Such gritty material is infused with Wilder’s compassion and defined by two towering central performances.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Feb 5, 2025

Though lighter than Arrows 2018 release on the extras front, Kinos 4K of The Apartment provides the definitive home-video presentation of one of Billy Wilders greatest films.

| Apr 18, 2022

This is a polished production, naughty, ironic, occasionally poignantly sad, and as sparkling as a Fourth of July fireworks display.

| Mar 16, 2022

[Jack Lemmon] is a genuine actor, not in the same universe with most of his film contemporaries, who are mere behavers. This picture is not good enough for him. Still, his performance makes it worth a visit.

| Mar 16, 2022

Director Wilder has come up with another real winner in The Apartment... It is a film with plenty of fun and one that promises hope in a society whose moral standards seems to be rapidly deteriorating

| Mar 16, 2022

Anybody complaining that modern Hollywood comedy doesn't have the old human touch, the heart once supplied by directors like Frank Capra and Gregory LaCava, ought to see this. It is one of the best films of the year.

| Mar 16, 2022

Billy Wilder, who gave us Some Like It Hot with Lemmon and quite a dash of wry humor, turns over his entire screenplay to master wit Lemmon in this latest one.

| Mar 16, 2022

It doesn't fit easily into any simple classification. For the script Wilder wrote in collaboration with I. A. L. Diamond -- and with Lemmon's talent in mind -- is an expert, winning blend of comedy and pathos.

| Mar 16, 2022

Lemmon's comic versatility is well exercised before the plot takes a sudden serious turn. The transition is a little startling, until Lemmon and MacLaine warm up to the switch and produce a human, believable, and some-what message-loaded finish.

| Mar 10, 2022

You can take your choice of adjectives to describe The Apartment.. Here is a partial list: Ironic, satirical, funny, sentimental, bitter and sad.

| Mar 9, 2022

Disguised as a comedy [and frequently very funny] this film struck me as a biting, skillful satire and a ribald portrait of some organization men.

| Mar 9, 2022

The dialogue of Wilder an d I. A. L. Diamond is sharp and witty, and the characterisation amusing down to the smallest role, thanks to disciplined direction of players who are all professional to their fingertips.

| Mar 9, 2022

It is a masterpiece of fun and irony about the small men who make up American big business.

| Mar 8, 2022

However funny Mr Lemmon may be this really is not a funny situation.

| Mar 8, 2022

Miss MacLaine, who has a metaphorical tightrope to walk, shows throughout that she is in no need of a safety net. Here again emotion finds itself expressed through comedy.

| Mar 8, 2022

"Some people take, and some people get took," Bud says, and The Apartment never wavers in condemning the former and aligning itself with the latter.

| Jul 1, 2020

While the mordant ruthlessness of the asides at the expense of big business intrigues, indiscretions and Christmas parties is compromised by a final sequence of quite awful sentimentality.

| Feb 5, 2020

All this is quite a load for a comedy, but where else has social comment ever been so effective? Wilder hones his points to a piercing edge...

| Jun 19, 2018

Production and direction wise, Wilder sustains his usual excellence. But his story is controversial and I am not one of those who can quite see The Apartment as the great comedy-drama he evidently intended it to be.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Feb 23, 2015

...despite all its cynicism, The Apartment still ends on a hopeful note...

| Original Score: A | Aug 7, 2014