the score by Miles is a remarkable one, tapping into the jazzy zeitgeist of the time
Comment
08/02/08
Elevator to the Gallows (1957)
95
%
Tomatometer
How does the Tomatometer work 
Reviews Counted:40
Fresh:38
Rotten:2
Average Rating:8/10
Theatrical Release:Jun 24, 2005 Limited
Synopsis: This psychological thriller is imbued with a wonderful Parisian atmosphere and a moody, improvisational score by legendary jazz trumpeter Miles Davis. A beautiful woman, Florence, and her lover,... [More]
Get This Movie
Reviews for Elevator to the Gallows
The movie's most compelling element of all is Moreau, wandering the nighttime streets trying to find her lover. It's as if she's blown from one cafe to the next on a blended wind of passion, dread and the lonely trumpet wail.
09/22/05
Top CriticAn intelligent thriller that served as an important precursor in the late 1950s to such New Wave classics as Breathless and The Four Hundred Blows.
02/20/02
The tasty 1957 noir thriller that introduced the world to French filmmaker Louis Malle, who at the time was a 24-year-old assistant director for Jacques Cousteau.
07/22/05
Top Critic"Gallows" was Malle's first film at the age of 24, and you can sense his eagerness to start pushing and kicking at the rigid noir plot structure to see what happens.
04/06/06
Louis Malle was just 25 when he made this moody piece of Gallic pulp fiction about a girl, a gun and a broken lift.
05/24/03
Efficient but soulless.
04/01/07
Top CriticThese 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.
09/15/05
Top CriticA plan for a perfect murder goes wildly wrong in this 1958 melodrama by one of France's great filmmakers.
06/23/05
Like a black-and-white Hitchcockian tour of hell.
08/18/05
Henri Decaë's black-and-white cinematography brings out the melancholy mystery of Paris' boulevards and cafes, and Ms. Moreau, shot with natural lighting and without make-up, is like a mournful goddess of glamour.
04/07/06
Top CriticThe plot crackles with energy and misdirection, while the black-and-white film sharpens angles and amplifies the shadows lurking in every hallway.
10/14/05
A stylish noir-ish crime drama boasting, amongst other things, an improvised Miles Davis soundtrack.
01/01/00
No review available.
07/06/05
Part film noir, part melodrama, part Hitchcockian thriller, the film strives to be anything and everything and in many ways succeeds.
07/18/05
The crisp black-and-white cinematography is the stand out, hugely benefiting from filming on location.... Adding to the melancholy is Miles Davis' sparingly used score.
06/24/05
Malle has a real knack for showing off the nasty side of humanity
05/09/06
It's devilishly clever, bleakly hilarious, and fatalistically romantic throughout, a celebration of grand, doomed gestures made for the sake of making them.
11/30/06
a perfect hybrid of French noir elegance and the New Wave's rough hewn realism
04/20/06
What makes this swooningly atmospheric movie a true romance is the face of Jeanne Moreau in close-up, at once impassive, devious and tragic as she wanders the rain-soaked streets of nighttime Paris.
07/28/05
RT On Current TV
What’s Hot On RT
Fresh Links
Featured
Wes Anderson on Fox 
The director talks about puppetry perfection and his film, Fantastic Mr. Fox
The New Cult Canon
AV Club looks at a beloved cult classic, Sam Raimi's Army of Darkness.
New Moon Portraits
TIME offers us a closer look at the characters from the latest Twilight film.
Unsexiest Men Alive
Moviefone lists their choices for the least attractive men in Hollywood.
Promos
Follow RT on Twitter
Get the latest Tomatometer updates on upcoming movies!
IGN RSS Feeds