Sunset Boulevard
Academy Award × 3·AFI #16·BFI #82·National Film Registry
Rent/Purchase
A hack screenwriter writes a screenplay for a former silent film star who has faded into Hollywood obscurity.
What critics thought
Sunset Boulevard is among the most unanimously celebrated films ever made about Hollywood — a pitch-black blend of noir, horror, and savage comedy that critics at release and in retrospect have treated as essentially flawless. The lone fault lines concern Norma Desmond's gravitational pull versus Joe Gillis's narrative function, and whether the film's relentless cleverness tips occasionally into coldness.
“it is one of those rare movies which are so full of exactness, cleverness, mastery, pleasure, and arguable and unarguable choice and judgment, that they can be talked about...for hours on end”
James Agee·Sight and Sound
“a pretentious slice of Roquefort”
The New Yorker
Genres
Drama, Film-Noir
Cast & Crew
DirectorBilly Wilder
StarringWilliam Holden, Gloria Swanson, Erich von Stroheim, Nancy Olson, Fred Clark
ComposerFranz Waxman
Sunset Boulevard
Academy Award × 3·AFI #16·BFI #82·National Film Registry
A hack screenwriter writes a screenplay for a former silent film star who has faded into Hollywood obscurity.
What critics thought
Sunset Boulevard is among the most unanimously celebrated films ever made about Hollywood — a pitch-black blend of noir, horror, and savage comedy that critics at release and in retrospect have treated as essentially flawless. The lone fault lines concern Norma Desmond's gravitational pull versus Joe Gillis's narrative function, and whether the film's relentless cleverness tips occasionally into coldness.
“it is one of those rare movies which are so full of exactness, cleverness, mastery, pleasure, and arguable and unarguable choice and judgment, that they can be talked about...for hours on end”
James Agee·Sight and Sound
“a pretentious slice of Roquefort”
The New Yorker
Genres
Drama, Film-Noir
Cast & Crew
DirectorBilly Wilder
StarringWilliam Holden, Gloria Swanson, Erich von Stroheim, Nancy Olson, Fred Clark
ComposerFranz Waxman
Rent/Purchase