For its 50th anniversary, the Odyssey hosts Kubrick’s masterful reimagining of the 18th century, and a self-serving Irishman’s struggle to thrive in it.

As Britain and Ireland are convulsed by the Seven Years War, Redmond Barry’s life collapses through duels and deceit, and he winds up fighting in it on the enemy side. Luck and further deception in Europe wins him an aristocratic marriage – but climbing English high society is more than his pride and temper can handle. After A Clockwork Orange and a failed Napoleon biopic, Kubrick transformed Thackeray’s rambling novel into a world of unprecedented detail and beauty, reviving the light, compositions, and cruelty of the setting to a flawlessly immersive degree. His impeccably atmospheric and incisive vision also boasts a once-in-a-lifetime cast: from Love Story’s Ryan O’Neal to Reggie Perrin’s Leonard Rossiter.