There is something special about the production, with its brash, vivid style, indelible performances by movie icons, and bold mixture of violence and comedy, romance and tragedy.

The Dirty Dozen flows nicely, keeping things moving and drawing the audience along in its rapid current

Unfortunately, this is also among the weakest of the early Bond films, although Connery is in peak form.

Unfortunately, after the introductory sequences, Casino Royale begins a downhill slide. It gets progressively sillier and more incoherent until it's impossible to keep any of the plot elements straight.

Arguably the most rewarding aspect of Persona is its rewatchability. The movie’s themes are so complex and deeply buried that it offers something new each time it is seen. Like a Rorschach test, one’s interpretation says more about the person offering the opinion than the film itself.

A Man for All Seasons offers an engaging, if somewhat dry, history lesson leavened with enough low-key drollness and powerful acting to keep it from ever becoming boring.

The underwater sequences, which are choreographed and directed with great skill, are Thunderball's standout feature... Thunderball is classic 007 -- not the best picture in the long-running series, to be sure, but a more-than-worthwhile diversion for the action-loving escapist in us all.

Pussycat is classic Meyer. The three leads are all topheavy, the action-packed plot is paper-thin, there are loads of double-entendres amidst the cheesy dialogue, and the style is pure low-budget. This is fun stuff, to be sure, but definitely of the "guilty pleasure" sort.

Goldfinger is studded with moments that have since become deeply embedded in the Bond mythos. John Barry's opening song (sung by Shirley Bassey) is among the series' best. Snippets of dialogue have attained an almost-legendary status, such as the exchange when Goldfinger is about to emasculate 007 with a laser. "Do you expect me to talk?" asks Bond. The response is succinct: "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die!"

Few genres of films are as magical as musicals, and few musicals are as intelligent and lively as My Fair Lady. It's a classic not because a group of stuffy film experts have labeled it as such, but because it has been, and always will be, a pure joy to experience.

From Russia with Love is among the most tightly-plotted of all the Bond films, and, as a result, is one of the shortest. It moves briskly, blending intrigue, romance, and action into an immensely satisfying whole.

Although many of the themes in An Autumn Afternoon are timeless, the film itself represents a snapshot of Japanese lifestyle in the 1960s.

A masterpiece... The genius of Dr. Strangelove is that it's possible to laugh -- and laugh hard -- while still recognizing the intelligence and insight behind the humor.

Tom Jones succeeded in large part because of its wit, its performances, and its energy.

There are no gadgets, forcing Bond to rely on his ingenuity (in one scene, when he needs to breathe while submerged, he uses hollowed-out reeds as air tubes). The single car chase is reasonably straightforward. And, for the only time in the series, 007 is unmistakably brutalized, appearing bloody, beaten, and disheveled as a result.

To Kill a Mockingbird is a faithful adaptation of one of the 20th century's most important American works of literature. It is also a masterpiece in its own right. This is one of those rare productions where everything is in place - a superior script, a perfect cast, and a director who has a clear vision and achieves what he sets out to do.

Along with The Searchers, it represents John Ford at his most accomplished. And it is one of the best Westerns Hollywood has ever produced.

El Cid is about as self-important as a motion picture can be. Regardless, there are still moments of breathtaking, almost transcendant splendor, when the film makers attain the grand aspirations they strive for.

Represents a brave and effective fusion of serious and fantasy elements, and offers two and one-half hours of solid entertainment. Admittedly, there are times when West Side Story strikes a campy or discordant note, but those instances are overbalanced by the more frequent moments when it offers its own brand of cinematic magic.

The film has more charm than the average romantic comedy, but, when considered from a bare-bones perspective, it follows most of the rules that define the genre.

One of the most compelling character-based films to emerge from the decade of the 1960s.

Yojimbo does not cause viewers to ponder deep issues in the way Rashomon does, nor does it possess the epic grandness of The Seven Samurai, yet it must still be considered in the top tier of Kurosawa's films. Stylish, compelling, and involving, it became as much a blueprint for future productions as it is an homage to past ones.

By introducing comedy into the mixture and telling the tale from an atypical perspective, Kurosawa has differentiated The Hidden Fortress from nearly every similar feudal era Japanese epic ever committed to the screen. This is a masterpiece that deserves more credit than it is often given.

Psycho is a brilliant excursion into fear that pushes many of our primal buttons, but it lacks the story and character complexity of Vertigo and Rear Window.

The Apartment represents Wilder at his most complete - seamlessly weaving the lighthearted and the serious without encountering a snarl or tangle.

North by Northwest is also surprisingly forthright when it comes to sexual matters. There aren't many euphemisms or double entendres in the interaction between Thornhill and Eve.

Taken as a whole, it’s excruciating in ways that few would consider enjoyable.

With an unnecessarily protracted running length of more than 140 minutes, Rio Bravo at times moves too slowly for its own good but the climax is as rousing as that of any Western made during the decade when the genre was at its peak.