This 1955 Todd-AO blockbuster, made from the landmark American stage musical, faithfully preserves the play's robust spirit and extroverted charm, while resetting it among vast golden and green outdoor vistas. [15 Nov 2005, p.C3]

The third and least of the three great Kelly-Donen MGM musicals--but that's no knock, considering the others were "On the Town" and "Singin' in the Rain." [27 Jan 2006, p.C7]

Few Alfred Hitchcock movies are more fun to watch than To Catch a Thief. [15 Jun 2007, p.C7]

One of the great movie horror tales, with one of the greatest of all movie villains, appeared to relatively little fanfare in 1955 when actor Charles Laughton released his sole movie directorial effort: a startlingly Gothic visualization of Davis Grubb's Southern nightmare novel The Night of the Hunter.[23 Nov 2001, p.C5]

Despite script collaboration by his friend William Faulkner, this is Hawks' hokiest movie, a stilted Egyptian period piece about pyramid-building and sexual intrigue with Jack Hawkins as the Pharaoh and Joan Collins a conniving temptress with a jeweled navel. Yet the director gives it real spectacle; it looks great. [13 Feb 1998, p.N]

The quintessential American love story --the one between the spoiled heiress and the spontaneous, fun-loving guy from the wrong side of the tracks--has seldom been more elegantly and entertainingly told.

Paddy Chayefsky, who wrote the script, has captured the human element deftly. Here are human beings as they really are, refreshingly life-like, piteously real, and often hilariously funny. [16 May 1955, p.15]

The movie can still make temperatures rise -- though for musical rather than political reasons.

Chirpy, bland, slightly maudlin Christmas musical comedy. [21 Dec 2001, p.C5]

Mankiewicz's classic Hollywood backstage tale of a tragic sex goddess/superstar (Ava Gardner), her gloomy, intellectual director (Humphrey Bogart) and the retinue of glamorous and/or exploitive movie types around them. [05 Nov 2004, p.C6]

With its lilting Lerner-Loewe score and great Kelly dance numbers, this is almost a Hollywood musical masterpiece. But it's sabotaged by the airless "outdoor" studio sets mandated by MGM. [13 Mar 1998, p.L]

Loony, but spellbinding. [28 Apr 2006, p.C9]

Director Edward Dmytryk, working from a top-notch script adapted from Herman Wouk's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, makes Bogie's gradual breakdown under relentless cross-examination from defense lawyer Jose Ferrer a superb example of screen melodrama. [21 Nov 1986, p.92]

They are all more capable performers than are usually found in horror films, and the script is not as stiffly self-conscious as the average, either, with the result that this does of devastation is a bit easier to take than some of its predecessors. [22 Jun 1954, p.27]

Tati's fabulous comedy about a bumbling French vacationer in Brittany -- the first appearance of his hilarious pipe-smoking alter-ego Hulot -- is almost a silent movie done in sound, with spare dialogue, affectionate characterizations, sunny beach scenes and complex sight gags that recall the genius of Chaplin and Keaton. [19 Dec 1997, p.T]

It remains the best movie ever photographed in 3-D, although the film, adapted from Frederick Knott's stage play, seems less than ideal for the 3-D process, given its tight interiors and extended dialogue scenes. [19 May 2000]

A recently resurfaced noir classic, in which an ex-con (Gene Nelson) is trapped between his criminal ex-buddies (Charles Bronson, Ted De Corsia and Timothy Carey), pulling him back into the underworld and the tough, toothpick-chewing L.A. cop (Sterling Hayden) who wants to make him a stoolie. Harsh, rough, sharp as a knife. [24 Oct 1997, p.L]

This Universal sci-fi saga has little of the style or atmosphere of the studio's '30s horror classics; its stars are amiable Richard Carlson and Julia Adams. But it does have a unique monster: the Amazonian gill man, a lovelorn amphibian who spots Adams underwater and doesn't stop swimming after her until the very last minute. [30 Oct 1998, p.I]

The desert isn't necessarily a desolate place, and this film makes it come alive. [15 May 1987, p.65C]

