Cinema: BEST PICTURES OF 1959

AMERICAN Some Like It Hot. Director Billy Wilder's splendid parody of a Mack Sennett comedy, sustained without letup or letdown for two hours (TIME, March 23).

The Diary of Anne Frank. A strongly affecting attempt by Director George Stevens to make film sense of the heartbreaking diaries of the young martyr of Amsterdam (TIME, March 30).

Pork Chop Hill. The only good war picture released in 1959 (TIME, June 8).

Middle of the Night. A wise, touching description of a love affair between a middle-aged man (Fredric March) and a girl in her 20s (Kim Novak). Actor March is superb, and the script is probably the best thing Playwright Paddy (Marty) Chayefsky has ever done (TIME, June 29).

Ben-Hur. Director William Wyler's $15 million superspectacle is certainly the biggest and probably the best of all the big ones (TIME, Nov. 30).

FOREIGN

The Mistress. A fine Japanese film, made in 1953 by Director Shiro Toyoda, that seems almost an Oriental version of A Doll's House (TIME, Feb. 9).

Aparajito. Made in India by Director Satyajit Ray, this picture is a sequel to Father Panchali, and the second section of a trilogy that promises to be one of the cinema's masterworks (TIME, Feb. 16).

Room at. the Top. A fine piece of social realism, translated by Director John Clayton from John Braine's novel about the ne'er-do-welfare state of Britain's Angry Young Men (TIME, April 20).

The Roof. Director Vittorio (The Bicycle Thief) De Sica finds a subtler way of saying that the sun in sunny Italy shines only on the rich (TIME, May 18).

Wild Strawberries. Obscure, pedantic, logy with undigested symbols, this is nevertheless a weirdly beautiful film, made by Sweden's Director Ingmar (The Seventh Seal) Bergman (TIME, July 13).

Black Orpheus. The Greek legend, reset by Marcel Camus, a French director of The New Wave, comes to new life in the whirling bodies and pounding drums of Brazilian Negroes (TIME, Nov. 16).

The 400 Blows. Director Francois Truffaut, another big fish in The New Wave, tells the terrifying tale of a small boy nailed to a cross his parents are too weak to carry (TIME, Dec. 14).

Ivan the Terrible: Part 2—The Revolt of the Boyars. The late Sergei Eisenstein's strange, sinister, grand-operatic allegory of the Stalin era (see below).