90
A tightly structured thriller with a brilliantly moody performance by Jeanne Moreau, and depending on your point of view, it's either one of the few genuine French noir films or an early entry in the New Wave.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
90
Moreau's nocturnal wanderings are made unbearably poignant by an exquisite Miles Davis jazz score that became famous in its own right.
100
Christian Science Monitor by David Sterritt
A plan for a perfect murder goes wildly wrong in this 1958 melodrama by one of France's great filmmakers.
100
Los Angeles Times by Kenneth Turan
A consummate entertainment rich with the romantic atmosphere of Paris in the 1950s. Coming at a turning point in French cinematic history, it drew upon several major talents - director Louis Malle, star Jeanne Moreau, cinematographer Henri Decaë, musician Miles Davis - and achieved near-legendary results with all of them.
90
Village Voice by Melissa Anderson
It's precisely Malle's omnivorous appetite that makes his first feature, adapted from a policier, so delectable, one stuffed with many sumptuous sights and sounds.
88
Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert
These 1950s French noirs abandon the formality of traditional crime films, the almost ritualistic obedience to formula, and show crazy stuff happening to people who seem to be making up their lives as they go along.
90
Washington Post by Stephen Hunter
Superb.
100
San Francisco Chronicle by Walter Addiego
As French crime thrillers go, this is about as good as it gets.
75
The film's look makes a divine accessory for its music, which Miles Davis composed. There's not even 20 minutes of it in the film, yet it still defines the atmosphere, transforming a crime yarn into a bebop noir.
100
Seattle Post-Intelligencer by William Arnold
A suspenseful, elegant entertainment.
Unsurprisingly, the legendary Jeanne Moreau gives the standout performance in Elevator to the Gallows as the surprisingly sympathetic femme fatale, but everyone and everything is in top form in Louis Malle's impressive feature film debut. Like his French New Wave contemporaries, Malle knew exactly what made American film noir so great, and he impeccably replicates that magic while bringing his own movement's innovations and style.