Ascenseur pour l'échafaud

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Ascenseur pour l'échafaud
original movie poster
Directed by	Louis Malle
Produced by	Jean Thuillier
Written by	Noël Calef Louis Malle Roger Nimier
Starring	Jeanne Moreau Maurice Ronet Georges Poujouly Yori Bertin
Music by	Miles Davis
Cinematography	Henri Decaë
Distributed by	Rialto Pictures
Release date(s)	January 29, 1958 (French release) June 10, 1961 (U.S. release)
Running time	88 min.
Language	French
IMDb profile

Ascenseur pour l'échafaud (released in the U.S. as Elevator to the Gallows and in the UK as Lift to the Scaffold) is a 1958 film directed by Louis Malle.

A French classic often associated by critics with the film noir style, it stars Jeanne Moreau and Maurice Ronet. The score by Miles Davis (Ascenseur pour l'Échafaud} is central to the film's effect. Critic Phil Johnson has described its soundtrack as "the loneliest trumpet sound you will ever hear, and the model for sad-core music ever since. Hear it and weep."^[1]

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The central characters, a pair of lovers, plan the perfect crime - the murder of the woman's husband. The murderer abseils up the office block to kill the husband in his office without being seen, but on going to his car, realises that he has left the rope dangling outside the building. Leaving his expensive car unlocked, he returns to remove the evidence, but after doing so becomes trapped in the lift as the building closes down for the weekend. In the meantime, the car is stolen by a young couple.

Much of the suspense comes from the man's attempt to escape from the lift. Although he succeeds, the murder plot is eventually discovered through photographs taken by the young couple with the camera they find in his car.