7 Star Films

Few animated films capture the idea of childhood escapism as purely as Walt Disney’s Peter Pan (1953). Adapted from J.M. Barrie’s beloved 1904 play and 1911 novel, the film promised a technicolour flight to Never Land—a realm where children never grow up, pirates and fairies are real, and the problems of the adult world vanish in clouds of imagination.

In 1959, Walt Disney released Sleeping Beauty, his most ambitious and expensive animated feature to date. Nearly a decade in the making and reportedly costing six million dollars—a record for animation at the time—the film was both a technical marvel and a commercial gamble. Upon release, it was met with mixed critical reception and underwhelming box office returns, casting a shadow over the studio’s feature animation department for years.

When Fantasia premiered in November 1940, it was unlike anything audiences had ever seen—or heard. Equal parts symphony, painting, myth, and fever dream, the film brought together classical music and hand-drawn animation in a visionary cinematic experience. Walt Disney’s third animated feature was also his riskiest, departing entirely from traditional narrative and character-driven storytelling.

Le Mans (1971) is a film unlike many others in the racing genre. Instead of taking a conventional narrative route, it offers a meditative, immersive experience of the famous 24 Hours of Le Mans endurance race held in France.

Released in 1989, Parenthood is a comedy-drama that manages the rare feat of being both sharply observational and warmly human. Directed by Ron Howard and based on a story developed with screenwriters Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel, the film explores the messy, imperfect, and profoundly emotional world of raising children—and being raised in turn—across multiple generations of one extended family.

Uncle Buck (1989) is a quintessential John Hughes film: heartfelt, hilarious, and sharply observant of both adult and adolescent growing pains. It’s also a career-defining vehicle for the late, great John Candy, whose turn as the bumbling but lovable title character transformed a potentially one-note comedic premise into a deeply resonant portrait of family, responsibility, and redemption.

Shirley Valentine (1989), directed by Lewis Gilbert and based on Willy Russell’s acclaimed stage play, is a poignant, funny, and quietly radical portrait of a woman reclaiming her identity after years of domestic invisibility.

Oliver Stone’s Born on the Fourth of July (1989) is a harrowing, deeply personal, and politically charged film that stands as one of the most powerful anti-war dramas in American cinema. Based on the autobiography of Vietnam War veteran Ron Kovic, the film charts his journey from patriotic zealot to paraplegic war hero turned radical activist.

Franco Zeffirelli’s 1967 adaptation of William Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew is a riotous, visually extravagant, and unashamedly theatrical film. Starring Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor at the height of their volatile real-life romance, the film turns the Bard’s problematic comedy into an electrifying battle of the sexes, a lush Renaissance spectacle, and a showcase for its leading couple’s magnetic chemistry.

Among the various incarnations of A Star Is Born—a story told across decades of Hollywood history—the 1954 version stands as arguably the most emotionally powerful and artistically accomplished. Directed by George Cukor and starring Judy Garland in a triumphant comeback role opposite James Mason, the film is both a dazzling showbiz musical and a devastating character study about fame, self-destruction, and personal sacrifice.

The Desert Fox is a striking and unusually nuanced war biopic that challenges the wartime cinematic trend of one-dimensional enemy portrayals. Directed by Henry Hathaway, this 1951 film offers a compelling dramatization of the final years in the life of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, one of Nazi Germany's most respected—and controversial—military leaders.

Daring swordfights, mistaken identities, simmering romance, and revolution all collide in MGM’s lush Technicolor spectacle Scaramouche (1952), a spirited adaptation of Rafael Sabatini’s 1921 novel. Directed by George Sidney, the film captures the adventurous essence of the swashbuckling genre, delivering an opulent and thrilling experience filled with theatrical bravado and breath-taking fencing sequences.

The 1940 film adaptation of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, directed by Robert Z. Leonard and starring Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier, stands as an intriguing fusion of Regency wit and 1940s Hollywood gloss.

Few biographical films manage to merge the soul of an artist with the artistry of cinema as successfully as Lust for Life, the 1956 adaptation of Irving Stone’s novel on Vincent van Gogh. Under the dynamic direction of Vincente Minnelli and bolstered by a career-defining performance from Kirk Douglas, the film is not merely a retelling of Van Gogh’s life—it is a vivid and compassionate descent into the tormented psyche of a man for whom art was both salvation and suffering.

Adapting Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick—arguably one of the most challenging and symbolically dense novels in American literature—is an ambitious endeavour for any filmmaker. In 1956, legendary director John Huston, fresh off a string of successful literary adaptations (The Maltese Falcon, The African Queen), took on the leviathan.

Blending wartime antics with sharp comedy and a splash of romantic absurdity, Operation Petticoat (1959) is one of the most endearing military comedies to emerge from the post-World War II era. Directed by the rising star Blake Edwards, produced by Robert Arthur, and starring Cary Grant and Tony Curtis, this film delivers a buoyant mix of slapstick, satire, and character-driven humour—anchored in one of the most outlandish premises of any WWII film: a pink submarine.

Elegant, witty, and drenched in mid-century glamour, Indiscreet (1958) is a prime example of sophisticated romantic comedy done right. Directed with charm and breezy precision by Stanley Donen (of Singin’ in the Rain fame), and boasting the incomparable chemistry of Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant, the film is a delightful blend of grown-up mischief, theatrical flair, and continental style. Based on Norman Krasna’s 1953 play Kind Sir, it manages to feel both timeless and distin

In 1927, Charles Lindbergh became a global hero by completing the first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean, from New York to Paris. Three decades later, one of Hollywood’s finest directors, Billy Wilder, undertook the ambitious task of translating this defining moment in aviation history to the big screen.

El Cid is one of the grandest and most ambitious historical epics of the 1960s, a decade marked by a wave of lavish, widescreen spectacles. Directed by Anthony Mann and starring Charlton Heston and Sophia Loren, the film dramatizes the life of Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar—better known as El Cid—a legendary Spanish hero whose military prowess and moral code helped shape the Reconquista of medieval Spain.

The Long, Hot Summer is a rich and steamy Southern melodrama that simmers with ambition, sexual tension, and familial rivalry. Directed by Martin Ritt in his first major studio feature and boasting a top-tier cast led by Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, the film is based loosely on the works of William Faulkner but infused with a distinctly Tennessee Williams-style heat and emotional volatility.