Robust safari movie, partly remade from "Red Dust," co-starring Ava Gardner and Grace Kelly. [23 Jun 2006, p.C2]

James Cagney had his crack at a Huey Long-like character in this overlooked 1953 feature directed by Raoul Walsh; the film suffers from a near-complete lack of originality but Cagney and Walsh, here as always ("The Roaring Twenties," "White Heat"), strike some sparks together. [01 Nov 1992, p.15C]

This cast could hardly be bettered and it's a great story as well: a taut, engrossing, highly perceptive scan of the fears, desires, repressions and ugliness boiling under the deceptively quiet surface of pre-war years. Our movies rarely get an American story this rich, evocative and true, and rarely realize it as well. If "Eternity" has dated at all, it's only in a good way; we can only wish our own movies were half as good or reflected American reality half as well. [5 Dec 2003, p.C8]

The definitive alien invasion movie, often imitated, never surpassed. [04 Sep 1987, p.54C]

It's a shame the dippy TV knockoff Hogan's Heroes has supplanted memories of this great dark WWII POW comedy. Seeing it makes you understand why Schindler's List was a long-time Wilder project. [17 Oct 1995, p.3C]

A cautionary tale of paranoia and prejudice. [25 Jul 2003, p.C1]

A stylish remake of Michael Curtiz' shocker "Mystery of the Wax Museum"--about a museum-art gallery filled with wax-dipped murder victims, run by the fiendish Vincent Price. [25 Jul 2003, p.C1]

Shane is one of those movies that I revisit at least once a year, just to remind myself how stirring a Western can be when the mix of myth and method is just right. [21 June 2002, p.C8]

Joseph Cotten as a killer, Monroe as his adulterous wife slithering under the sheets and Jean Peters as the unfortunate witness in this taut Niagara Falls thriller. [09 Jun 2006, p.C7]

One of the best-liked backstage dramas, with Douglas shining as egotistical producer Jonathan Shields (said to be based on David O. Selznick) who ruthlessly sheds friends, lovers and colleagues on his way to the top, only to seek them after his fall. [25 Apr 2003, p.C1]

Stuart Heisler's fascinating (but not biographical) backstage Hollywood drama about a fading Oscar-winning actress, co-starring Sterling Hayden and Natalie Wood. [19 Jul 2005, p.C3]

Shallow, colorful adaptation of one of Hemingway's best short stories. [08 May 1998, p.M]

The most purely enjoyable of all the great Ford films. [18 Sep 1998, p.J]

Playing a deranged, possibly homicidal babysitter going bonkers in a hotel, Monroe steals the show in this efficient, vaguely creepy little thriller--despite the presence of both Richard Widmark (as her airline pilot target) and Anne Bancroft (as the hotel's pert lounge singer). [09 Dec 2005, p.C6]

The movie's lovers and its haters can agree on one thing. The third section, set in Greece and dealing with another, less interesting magic spell cast on Hoffmann's soprano sweetie (Ann Ayars), ranks as the weakest. [10 Apr 2015, p.C4]

Prototypical DeMille extravaganza about a circus tour beset with colorful crises, romance, train wrecks and spectacular melodrama from beginning to end. [21 Aug 1998, p.H]

One of the most lavish and entertaining of all Hollywood religious epics. [15 May 1998, p.M]

Great direction, script (A.I. Bezzerides), score (Bernard Herrmann). [25 Aug 2006, p.C7]

Songwriter bio on Gus Kahn (Danny Thomas); Day is his long-suffering mainstay. [13 Apr 2007, p.C5]

One of the supreme romantic musicals. To see Kelly hoofing atop Oscar Levant's piano, suavely partnering Leslie Caron along the banks of the River Seine and exulting in her love in the final sequence is to behold the film musical near its apex. [2 Oct 1992, p.L]

The first-rate cast, Lee Garmes' camerawork and the tense, excellent script (by Phil Yordan and, uncredited, Dashiell Hammett), all help build toward an unsurprising but memorable climax. [16 Oct 1996, p.2]

