CURRENT & CHOICE

The African Queen. A prissy old maid (Katharine Hepburn) and a gin-swilling skipper (Humphrey Bogart) triumph over jungle heat, hardship and the hangman's noose in John Huston's Technicolored version of C. S. Forester's adventure yarn (TIME, Feb. 25).

Rashomon. A powerful Japanese film about an ancient crime of passion, told with barbaric force (TIME, Jan. 7).

Decision Before Dawn. A spy drama, semi-documentary in flavor, set against the spiritual and physical chaos of Germany on the eve of defeat in World War II (TIME, Dec. 24).

Miracle in Milan. A warmhearted fantasy about the brotherhood of man, inventively directed by Italy's Vittorio (The Bicycle Thief) De Sica (TIME, Dec. 17).

Quo Vadis. Christianity v. paganism in Nero's Rome in the costliest ($6,500,000) movie ever made; with 30,000 extras, 63 lions, Robert Taylor and Deborah Kerr (TIME, Nov. 19).

Detective Story. Playwright Sidney Kingsley's account of a day in a Manhattan detective squad room still swirls with melodrama under William Wyler's direction (TIME, Oct. 29).

The Lavender Hill Mob. A sprightly British spoof with Alec Guinness stealing the show as a prim bank employee who absconds with $1,000,000 (TIME, Oct. 15).

An American in Paris. Imaginative musical in Technicolor, with songs by George Gershwin, dances by Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron (TIME, Oct. 8).