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The Killing

1956

Stanley Kubrick

Sterling Hayden, Coleen Gray, Vince Edwards, Jay C. Flippen ...

7.9

26,924

Film noir. Mystery. Thriller Based on Lionel White's crime novel 'Clean Break'. Johnny Clay (Sterling Hayden) is an ex-con with a plan to steal $2 million from a San Francisco racetrack. He assembles an odd collection of tough guys and moles to participate in the heist. But just as there is no such thing as the perfect murder, there is no such thing as the perfect crime.

	Author	Review
United States	Roger Ebert rogerebert.com	"We feel in safe hands (...) The writing and editing are the keys to how this film never seems to be the deceptive assembly that it is (…) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 4)"	POS
United Kingdom	Philip French The Guardian	"Cut to the bone, punctuated by fades-to-black, 'The Killing's detached semi-documentary voice-over constantly turns back at each move in the plot"	POS
United States	Glenn Heath Jr. Slant	"Kubrick withholds the expectation of capture, betrayal, or death until the last possible moment (...) It’s a nearly wordless and always gripping example of narrative misdirection (…) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 4)"	POS
United States	A.H. Weiler The New York Times	"It evolves as a fairly diverting melodrama (...) An engrossing little adventure"	POS
United Kingdom	Kim Newman Empire	"Even though he was just staring out, Kubrick instantly mastered the crime genre. A stunning film (…) Rating: ★★★★★ (out of 5)"	POS
United Kingdom	Geoff Andrew Time Out	"This noir-ish heist movie is nevertheless far more satisfying than most of his later work, due both to a lack of bombastic pretensions and to the style fitting the subject matter."	POS
United States	Noel Murray AV Club	"Kubrick was making movies that felt as free as what the Europeans were doing at the time (...) Treating each shot as a unique creative exercise"	POS
United States	Jonathan Rosenbaum Chicago Reader	"Arguably Stanley Kubrick's most perfectly conceived and executed film (...) Not to be missed"	POS
United Kingdom	Wendy Ide The Times	"It combines a clear-eyed, cool-headed approach with dialogue that crackles and a smart, non-linear structure (...) It’s also superbly shot in brooding black and white"	POS
United States	Time	"[It] announces the arrival of a new boy wonder in a business that soon separates the men from the boys"	POS

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