The best Herbert Lom’s drama movies

The rebellious Thracian Spartacus, born and raised a slave, is sold to Gladiator trainer Batiatus. After weeks of being trained to kill for the arena, Spartacus turns on his owners and leads the other slaves in rebellion. As the rebels move from town to town, their numbers swell as escaped slaves join their ranks. Under the leadership of Spartacus, they make their way to southern Italy, where they will cross the sea and return to their homes.

Londoner Harry Fabian is a second-rate con man looking for an angle. After years of putting up with Harry's schemes, his girlfriend, Mary, becomes fed up when he taps her for yet another loan. His latest ploy, promoting an aging Greek wrestler, goes awry when the wrestler dies and everyone points the finger at Harry. Hiding out in a riverfront barge, Harry sees his grand ambitions spiral into a nightmare of fear and desperation as the underworld closes in.

Jesus Franco's campy women's prison film is worthwhile for genre devotees primarily due to an outstanding cast. Mercedes McCambridge is unintentionally hilarious as sadistic lesbian warden Thelma Diaz, spitting tacky dialogue with exuberant venom in a performance so overbearing that it verges on classic. The plot is standard for the genre, as three women (Maria Rohm, Elisa Montes, Luciana Paluzzi) are sentenced to an island prison off the Panamanian coast, only to encounter torture, rape, and lesbianism. When sympathetic Warden Caroll (Maria Schell) replaces Diaz, the prisoners assume that conditions will improve, but their agony only worsens until they decide to escape. Rosalba Neri co-stars, and Herbert Lom runs the corrupt men's prison nearby. 99 Mujeres was heavily censored in various prints, with versions running anywhere between 70 and 108 minutes. Edits running 84, 86, and 94 minutes are most commonly available.

Epic film of the legendary Spanish hero, Rodrigo Diaz ("El Cid" to his followers), who, without compromising his strict sense of honour, still succeeds in taking the initiative and driving the Moors from Spain.

Napoleon's tumultuous relations with Russia including his disastrous 1812 invasion serve as the backdrop for the tangled personal lives of two aristocratic families.

In 1700s Austria, a witch-hunter's apprentice has doubts about the righteousness of witch-hunting when he witnesses the brutality, the injustice, the falsehood, the torture and the arbitrary killing that go with the job.

Ten people are invited to a hotel for a weekend getaway by a Mr. U. N. Owen, who mysteriously isn't in attendance. When the group gets together for their first dinner, a record is played in which Mr. Owen accuses each guest of committing various unpunished crimes, which sets off a series of murders in the hotel.

An ex-con trying to go clean ends up working for a crooked trucking company swindling money.

The corrupt Lord Ambrose D'Arcy steals the life's work of the poor musical Professor Petry. In an attempt to stop the printing of music with D'Arcy's name on it, Petry breaks into the printing office and accidentally starts a fire, leaving him severely disfigured. Years later, Petry returns to terrorize a London opera house that is about to perform one of his stolen operas.

World War II drama in which a member of the French Resistance and three British agents undertake a hazardous mission to infiltrate a German HQ in search of vital information that could lead to the overthrow of the Nazis.

In Fort Lamy, French Equitorial Africa, idealist Morel launches a one-man campaign to preserve the African elephant from extinction, which he sees as the last remaining "roots of Heaven." At first, he finds only support from Minna, hostess of the town's only night club, who is in love with him, and a derelict ex-British Army Major, Forsythe. His crusade gains momentum and he is soon surrounded by an odd assortment of characters: Cy Sedgewick, an American TV commentator who becomes impressed and rallies world-wide support; a U.S. photographer, Abe Fields, who is sent to do a picture story on Morel and stays on to follow his ideals; Saint Denis, a government aide ordered to stop Morel; Orsini, a professional ivory hunter whose vested interests aren't the same as Morel's; and Waitari, leader of a Pan-African movement who follows Morel only for the personal good it will do his own campaign.

Alfred Dreyfus, a German-Jewish captain serving in the French Army, is falsely accused of treason and made a scapegoat for military espionage in an act of institutional anti-Semitism. Sent to prison, he becomes a cause célèbre for the novelist Émile Zola, who dubs it the "Dreyfus Affair." Eventually, Dreyfus is pardoned when the military cover-up is made public, and he returns to France. But his name is forever tarnished by the accusations of treason.

Tony and Felix own a tramp boat, and sail around the Caribbean doing odd jobs and drinking a lot. They agree to ferry the beautiful but passportless Irena to another island. They both fall for her, leading to betrayal and a break-up of their partnership. Tony takes a job on a cargo ship. After a collision he finds himself trapped below deck with time running out (the ship is aflame), and only Felix, whom he hates and has sworn to kill, left to save him.

The thrilling, critically acclaimed account of Rudi Matt (James MacArthur), a young kitchen worker who is determined to conquer the Citadel -- the jagged, snowcapped peak that claimed his father's life.

A private eye is hired by an insurance company to investigate a shipping magnate suspected of deliberately sinking his own ships for the insurance money. He finds himself involved in a web of deception, double-crossing and murder.

A secret jet aircraft capable of traveling three times the speed of sound is being developed by a group of scientists secretly. On the day of the test flight, one of the scientists dies in a mysterious accident, and there are many arguments concerning the flight itself; some think it should be ground-controlled while Heathley (James Donald) wants it to be a manned flight with himself at the controls. Conflict also arises when one of his fellow scientists, taking advantage of Heathley's lack of attention toward his wife, Lydia (Phyllis Calvert), makes some moves on her. Then there is the question of just who is the enemy agent on the project. The single-minded Heathly, much to his dismay and little to his credit, uncovers him when he chooses his co-pilot.

Visiting in England, an American surgeon Doctor John Marlowe is decoyed to a middle European country, and discovers the operation he is to perform is on the Vosnian dictator. When the latter dies, he is replaced by a look-alike, but Marlowe then becomes the object of a shoot-to-kill, vicious pursuit by the secret police of Vosnia since it is vital to Vosnia that the dictator's death does not become known. Fleeing, he seeks help from an actress, Lisa Robinson, and the two are harried across the countryside.

Good and bad characters are stuck in a ski chalet near buried Nazi gold in the Alps.

British melodrama about a cabbie befriending a girl caught up in the white slave trade.

An ex-chorus girl lives on the Riviera, supported by a married man she doesn't know is a crook.