Directed by Elaine May • 1971 • United States
Starring Walter Matthau, Elaine May, Jack Weston

The brilliance of Elaine May is on full display in her directorial debut, a deliciously deadpan black-comic jewel that stands as one of the finest and funniest films of the 1970s. She stars as the endearingly awkward, plant-obsessed heiress Henrietta Lowell, whose fortune becomes the target of trust-fund-depleted patrician wastrel Henry Graham (Walter Matthau), who’s willing to go as far as marriage and murder to get his hands on it. May famously clashed with studio executives in order to protect her vision, and the resulting film, though ultimately recut against her wishes, is a testament to her singular comic genius.