Look ma, no poll!
Saw the new Criterion issue of Night and the City last night, which
kp3000 hipped me to ages ago but I've only now been able to get from Facets. It's really excellent, and highly recommended. Noir fans will like it because of the black-soaked, doomstruck tone; film geeks will dig on the excellent inky camerawork and the terrific London location filming; people who like movies with a ton of emotional punch will love the relationships between the gangster boss and his father, the hero and his girlfriend, and the nightclub owner and his wife; and fans of good acting will enjoy some top-shelf performances by Richard Widmark and Herbert Lom. Also, for wrestling fans, or just people who like incredibly raw, visceral physical movement in film, there's a lengthy and painful wrestling match between Mike Mazurki, playing a drunken professional wrestler, and Stan Zybyszko (who was 71 years old when he did this, his first and only acting role, and who is really magnificent), playing an old-school Greco-Roman guy, that ranks as one of the best fight scenes I've ever seen.