(Alexander Mackendrick, 1957)

Considered too dark at the time of its initial release, but now acknowledged as one of a handful of masterpieces of American film noir, with a brilliantly acerbic and quotable screenplay by playwright Clifford Odets and Ernest Lehman (based on the latter's short stories) and a jazz and jazz-flavored score by Elmer Bernstein (The Man with the Golden Arm) and Chico Hamilton, featuring the actual Chico Hamilton Quintet performing as themselves on screen, with the exception of the quintet's real 26-year-old guitarist John Pisano, who instead recorded the dubbing for the on-screen guitar miming of Martin Milner's on-screen character, the fictional jazz guitarist "Steve Dallas." (In addition to Milner miming guitar and Hamilton himself on drums, the on-screen Quintet featured Carson Smith on bass, Fred Katz on cello, and Paul Horn on flute.) Tony Curtis (as press agent "Sidney Falco") and Burt Lancaster(as Broadway columnist "J.J. Hunsecker") give two of the greatest performances (and create two of the most memorable characters) in the history of screen acting.