The Big Steal (Don Siegel, 1949)

Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, Patric Knowles, John Qualen, and William Bendix in The Big Steal

Cast: Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, William Bendix, Patric Knowles, Ramon Novarro, Don Alvorado, John Qualen, Pascual García Peña. Screenplay: Daniel Mainwaring, Gerald Drayson Adams, based on a story by Richard Wormser. Cinematography: Harry J. Wild. Art direction: Ralph Berger, Albert S. D'Agostino. Film editing: Samuel E. Beetley. Music: Leigh Harline.

Can film noir be funny? The Big Steal is unquestionably noirish, reteaming as it does the pair from the über-noir Out of the Past (Jacques Tourneur, 1947), Robert Mitchum and Jane Greer, and involving a lot of twists and turns in its plot centered on a payroll heist. But director Don Siegel and his cast give it a lightness and wit that elicits as much amusement as suspense. Ramon Novarro has some droll moments as a Mexican police inspector.

Elevator to the Gallows (Louis Malle, 1958)

Maurice Ronet in Elevator to the Gallows

Cast: Jeanne Moreau, Maurice Ronet, Georges Poujouly, Yori Bertin, Jean Wall, Iván Petrovich, Elga Andersen, Lino Ventura. Screenplay: Roger Nimier, Louis Malle, based on a novel by Noël Calef. Cinematography: Henri Decaë. Art direction: Jean Mandaroux, Rino Mondellini. Film editing: Léonide Azar. Music: Miles Davis.

Crime doesn't pay, we're often told, and if any movie seemed designed to make that point it's Louis Malle's first non-documentary feature Elevator to the Gallows which is about two intersecting crimes that both go wrong. The first is the plot by Julien Tavernier (Maurice Ronet) to kill his boss, Simon Carala, whose wife, Florence (Jeanne Moreau), is Julien's mistress. Things begin to go wrong when Julien's car is stolen during the carefully plotted murder and Julien finds himself trapped overnight in an elevator. Then the car thief, Louis (Georges Poujouly), and his girlfriend, Véronique (Yori Bertin), go for a joy ride, during which Florence spots the car with Véronique in it and thinks Julien has abandoned her. Meanwhile, the joyriders find Julien's identification in the car they have stolen and check in under his name in a motel on the outskirts of Paris. They wind up partying with a German couple, taking pictures of the group that Véronique leaves for developing. But Louis murders the German couple when he tries to steal their Mercedes so he can abandon Julien's car. Oh, murder will out, too. Moreau was already well known in France as a stage actress, but her performance in Elevator to the Gallows made her a movie star, especially after Malle cast her in his next film, The Lovers (1958). The engaging twists of the film are given a melancholy cast by Miles Davis's evocative score.

Amélie (Jean-Pierre Jeunet, 2001)

Cast: Audrey Tautou, Mathieu Kassovitz, Rufus, Lorella Cravotta, Serge Merlin, Jamel Debbouze, Clotilde Mollet, Claire Maurier, Isabelle Nanty, Dominique Pinon, Artus de Penguern, Yolande Moreau, Urbain Canceller, Maurice Bénichou, Michel Robin. Screenplay: Guillaume Laurant, Jean-Pierre Jeunet. Cinematography: Bruno Delbonnel. Production design: Aline Bonetto. Film editing: Hervé Schneid. Music: Yann Tiersen.

Amélie is a charming film, but I have to admit that I'm immune to its charms, finding it a bit self-conscious and much too aggressive in thrusting them upon us. It was a huge international hit, however, and remains a favorite of a lot of people whose taste I trust. Chacun à son goût.

Empire of Passion (Nagisa Oshima, 1978)

Kazuo Yoshiyuki and Tatsuya Fuji in Empire of Passion

Cast: Tatsuya Fuji, Kazuko Yoshiyuki, Takahiro Tamura, Takuzo Kawatani, Akiko Koyama, Taiji Tonoyama, Sumie Sasaki, Eizo Kitamura, Masami Hasegawa, Kenzo Kawarasaki. Screenplay: Nagisa Oshima, based on a story by Itoko Nakamura. Cinematography: Yoshio Miyajima. Set decoration: Jusho Toda. Film editing: Keiichi Uraoka. Music: Toru Takemitsu.

A fine, creepy ghost story set in Edo period Japan. A man and woman plot to murder her husband and throw his body in a well. But as their passion cools, they become the subject of gossip and rumor, driving them apart. And then the murdered man's ghost begins appearing and the police decide to investigate. Handled with Oshima's characteristic take on sexual obsession.

Full Metal Jacket (Stanley Kubrick, 1987)

Vincent D'Onofrio in Full Metal Jacket

Cast: Matthew Modine, Vincent D'Onofrio, R. Lee Ermey, Adam Baldwin, Dorian Harewood, Kevyn Major Howard, Arliss Howard, Ngoc Lee, Papillon Soo. Screenplay: Stanley Kubrick, Michael Herr, Gustav Hosford, based on a novel by Gustav Hosford. Cinematography: Douglas Milsome. Production design: Anton Furst. Film editing: Martin Hunter. Music: Vivian Kubrick. 