The well-loved science fiction tale of the brainy extraterrestrial Klaatu (Michael Rennie), who comes to Earth to warn the planet against its self-destructive nuclear pursuits; he winds up observing humanity close up. [06 Oct 2006, p.C6]

It's full of cinematic invention, rich verbal and visual poetry, packed with raw life and nonpareil acting. [Dirctor's Cut]

They're a witheringly beautiful couple; ex-cinematographer Stevens lavishes all his gifts of composition, lighting and texture on their closeups. [05 Apr 2007, p.C10]

Weird attempt to turn Booth Tarkington's Penrod stories into a mini-Meet Me in St. Louis, co-starring Gordon MacRae and Leon Ames. [13 Apr 2007, p.C5]

Jimmy Stewart's signature role as amiably soused Elwood P. Dowd, who navigates his way through a contentious and mercenary world with the aid of his best friend, the invisible 6-foot-3-inch rabbit Harvey. [27 Jun 2008, p.C2]

Sunset Blvd. remains one of the best, truest, funniest, saddest and scariest of all movies about Hollywood. [09 Jun 2006, p.C8]

The first of Mann's great Jimmy Stewart cycle -- and one of his best. [30 Apr 2010, p.C3]

One of the finest, funniest and most civilized of all Hollywood domestic comedies. [01 Sep 2006, p.C5]

Vincent Sherman's tangy 1950 gangster crime-romance. [19 Jun 2005, p.C3]

One of the great film noirs and a quintessential heist movie, a classic of American hard-boiled storytelling that, though endlessly copied, hasn't been bettered. [27 May 2005, p.C6]

So-so. [23 Jan 1997, p.9B]

No other film has a final effect quite like "Rules." One walks away from it drained and exhilarated, after experiencing a whole world and seemingly every possible emotion in a few swift golden hours.

Enchanting film.

John Wayne as the gutsiest sarge and top kick on Iwo Jima, in one of his most prototypical war yarns. Vintage Duke. [09 Jul 2000, p.23C]

A fascinating study of sexual heat fueled by guns and ammo. [19 Oct 2001, p.C8]

This is the best of all the Tracy-Hepburn comedies--and one whose unabashedly feminist screenplay seems more incisive with each passing year. [10 Mar 2006, p.C7]

It's permeated with a sweetness and vulnerability unusual for any crime movie. [29 May 1998, p.N]

The second, and finest, of Ford's cavalry trilogy. [17 Aug 2007, p.C7]

The Third Man is a film where everything works: script, direction, the performances of Welles, Cotten, Trevor Howard (the cynical police major) and Alida Valli (the enigmatic traveler), Robert Krasker's flamboyantly tilted black-and-white cinematography and the unforgettably spare and haunting zither score by Anton Karas. [5 Sept 1996, p.6]

Perhaps the roughest of the classic gangster movies, with a climax that almost blows the theater down. [24 Jul 2009, p.C3]

It's "Rear Window" with kids, and it's gorgeously shot with long, looming, twisted perspectives on actual New York locations, by cinematographer-turned-director Tetzlaff ("Notorious"). [27 Feb 2000, p.27C]

To cop a phrase, it's a knockout. [05 Sep 1999, p.32C]

The great Christmas western with Duke Wayne, Pedro Armendariz and Harry Carey Jr. as three fugitive outlaws, who, by caring for an abandoned baby, unwittingly become sagebrush equivalents for the Three Wise Men. [04 May 2001, p.C1]

It's as impressive for the near-flawless performances of its deep cast of British film and theatrical stars (including Jean Simmons as Ophelia, Eileen Herlie as Gertrude and John Gielgud as the voice of Hamlet's father's ghost) as it is for its director's surprisingly rich and baroque visual style. [04 Aug 2006, p.C8]

One of the cinema's supreme, most outrageously eccentric and audacious technical experiments: the legendary single shot movie.

