It's fast and furious, but suffers from an overstuffed plot.

Douglas gives an appropriately fiery star turn as Van Gogh, delivering some of the best work of his career.

An erratic but compelling film that lingers long after the fade-out.

Written with all the bite of a distinctly middle-class church social, this musical re-working of The Philadelphia Story feels distant.

Even without the music, this well-written story would be a splendid entertainment. But it's the music, that wonderful score written by Rodgers and Hammerstein, that makes this movie as beloved as it is.

Filmed at considerable danger to cast and crew, MOBY DICK, under Huston's strong direction, is one of the most historically authentic, visually stunning, and powerful adventures ever made.

Though there is obviously more polish and a lavish budget in this remake, the 1956 version of The Man Who Knew Too Much has no more or less impact than the first version.

A deeply emotional experience that is also a grand entertainment, The Searchers is a true American masterpiece.

While much of Godzilla, King of the Monsters is second-rate, there's no doubt that you're watching a star being born.

Nothing about it is pretty, with director Mark Robson (who'd already helmed the powerful CHAMPION) moving the story along at a frenetic pace and Burnett Guffey's stark black-and-white photography lending a grim feel to the movie. All of the performers are excellent, especially Bogart, in what would be his final screen appearance.

A superb sci-fi flick, FORBIDDEN PLANET offers an unusually intelligent script, exciting direction by Wilcox and generally good acting from a decent if rather dull cast.

A beautiful and unusually quiet film from one of the world's greatest living directors.

This film lacks the cinematic boldness of Olivier's earlier screen Shakespeare; there's nothing here to match the gloomy mise-en-scene of Hamlet or the cocky theatrical conceits of Henry V. But his riveting performance transcends his conventional directing and utterly dominates the movie.

The last of the comedies produced by the Ealing Studios, and one of the finest, with a supremely dark tone which makes a climactic series of murders as hilarious as they are grotesque.

A superbly crafted film by innovative director Siegel, this low-budget science fiction tale became one of the great cult classics of the genre.

Another of director Sirk's melodramatic, bitter attacks on the values of American middle-class life in the 1950s, this one stars MacMurray as a middle-aged milquetoast who lives in a claustrophobic home with his token wife, Bennett, and their three self-absorbed children.

With its touching story and stylized treatment, ALL THAT HEAVEN ALLOWS is one of Sirk's finest films.

A great play but just a good movie, Guys and Dolls fails to convey the charm that the magnificent stylized stage version brought to the unique world inhabited by Damon Runyon's characters, despite the collaboration of some very talented people.

Otto Preminger defied the Code with this pioneering look at drug addiction, featuring a stylish rendering of the post-war hipster milieu, a crisp jazz soundtrack, and a remarkable Sinatra.

In this powerful study of juvenile violence, Dean is riveting as a teenager groping for love from a society he finds alien and oppressive.

Watch it for the songs. A paean to Oklahoma's "Sooner" pioneers, it's a watchable, if hardly terrific, rendering of an innovative Broadway landmark.

A tongue-in-cheek nod to gumshoes Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe.

Cary Grant is at his most suave and Grace Kelly is stunningly beautiful in To Catch a Thief, a bubbly and effervescent Alfred Hitchcock romantic-suspenser that finds the Master in a relaxed and purely entertaining mood.

An occasionally brutal, but generally plodding western from Lancaster (his first as a director), who fails to pump much life into the anemic script, giving the cast little to do.

This stodgy film version of the famous Broadway success was one performance too many.

Beautiful, haunting, poetic, and intensely personal, THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER is a unique, terrifying masterpiece.

Based on a French play by way of Broadway, Angels is both warm and sophisticated, combining witty, carefree humor with more unabashedly evil undertones. The charmingly hammy performances capture this feeling well: In addition to Bogart, Aldo Ray and Peter Ustinov are especially winning as his partners in crime.

The book featured lots of sexy scenes, but the film adaptation is, at best, cool and dispassionate. Mitchum's facial expressions seem to fall into two categories: sullen and sour.

This frothy musical has a likable cast and a gossamer-thin story.

Hawks used more than 10,000 extras and handled the DeMille-type hordes well enough. The problems arose in the shooting of the small moments, the times when actors had to speak to each other.

Disney's first CinemaScope cartoon, Lady and the Tramp cost $4,000,000 and took three years to complete, but it grossed over $25,000,000, making more money than any other film from the 1950s except THE TEN COMMANDMENTS and BEN-HUR.

MARTY, coming in the mid-1950s, in an era of epics and extravagant films designed to stifle upstart television, was all the more startling in that it was a movie expanded from an original television drama (with Rod Steiger in the lead), written brilliantly by Chayefsky, one of the leaders of what came to be known as "kitchen sink" or "clothesline" dramas.

A powerful film whose influence can be seen in Hud and most other antihero films, East of Eden is masterfully directed by Kazan. All the principals give riveting performances, but it was Dean who emerged as an overnight sensation. Eden also features a quintessentially hardbitten performance from Van Fleet, who won an Oscar for her pains.

