron, Teri (Francis) is searching for a lover who'll put some excitement in her life. So when she joins her husband at a jewelry store to purchase the famous Excelsior diamond ring, the Baroness finds the shop has exactly what she's been looking for when it's robbed by a debonair gentleman thief (Powell). Refusing to be locked in the vault, Teri agrees to not make a sound until the robber gets safely away. But when she returns home to find the ring in her safe and the thief waiting patiently in her bedroom, the Baroness is about to find the thrill she's been craving.

William Powell and Joan Blondell star in a drama about a less-than-scrupulous assistant district attorney who gets the chance to regain his conscience. Anton Adam (Powell) is more interested in furthering his career than justice, but his errors finally catch up to him when he becomes the subject of blackmail then barely escapes going to prison himself. But through it all, his loyal secretary (Blondell) remains by his side.

Love is blind, fickle and true. And under the sway of capricious fairies it becomes blinder (a queen romances a donkey), more fickle (best friends swoon over each other's beau) and truest of all (lovers repledge their devotion). "Lord, what fools these mortals be!" in Shakespeare's bewitching comedy!

What was in fashion in 1934? Comedy, con men, Orry-Kelly gowns, Busby Berkeley production numbers and in their only screen pairing, two of cinema's greatest stars: William Powell and Bette Davis. The story whisks audiences off to Paris with a fashion sharpie (Powell) and a designer (Davis) who hope to bootleg the hottest haute couture and flood New York with knockoffs. The two stars make larceny seem like great fun. And Berkeley's numbers are astonishing. Gorgeous girls wearing little more than ostrich plumes form a Web of Dreams, Venus with Her Galley Slaves and The Hall of Human Harps, which prompted one indignant mother to write an article titled I Don't Want My Daughter Growing Up to Be a Human Harp.

Juarez is the story of three men – Benito Juarez (Paul Muni), Napoleon III (Claude Rains) and Emperor Maximilian (Brian Aherne) – driven by political passions. And of a woman, Empress Carlota (Bette Davis), driven to madness. John Garfield and Gale Sondergaard join the illustrious cast of this epic, directed by William Dieterle (A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Life of Emile Zola) and set against a backdrop of revolution and royal ambition, with Mexico as the prize. All the leads earned critical plaudits, but many reviewers singled out Davis for one bravura sequence in which, as the mentally fragile Empress, she confronts Napoleon, demanding he save her husband's life. "Her final flitting away into the darkness of madness is the most unforgettable moment in the picture" (James Shelley Hamilton, National Board of Review).

Playboy and ne'er-do-well Gordon Bates is dead, that's for sure. But whodunit? That's not so sure. There are suspects aplenty. So, from Headquarters comes the army of crime specialists – toxicologists, fingerprint experts, ballistic experts, technicians running data-card tabulations on Hollerith machines and, for good measure, authorities on the use of invisible ink – that know the how and can point to the who. George Brent and Eugene Pallette portray the lead crime dogs in this swift sniff-out of a killer that sifts through murderous means and motives at an engagingly pell-mell pace. William Dieterle (A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Hunchback of Notre Dame), on his way to A-list prominence, directs with great visual hubbub and flourish.

Linda Gault is a luxury loving wife who casually seduces other men, even getting investment tips from one of her lovers. Linda is devastated by the stock market crash of 1929 when her husband, Geoffrey, loses their fortune due to a bad tip. The Gaults must decide what is most important in their relationship - or if they are better off apart.

Jabez Stone is a hard-working farmer trying to make an honest living, but a streak of bad luck tempts him to do the unthinkable: bargain with the Devil himself. For seven years of good fortune, Stone promises “Mr. Scratch” his soul when the contract ends. When the troubled farmer begins to realize the error of his choice, he enlists the aid of the one man who might save him: the legendary orator and politician Daniel Webster. Directed with stylish flair by William Dieterle, The Devil and Daniel Webster brings the classic short story by Stephen Vincent Benét to life with inspired visuals, an unforgettable Oscar-winning score by Bernard Herrmann, and a truly diabolical performance from Walter Huston.

A group of refugees fleeing Chinese Communist rule via train are beset by a gang of terrifying outlaws.

Confederate soldier, Brett Sherwood (Alan Ladd), is en route to join Captain Quantrill's bandits. Along the way he rescues a man accused of a killing he had been responsible for. Things become complicated when the man's fiancée discovers the truth and Brett finds out Quantrill is not what he appears to be.

Nominated for five Oscars and winner for Best Picture, this biographical drama stars Paul Muni ("I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang," "The Life of Louis Pasteur") as the famed writer who risks his reputation to defend a Jewish army officer accused of treason. Academy Award-winner Paul Muni received an Oscar-nomination for his stirring performance while co-star Joseph Schildkraut won for Supporting Actor. Recently selected by the prestigious American Film Institute as one of the top 400 American films of all time. "The Life of Emile Zola" was also selected for preservation by the National Film Registry due to its cultural, historical and aesthetic significance.

Considered by many as the greatest adaptation of the Victor Hugo classic novel about the deformed bell ringer of Notre Dame who rescues a beautiful gypsy woman from his evil guardian and falls in love with her. A stunning achievement starring Oscar-winner Charles Laughton ("Spartacus," "Mutiny on the Bounty") as the heroic hunchback, Quasimodo. Featuring the screen debut of Academy Award-winner Edmond O'Brien ("D.O.A.," "The Wild Bunch") and the U.S. debut of the beautiful Maureen O'Hara ("How Green Was My Valley," "Only the Lonely"). Also starring Oscar-winner Thomas Mitchell ("It's a Wonderful Life," "Stagecoach") and Cedrick Hardwicke ("The Ten Commandments"). Produced by Academy Award-recipient Pandro S. Berman ("Ivanhoe," "Top Hat," "Father of the Bride"). Nominated for its outstanding musical score.