The best of all cattle-drive westerns. [11 Oct 1998, p.16C]

That great ex-Berliner Wilder's cynical, darkly funny look at postwar Berlin--a hive of bombed-out buildings, desperate citizens and black-market morality, run by the U.S. military with a slightly blind eye. [02 Jun 2006, p.C4]

Maxwell Anderson's poetic-political play about crime and fascism, set in a "Petrified Forest"-style ensemble during a Key West hurricane, was turned by Huston and co-writer Richard Brooks into a crackling thriller. [27 Nov 1998, p.Q]

A Selznick-produced Hitchcock: a courtroom melodrama of murder and romantic degradation for which Hitch wanted Laurence Olivier, Greta Garbo and Robert Newton, but had to settle for Gregory Peck, Alida Valli and Louis Jourdan. [26 Nov 1999, p.A]

A charming confection, set on an ocean liner. [13 Apr 2007, p.C5]

Melody Time delivers on its promise of rhythm and romance, reason and rhyme, something ridiculous, something sublime. [11 Jun 1998, p.10C]

A Christmas perennial: a witty, polished, lushly sentimental and amusingly sexless romantic comedy in which suave angel Cary Grant mixes in the affairs of troubled bishop David Niven and his lovely wife Loretta Young. [24 Dec 2004, p.C10]

Minor but irresistible MGM musical capturing '20s college life through the prism of the jivin' '40s era. [18 Jan 2008, p.C2]

What makes this video really interesting and superb entertainment for viewers 5 and older is that it blends animation with live action and carries two separate, full animated features with separate human narrators. [07 Aug 1997, p.9B]

It just doesn't swing (or bop), but the stars always click. [15 Jul 2005, p.C8]

A socially conscious prison picture (written by Richard Brooks) that sometimes deliriously suggests a Brooklynesque mating of Jean Genet and Warner Bros. [20 Apr 2007, p.C8]

A Christmas season evergreen.

Lean's masterly film of the classic Charles Dickens novel of success, romance and their dark underpinnings. [18 Jun 2010, p.C3]

Odd Man Out is the extraordinary thriller about a botched IRA bank robbery and the badly wounded and increasingly feverish rebel, Johnny (James Mason), who wanders Belfast with both his mates and the police on his trail. [29 Feb 2008, p.C8]

Typical tough '40s Walsh noir. [08 Aug 1997, p.M]

The most well-loved of all Christmas movies.

The great "coming home" film of World War II. [28 Nov 2008, p.C7]

Scripted by Ben Hecht, and with Salvador Dali's notorious surreal dream sequence as a shocking interlude, this was one of Hitchcock's most romantic and popular '40s movies [26 Nov 1999, p.A]

One of the all-time classic noirs. [06 Nov 1998]

Noel Coward's much-loved thwarted romance. [14 Nov 2008, p.C7]

Based on Francis Beeding's The House of Dr. Edwardes, scripted by Ben Hecht, and with Salvador Dali's notorious surreal dream sequence as a shocking interlude, this was one of Hitchcock's most romantic and popular '40s movies; it's also the source of most of Mel Brooks' parody High Anxiety. [26 Nov 1999, p.A]

Curtiz holds you in his master grip, creating one of those WW II-era California noirs that keeps swinging you from darkness to sunlight, love to hatred, happiness to the pits of despair and death. [18 Nov 2005, p.C6]

Among the finest hours of horror star Boris Karloff. [18 Oct 2005, p.C3]

A successful lifestyle journalist, Elizabeth (Barbara Stanwyck) is lauded by her readers as the sweetest, most efficient homemaker in the countryside. Problem is, she is a chain-smoking urbanite in a city apartment. [05 Dec 2014, p.C2]

It's not all that funny -- but fascinating in a weird, knockabout way. [28 Aug 1998, p.O]

It's the film for which Albright painted a series of progressively decaying portraits of Dorian, climaxing in a ghastly vision of venereal rot and putrescence. [27 Feb 1997, p.11B]

The British hated it (because their soldiers took Burma), but this is a rock-solid Walsh actioner, with Errol Flynn, James Brown and Henry Hull. [06 Apr 2007, p.C7]