Vic Morrow is excellent as the leader of a gang of thugs, as is Poitier in a star-making performance, though at age 31 he unfortunately doesn't convince as a high school student.

The Racers was the first big-budget Hollywood treatment of motor racing, and its very exciting racing footage almost compensates for the slim plot.

The marvelous sets--with their quaint blend of Victorian and futuristic elements--are worth the price of admission alone. The direction is sharp as are the special effects. All the major performances are fun but James Mason is a standout. Dare we say it? It's fun for the entire family!

F. Scott Fitzgerald's tragic love story was brought to the screen with surprising vitality under Brooks' expert hand. He drew fine performances from Taylor, Johnson, and others in a sumptuous MGM production that captured the flavor of expatriate life in the City of Light.

Preminger's heavy-handed adaptation of a Broadway triumph combines gorgeous music with risible lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II; the project is saved by a terrific cast.

Judy Garland is at her peak, pulling out all the stops, daring the gods in this dark, weighty fable of the price one pays to be at the top.

Though it's not as satisfying as it might have been, it still boasts great stars and catchy songs in addition to a love story, and is a perennial holiday favorite.

THE BAREFOOT CONTESSA is marked by Mankiewicz's sharp wit--sometimes too much wit. When there is one character cracking wise, fine. When you have two, okay. But when almost all the characters sound as though they were sitting around the writer's table at the MGM commissary, suddenly credibility goes out the window.

A charming, if often-seen, tale, paced with alacrity by Wilder from the adaptation of Taylor's hit play. [Review of re-release]

Possibly Minnelli's worst screen musical.

A superb example of suspense filmmaking, especially when one considers the technical limitations of its single set.

Not quite as heart-wrenching as the original version, this remake is still pretty good and does benefit from being filmed in color.

Close to perfect. A magical blend of the right story, a great score, and the astonishing choreography of Michael Kidd, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers is one of the big screen's most entertaining musicals.

A draining experience from beginning to end, relentless in its portrayal of inhumanity.

Complex, atypical Bogie performance is keynote for strong drama from Pulitzer-winning novel and Broadway show.

THEM! is one of the best of a 1950s spate of monster movies rooted in nuclear paranoia.

With very little dialogue and a creative use of sound, Tati (the actor and director) gives us an entirely new way of looking at a very familiar landscape.

Lower case Hitch, but diverting and sleek, with the climax early on. [review of original release]

The film rises above the level of agitprop by avoiding sloganeering and using the real words of real people to tell its story. Its feminism, too, is real and unforced, with women simply being shown struggling alongside--and when necessary defying--their male counterparts.

Nelson is most believable in a nonhoofing role.

Imbued with great atmosphere by director Jack Arnold, the film is genuinely frightening, but also elicits a certain amount of pathos for the creature, reminiscent of that that goes out to the unfortunate King Kong.

The first and best biker movie.

Extensive attention to detail of sets and costumes, superior photography, and standout performances by Taylor, Ferrer, and Woolf put this a cut above other Arthurian legend films.

The film is partly inspired by SHANE, accentuating the close relationship of hero-worshiping youngster to virtuous gunfighter, and its exterior shooting has the look of a John Ford work, but HONDO stands tall on its own.

Even if the screenwriters were obviously inspired by the mega-success of ANNIE GET YOUR GUN, that doesn't make this funny, rambunctious entertainment a mere rip-off. Whether dancing, singing, or hamming it up as the legendary tomboy, Day proves that she was second only to Judy Garland as the Golden-Age Hollywood Musical's consummate triple threat.

Though the story is a hackneyed one--the rise of an itinerant to a position of power--Cagney is so dynamic that he rivets the viewer's attention.

The massive James Jones novel, deemed impossible to put onscreen because of its strong sexual content and language, finally emerged as a lavish, star-studded spectacle, much bowdlerized but redeemed by a slew of fine performances.

The film has enough adventure and excitement to satisfy, and the faintly bittersweet note of the ending is made deliciously palatable by its artistic rightness.

Though it's bogged down by a stiff cast, a yawn-inspiring conventional romance, and a sappy religiosity, it remains a landmark in the history of special effects.

The world of professional golf gets the Martin and Lewis treatment in this mildly funny film.

Seamlessly directed by Vincente Minnelli, The Band Wagon is one of the finest musicals ever made. Playing its hackneyed story with tongue firmly in cheek, it simultaneously reflects upon the musical genre, satirizes its conventions and delivers marvelous entertainment.

Unlike previous POW films, Wilder and co-writer Edwin Blum's script, based on the play by Donald Bevan and Edmund Trzcinski, presents the prisoners not as paragons of patriotic virtue but as real, self-interested, bored soldiers trying to survive. Holden is magnificent as the heel-turned-hero, but Stalag 17 is full of wonderful, well-directed performances.

HOUSE OF WAX was stunningly directed by Andre de Toth who used the new 3-D process to its fullest potential without bogging down the narrative with too many "gee-look-what-I-can-do" tricks.

Although the film is often brutal, there is such a positive sense of morality displayed here that Shane should be seen by the whole family.

