Email Author Ellliott Stein

2009 Stories by Ellliott Stein

• Murders in the Rue Morgue

  published December 29, 2009

  Dir. Robert Florey (1932). Made by a talented French director in Hollywood, but full of striking Germanic expressionist flourishes, this perverse... More >>

• Easy Living

  published December 29, 2009

  Dir. Mitchell Leisen (1937). This irresistibly madcap Depression-era Cinderella story, based on a marvellous Preston Sturges script, is one of the... More >>

• It's Always Fair Weather

  published December 29, 2009

  Dir. Stanley Donen & Gene Kelly (1954). This pungent bittersweet musical involves the reunion of three ex-G.I. buddies who find they no longer... More >>

• The Seven Year Itch

  published December 29, 2009

  Dir. Billy Wilder (1955). The Production Code didn't accept adultery as a subject for comedy, so Wilder's labored screen version of the Broadway... More >>

• Breakfast at Tiffany's

  published December 29, 2009

  Dir. Blake Edwards (1951). Romantically awash in New York atmosphere, Edwards's celebrated film is heavily dependent on the charm of Audrey... More >>

• The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

  published December 22, 2009

  Dir. Robert Wiene (1919). One of the most inspired horror films ever made, and a key work in the history of film design, this expressionistic... More >>

• My Sister Eileen

  published December 22, 2009

  Dir. Richard Quine (1955). This was the fourth dramatized version of Ruth McKenney's stories about two smalltown girls who come to New York to... More >>

• Sweet Charity

  published December 22, 2009

  Dir. Bob Fosse (1969). Fosse's debut as film director was this adaptation of the Broadway musical based on Fellini's Nights of Cabiria. Its... More >>

• Playtime

  published December 15, 2009

  Dir. Jacques Tati (1967). Tati's costly masterpiece was a box office flop whose failure put him into bankruptcy. The director again plays Monsieur... More >>

• Seven Brides for Seven Brothers

  published December 15, 2009

  Dir. Stanley Donen (1954). Donen's exuberant musical, loosely derived from the tale of the Rape of the Sabine Women, is justly celebrated... More >>

• Adam's Rib

  published December 15, 2009

  Dir. George Cukor (1949). Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy were never more relaxed with each other than as a couple of married lawyers who get... More >>

• Ball of Fire

  published December 15, 2009

  Dir. Howard Hawks (1942). The great Barbara Stanwyck is, if possible, even more marvelous than usual as a brassy nightclub entertainer recruited... More >>

• Jason and the Argonauts

  published December 1, 2009

  Dir. Don Chaffey (1963). The masterpiece of illusionist effects animator Ray Harryhausen. This sweeping adventure story of Jason's encounters with... More >>

• Waterloo Bridge

  published December 1, 2009

  Dir. James Whale (1931). Whale's sensitive adaptation of Robert Sherwood's play set in London during World War I stars Mae Clark in the finest... More >>

• Frankenstein

  published December 1, 2009

  Dir. James Whale (1931). The most influential horror film ever made, this stark and stylish work has a weird fairytale beauty. Boris Karloff... More >>

• Boom

  published December 1, 2009

  Dir. Joseph Losey (1968). This translation to film of Tennessee Williams's much-revised play The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore is a... More >>

• Cries and Whispers

  published December 1, 2009

  Dir. Ingmar Bergman (1972). This autumnal masterpiece, enhanced by Sven Nykvist's masterful camerawork, represents Bergman at the peak of his... More >>

• Salvatore Giuliano

  published November 24, 2009

  Dir. Francesco Rosi (1961). Rosi's vivid and gritty drama depicts the career of the notorious Sicilian criminal, but rejects easy spectacle and... More >>

• The True Glory

  published November 24, 2009

  Dir. Carol Reed and Garson Kanin (1945). This joint British-American movie is a superb, full-scale, broad and eloquent account of the World War II... More >>

• Brazil

  published November 24, 2009

  Dir. Terry Gilliam (1985). Although the plot's full of holes, this latter-day Orwellian story of a bleak dystopian alternative future has been... More >>

• Hour of the Wolf

  published November 24, 2009

  Dir. Ingmar Bergman (1967). One of Bergman's weirdest, this surreal Gothic fantasy concerns an artist (Max von Sydow) who vanishes, leaving only a... More >>

• L'âge d'or

  published November 24, 2009

  Dir. Luis Bunuel (1930). Widely banned at first, Bunuel's transgressive masterpiece concerns two lovers who constantly have their sexual desires... More >>

• The Job, aka The Sound of the Trumpets

  published November 17, 2009

  Dir. Ermanno Olmi (1961). This wryly serious comedy was made during the great economic boom of the early 1960s, when Italy was rapidly evolving... More >>

• Voyage to Italy

  published November 17, 2009

  Dir. Roberto Rossellini (1953). This major work deals with the visit to Naples by an English couple (George Sanders and Ingrid Bergman). Bored and... More >>

• The Hoodlum

  published November 17, 2009

  Dir. Sidney Franklin (1919). In this comedic class fable, Mary falls for a young man who had been jailed because of her wealthy grandfather's... More >>