Eyes Without a Face

Georges Franju made it in France in 1960 and audiences fainted at Edinburgh. It was cut in several territories and dismissed in France as beneath him.

The operation sequence is the reason: a face is removed in one continuous, clinical, almost silent take, filmed as a medical procedure with no music and no cutting away. It is the direct ancestor of every surgical horror sequence since.

What makes it endure is Édith Scob as Christiane, who spends the film in a smooth white mask with holes for the eyes, acting entirely with her hands and her walk. The mask is one of the great designs in cinema.

Maurice Jarre's score is a fairground waltz, which is either a mistake or the best decision in the film depending on the viewer.

The final image, in a wood, with doves, is unlike any other ending in this category.