There was little room for Hitchcock's usual humor here, nor is there even much suspense.

Luxe MGM historical ransacking, locationed to the nines, beautiful to look upon, but with energy lapses in the soggy script of Sir Walter Scott's epic classic.

A wonderful movie.

Everyone's honeymoon haven at one time, Niagara Falls, is the deceptive setting for this offbeat, absorbing film with bowstring-tight direction from Hathaway and superb performances from Cotten as a jealous husband and Monroe as his neurotic wife.

This quintessential movie on movies is an engrossing, seductive Minnelli epic, graced with superb performances.

Hope and Crosby had been making "Road" films for 12 years when they did this, their sixth installment in the series, the only one in color. It was getting tiresome by that time, although they managed some fun out of the slim plot.

THE STAR would have been a much better film if all its loose ends had been gathered. As it is, the ending is too curt and too convenient to bring the tale to a close with a ring of truth.

LeRoy's direction is apparently nonexistent, but what this movie really lacks is a good musical score with tunes by someone like Harry Warren, Richard Rodgers, or Cole Porter.

Chaplin, as usual, is the whole show, superb in this swansong statement about his own career and the old-style entertainment he best represented.

One of the more successful attempts to bring Hemingway material to the screen, this story of a writer who has lost his intellectual and emotional bearings after enjoying early commercial success works splendidly under King's sure directorial hand, and is enacted with power and conviction by Peck.

The wonderful performances by Ford's stock company in these roles help make THE QUIET MAN an utterly moving and fascinating portrait of rural life in Ireland.

DON'T BOTHER TO KNOCK is directed with a quick pace by Baker, the Taradash script is as tight as a sardine can, and all the principals do well with their roles, especially lovely Marilyn Monroe.

Not a frame is wasted in this taut, superbly directed, masterfully acted film, the first so-called "adult Western." (Review of Original Release)

The story is a familiar one--Robin Hood and his band of merry men trying to save the poor folks of Nottingham from Prince John's greedy ways--but, given the Disney treatment, the legendary heroes and events seem even more romantic.

The point isn't what happens, but how it happens, and under the direction of George Cukor--working from the script by Garson Kanin and Ruth Gordon--Tracy and Hepburn turn in unforgettable performances.

While the dizzying array of design elements and magnificent vocal performances is impressive, 138 minutes is just too long to keep the interest of any but the pure opera devotee.

A rare misfire from the normally reliable team of Powell and Pressburger (THE RED SHOES), this 1890s British-based film was taken from a fair novel and only barely came up to the novel's standards, despite an excellent and lively turn by Jones in the lead.

It's big, it's garish, it's loud, and most of all, it's wonderful. This is Cecil B. DeMille's superlative salute to the circus world, and all its glamour and flashy hoopla suits perfectly the director whose middle name was epic.

Very likely the greatest musical MGM or anyone else ever produced, SINGIN' IN THE RAIN has everything--great songs, great dances, a wonderful, nostalgic story, and a dependable cast, although we're beginning to find Kelly and O'Connor a trifle overanimated in scenes they needn't be (butthen whenever we see the talented yet obsequious Mr. Kelly play modest, we get a strange olfactory sensation--that of ham baking)

A film that has everything--adventure, humor, spectacular photography and superb performances.

The story's authenticity was enhanced by the real-life marriage of Grant and Drake and their resulting on-screen rapport.

One of the most brilliantly constructed films of all time, RASHOMON is a monument to Akira Kurosawa's greatness, combining his well-known humanism with an experimental narrative style that has become a hallmark of film history.

One of MGM's biggest box-office hits, the epic QUO VADIS offers a spectacular cast to match its overwhelming production; there's plenty to enjoy, but don't look for greatness. Over it all looms a loony Ustinov as Emperor Nero, despite director LeRoy's best efforts to keep him from chewing the scenery as he enjoyably steals the show.

De Sica handles his fantastic material subtly and with simplicity, yielding an original mix of sharp satire and poetic fable that extended the limits of the neo-realist style.

On Dangerous Ground is tautly directed by that master of stark dramas, Nicholas Ray. Ryan and Lupino give sterling performances but the story line is broken up into two distinct segments, which lessens the film's impact and cohesiveness.

If the naive dramatic situations and trite idealism can be ignored, the viewer is in for an amazing spectacle of special effects in WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE.

The songs are all Gershwin Brothers standards; Kelly's choreography is breathtaking; the original screenplay by playwright Alan Jay Lerner is alternately witty and touching; and Minnelli's direction feels buoyantly assured.

Detective Story is methodical in its depiction of the sometimes traumatic events of one day in a precinct but the marvelous quirks and shadings of these characters create highly exciting drama.

Great performances by all make this a little gem of a film.

A hilarious tongue-in-cheek crime comedy, one of the finest to come out of the Ealing Studios during their most prolific years.

Superb performances by all involved, restrained direction by Wise, and a magnificent and innovative score by Bernard Herrmann help keep this 35-year-old film just as relevant today as it was the day it was released.