Moira Walsh
Tomatometer-approved critic
The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)
93%
EDIT
“Unfortunately this laudable but cinematically static purpose rules out both the fact action and the light touch without which science fiction is a bore.” –
America Magazine
Jan 15, 2026
Full Review
Born Yesterday (1950)
95%
EDIT
“There is plenty of latitude for quarreling with the film's undue emphasis on its heroine's moral lapses. ” –
America Magazine
Oct 13, 2025
Full Review
White Heat (1949)
94%
EDIT
“Though undeniably exciting, the net result is pretty pointless and very brutal.” –
America Magazine
Apr 22, 2024
Full Review
The Caine Mutiny (1954)
95%
EDIT
“The film is a creditable adaptation of a stirring tale. The necessary pruning has been so done that the novel’s clash of events and characters retains its original balance.” –
America Magazine
Apr 19, 2024
Full Review
The Lavender Hill Mob (1951)
100%
EDIT
“T.E.B. Clarke's script is a tongue in cheek masterpiece of ingenious improbability. ” –
America Magazine
Apr 18, 2024
Full Review
Sabrina (1954)
89%
EDIT
“The leading players are professionally competent as usual but seem miscast, with the exception of Miss Hepburn, whose role has been tailored to exploit her elfin charms and who succeeds in being a little too elfin to be quite bearable.” –
America Magazine
Mar 28, 2024
Full Review
The Big Heat (1953)
95%
EDIT
“This aggregation of horrors succeeds in being so repellent, and also so unreal and ultimately ludicrous, that I would not have mentioned the picture except that, strange to say, it has been given quite favorable mention in other quarters.” –
America Magazine
Mar 27, 2024
Full Review
The Searchers (1956)
87%
EDIT
“The film has a seemingly authentic feeling for the harshness and crudity of frontier life... and any number of striking photographic effects. It is curiously deficient however in the unity and cumulative power implicit in the material.” –
America Magazine
Mar 25, 2024
Full Review
Westward the Women (1951)
69%
EDIT
“It seldom gets out of the standard, adult horse-opera class. ” –
America Magazine
Feb 23, 2024
Full Review
The Left Handed Gun (1958)
83%
EDIT
“It is as fundamentally unsatisfactory a film as was ever made by people with talent and serious intent.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 29, 2023
Full Review
Too Much, Too Soon (1958)
EDIT
“The film does not unduly sensationalize the material and it is neither uninteresting nor unconvincing. It is however almost unrelievedly downbeat.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 29, 2023
Full Review
South Pacific (1958)
75%
EDIT
“South Pacific is too sophisticated to have the broad general suitability of The King and I. For its more limited audience, however, it is a practically perfect screen version of a contemporary musical comedy classic.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
The Sound and the Fury (1959)
60%
EDIT
“The Sound and the Fury is another depressing but generally tasteful and responsible examination of the seamier side of life.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
Imitation of Life (1959)
82%
EDIT
“It is an inadvertently compromising title to put on a film that actually is nothing but an imitation of life and a bad one at that.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
Some Like It Hot (1959)
95%
EDIT
“Some Like It Hot is the wildest and wooliest comedy since Preston Sturges left Hollywood and the Marx Brothers disbanded as a team... Director (and co-author) Billy Wilder is one of the best in the business and knew exactly what he was doing.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
The Shaggy Dog (1959)
68%
EDIT
“It is a real shaggy dog story in the sense of having neither explanation nor point. It is intelligently made however and surprisingly likeable especially for youngsters. Also its lunatic premise gives rise to some pricelessly funny bits.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
The Diary of Anne Frank (1959)
81%
EDIT
“The movie is done with taste and skill and no little cinematic distinction.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
I Want to Live! (1958)
94%
EDIT
“Most of the picture’s impact, however, is the contribution of Susan Hayward, giving the performance of her career as the doomed but indomitable Barbara.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
The Horse's Mouth (1958)
89%
EDIT
“In the first place the hero’s adventures have an inspired slapstick quality such as screen comedy seldom achieves nowadays. Secondly... on occasion, [it is] quite moving as a study of the temperament of the artistic genius.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
King Creole (1958)
96%
EDIT
“Presley shows signs that he is getting the hang of acting. The picture itself, however, after a promising enough beginning turns into a lurid melodramatic hash.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
Rio Bravo (1959)
96%
EDIT
“In addition to its excessive length and consequent slow pace the film has other liabilities... Nevertheless the characterizations are unusually solid and get more interesting as they go along.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
Aparajito (1956)
96%
EDIT
“[The sequel to Pather Panchali] is movingly and beautifully done on its own terms and establishes that its author-director, Satyajit Ray, is not a one-picture man but the possessor of an authentic movie-making talent.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
Darby O'Gill and the Little People (1959)
100%
EDIT
“The picture takes an inordinate amount of time getting started but once underway it displays a flair for the unexpected, the imaginative and the madly logical that all good fairy stories should have.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
The Nun's Story (1959)
85%
EDIT
“[Conveys] a profound and moving insight into the total self-sacrifice and tough-fibred holiness of convent life. Moreover it clothes these insights in striking dramatic terms which can hardly fail to absorb and edify the believer and the unbeliever alike.” –
The Catholic World
Nov 28, 2023
Full Review
The Lone Ranger (1956)
90%
EDIT
“The picture proceeds exactly according to formula. It has enough elementary action to have provided a bonanza for stunt men but its appeal would appear to be limited strictly to small boys of all ages.” –
America Magazine
Nov 9, 2023
Full Review
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