Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

What a horrible story and extremely awkward predicament! He commits the absolutely most perfect murder imaginable, and then a telephone call makes him forget one detail, and when he tries to remedy his mistake he is caught in an elevator between two storeys and can't get out! And that's only the introductory plot to a web of plots or rather an inextricable mess of misfortunes...There are altogether four criminals and three murders committed, only one planned and three just slipping into it by circumstances. Jeanne Moreau is always perfect in wicked roles, there is a certain trait around her mouth which makes her hopelessly and incurably look cruel, her laugh is never convincing, and she has no sense of humour. That'¨s what's generally lacking in French films, which is why they are best at making sinister films, like this one, "Les yeux sans visage", "Les diaboliques" and other hopelessly dark thrillers, of which this is another one and definitely one of the very best in its grey tristesse and filmed almost exclusively in sterile surroundings - that's the dominant character of almost all French films of the Nouvelle Vague, which makes them slightly inhuman. This is more human, since it's a crime passionnel it's all about, and the youths are just humanly stupid and actually try to commit suicide for their offence.Maurice Ronet is always expressionless and here more than ever - a total poker face, having nothing else to do but to submit to his bleak destiny - not even the smartest murder in the world could save him here.Miles Davis' dark jazz underscores the défaitism of the thriller by being mostly silent but for some poignant reminders to add some acuteness to the dreary mood. It's a brilliant film, the first of many by Louis Malle, most of them equally hopeless, like the dreadful suicide study "Le feu follet"(also with Maurice Ronet), but this is only his second best film. His best film remains his very odd and different collaboration with Jacques-Yves Costeau in "The Silent World", which is also his most human film.

ELEVATOR TO THE GALLOWS is a crime drama, which is a sort of collision between the American film noir and the French New Wave. The film was based on a novel of the same name by Noël Calef. The main protagonist is a former paratrooper and veteran of war. He decides to kill the husband of his mistress, who is a rich industrialist and his boss. He has planned the perfect murder, while his crime has to look like a suicide. However, he remains stuck in an elevator after the murder, which initiates a series of unplanned events...Mr. Malle has brought protagonists in a very interesting position. The murderer was captured after his own mistakes. Two young delinquents have engaged in a very dangerous adventure. Woman in love has aimlessly wandered on the bleak streets. The three human stories that are associated with love and crime.The perfect crime has lost its purpose in a series of random events. Each of these events was accompanied by a large dose of irony. The story has certain drawbacks. Every crime was made for love. Plots, which are based on the murder and theft were quite tense.Each of the protagonist has faced with a life struggle. The gloomy and depressing atmosphere has fully corresponded to such relationships. The acting is pretty good, but there is a lack of emotion. Characterization is solid, but almost all the characters have remained incomplete at the end of the film.Jeanne Moreau as Florence Carala is a major figure in this film. She is a woman who has fought for her love to the end. This is a realistic view on a woman in love, while her love and happiness running away from her. Her face is the scene of clashes between the drama, love, desire, courage and disappointment. Maurice Ronet as Julien Tavernier is very interesting at the beginning of the film. However, his character becomes monotonous in the second part of the film. Georges Poujouly (Louis) and Yori Bertin (Véronique) are a young couple of delinquents, which are lost in their own struggle between existence and immaturity.This movie is a somewhat successful experiment. There are certain segments of the ambiguities in the story, but plots are quite interesting. Maybe a little slow for the crime genre.

I am a great fan of noir and thus was severely underwhelmed by this considering the glowing reviews. Jeanne Moreau looks great and the photography is suitably stylish and atmospheric but it's just that the story is so routine, so mundane, so ordinary. It looks like there might be a few clever twists but they never come, no, the clever cops work it all out and the silly chumps leave incriminating photos to seal their fate and by the way, who took the photos anyway? I hardly think they had selfies in those days, especially not on a spy camera, but rather indiscreet nonetheless considering the circumstances. However, justice is done, the bad guys get theirs and that's that. There is none of the moral ambiguity, nihilism or hopelessness that true masterpieces of the genre like Scarlet Street, Kiss Me Deadly or The Third Man have in spades. This plays out more like a routine episode of Colombo with all loose ends nicely tied up, thank you very much. A real disappointment.

Elevator to the Gallows, directed by Louis Malle, came out in France in 1958, the same year as Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo- and they bear noticeable similarities. Indeed, the Criterion Collection's booklet on Elevator cites Hitchcock as an influence on Malle. Both films are about attempts to carry out the perfect murder, with classic motives. Both are atmospheric and rich. Elevator to the Gallows may not be as famous, and I think it's somewhat underrated- Leonard Maltin gave it a lukewarm rating and claimed it "doesn't hold up," but failed to explain how and by what standards. He even got the name of the movie wrong, calling it by its bastardized title Frantic. I'd say Malle's film is one of the best I've seen from France and from the 1950s.In it, Julien Tavernier kills a man named Simon Carala because he's in love with Carala's wife Florence, played by the beautiful Jeanne Moreau. He tries to make it look like suicide, then forgets a key piece of evidence outside the scene of the crime. Going back to get it, he gets caught in the elevator, while his car is stolen by a young couple. The young man impersonates Tavernier, and then commits a murder of his own, for which the real Tavernier is blamed by the French press (which evidently doesn't have to obey libel laws).Elevator is a very good yarn, as two separate murders happen to be thrown together as a wicked twist of fate, with guns fired not by their owners. Some reviewers have questioned how Tavernier could have forgotten such an important piece of evidence, but come on- he had committed a crime, and probably wanted to be done with it as quickly as possible; forgetting things is understandable under the stressful circumstances. Like Orson Welles with Citizen Kane, Malle made a real cinematic achievement at a young age, and more people should see this movie.