Is Full Metal Jacket one movie or two? That debate continues to rage, with a lot of us preferring the first half of the film, about the Marine boot camp, to the second, which follows some of the trainees into combat in Vietnam. Certainly the first half is dominated by the two most memorable performances in the movie, R. Lee Ermey as the drill sergeant and Vincent D'Onofrio as the private driven to madness by the former's training techniques. That inevitably leads to some dissatisfaction with the more conventional nature of the combat sequences, which, though often shot thrillingly, making use of various locations in, of all places, England, sometimes have a war movie familiarity that even a director like Stanley Kubrick can't overcome. 

Diary of a Chambermaid (Luis Buñuel, 1964)

Jeanne Moreau and Michel Piccoli in Diary of a Chambermaid

Cast: Jeanne Moreau, Georges Géret, Daniel Ivernel, Françoise Lugagne, Muni, Jean Ozenne, Michel Piccoli. Screenplay: Luis Buñuel, Jean-Claude Carrière, based on a novel by Octave Mirbeau. Cinematography: Roger Fellous. Production design: Georges Wakhévitch. Film editing: Louisette Hautecoeur.

Jeanne Moreau's aura of knowingness serves as a filter through which we view the Monteil household in Luis Buñuel's sharp-edged satire on wealth and privilege.

Eyes Wide Shut (Stanley Kubrick, 1999)

Cast: Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman, Sydney Pollack, Todd Field, Marie Richardson, Thomas Gibson, Julienne Davis, Vinessa Shaw, Rade Serbedzija, Leelee Sobieski, Alan Cumming. Screenplay: Stanley Kubrick, Frederic Raphael, based on a story by Arthur Schnitzler. Cinematography: Larry Smith. Production design: Leslie Tomkins, Roy Walker. Film editing: Nigel Galt. Music: Jocelyn Pook.

Some people think Eyes Wide Shut is a masterpiece; others think it's pretentious hooey. While I incline toward the latter opinion, I have to wonder if Stanley Kubrick had lived to see it fully through its postproduction stage -- he died shortly after submitting a final cut to the studio -- he would have tinkered it into something that inspired less ambivalence. I also wonder if he hadn't yielded to studio pressure to cast movie stars in the lead roles, we wouldn't have found the characters played by Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman less glossy and more interesting. And then there are the orgy scenes, too choreographed to be real, although movie orgies are rarely titillating even when they're not digitally altered as the ones in the original release of the film were to avoid an NC-17 rating. The main thing for me, however, is that every time I see the movie I can't remember a few days later what it was all about. Which makes me wonder if it's about anything. 

The Tale of Zatoichi (Kenji Misumi, 1962)

Shintaro Katsu in The Tale of Zatoichi

Cast: Shintaro Katsu, Masayo Banri, Ryuzo Shimada, Hajime Mitamura, Shiguro Amachi, Michiro Minami, Eijiro Yanagi, Toshio Chiba, Manabu Morita. Screenplay: Minoru Inazaka, based on a story by Kan Shimozawa. Cinematography: Chikashi Makiura. Production design: Akira Naito. Film editing: Kanji Suganuma. Music: Akira Ifukube.

Shintaro Katsu's performance in The Tale of Zatoichi as the blind masseur who happens to be a brilliant swordsman launched a string of sequels as well as a long-running Japanese TV series in which he starred.

Cousin Cousine (Jean-Charles Tacchella, 1975)

Victor Lanoux and Marie-Christine Barrault in Cousin Cousine

Cast: Marie-Christine Barrault, Victor Lanoux, Marie-France Pisier, Guy Marchand, Ginette Garcin, Sybil Maas, Popeck, Pierre Plessis, Catherine Verlor. Screenplay: Jean-Charles Tacchella, Danièle Thompson. Cinematography: Eric Faucherre, Georges Lendi, Michel Thiriet. Film editing: Marie-Aimée Debril, Agnès Guillemot, Juliette Welfing. Music: Gérard Anfosso.

A pleasant romantic comedy about the ideal couple, Karine (Marie-Christine Barrault) and Ludovic (Victor Lanoux), who can't seem to get around to coupling, even though their spouses are having it off with each other. A bright international hit that was less brightly remade in 1989 as Cousins by Joel Schumacher with Ted Danson and Isabella Rossellini. It seems to need the French touch to bring its events and its off-beat characters to life.

Matador (Pedro Almodóvar, 1986)

Nacho Martínez and Assumpta Serna in Matador

Cast: Assumpta Serna, Antonio Banderas, Nacho Martínez, Eva Cobo, Julieta Serrano, Chus Lampreave, Carmen Maura, Eusebio Poncela. Screenplay: Pedro Almodóvar, Jesús Ferrero. Cinematography: Ángel Luis Fernández. Production design: Fernando Sánchez. Film editing: José Salcedo. Music: Andrés Vicente Gómez.

Pedro Almodóvar was just getting established as a major filmmaker -- his big breakthrough, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, would come in 1988 -- when he released Matador, a film whose spicy stew of eccentrically transgressive characters, sex, and violence, all treated with a comic vision, led critics to compare him to Luis Buñuel. It has become more clear that Almodóvar is his own man, whatever the influences may have been.