Though familiar breakthrough films such as Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless [À bout de souffle] (1960), Alain Resnais' Hiroshima, Mon Amour (1960) and Francois Truffaut's Jules et Jim (1962) are thoughtfully covered, they are seen in light of the eruption of talent elsewhere. "The French Nouvelle Vague or 'New Wave,' " Cowie writes, "seized so much attention that it almost obscured the flowering of film in many other countries."

Cowie discusses the contributions of such directors as Poland's Krzysztof Zanussi, Jerzy Kawalerowicz and Roman Polanski; Italy's Francesco Rosi, Federico Fellini, Lucino Visconti, Micelangelo Antonioni and Bernardo Bertolucci; Spain's Carlos Saura and Juan-Antonio Bardem; Japan's Nagisa Oshima (Curiously, India's Satyajit Ray's films are not discussed); Czechoslovakia's Milos Forman; Sweden's Ingmar Berman and Vilgot Sjöman; Britain's Karel Reisz, Lindsay Anderson and Tony Richardson. Along with France's Agnès Varda, Louis Malle, Claude Chabrol — and, more famously, Godard, Renais and Truffaut — these were some of the directors who "unleashed a movement as revolutionary and enlightening as the Impressionist upheaval in the pictorial art of the 19th century."

Revolution! is as lively as its title, free of ham-handed analyses, academic jargon or smug theories — no small feat when examining movies of the world within the political, social and artistic context of the turbulent '60s. Fresh air circulates in the printouts of numerous interviews with filmmakers — mostly with directors (including Bertolucci, Forman, Reisz, Renais, Wajda, Varda and John Boorman) — but also with cinematographers and editors.

Revolution!'s decade is not that of the James Bond blockbusters or of big Hollywood studio productions. We're talking about risk-taking, experimenting filmmakers here and Cowie embraces such American directors as Shirley Clarke, John Cassavetes and John Frankenheimer. He credits Frankenheimer as responding "more eagerly ... to the opportunities offered by new equipment and faster film stock" than his contemporaries who had also emerged from live television. "His masterpiece, The Manchurian Candidate (1962), was made with the same freedom as a European director enjoyed in those years."

Perhaps Bertolucci best puts the period in a perspective which also fits Cowie's presentation of it: "You know, there were many mutations if you look back at cinema history: first it was silent, then it started to speak, then it started to think, in the '60s — about the nature of itself."

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And how many times have you tuned in on the middle of a TCM feature, become mesmerized, but wondered about the actors, director, DP, editor and the plot? The New York Times Guide can answer your questions and evaluate the movie far beyond the "3½ stars" type of film books.

Originally published in 1999, the revised and updated Guide has added two new Times' critics' reviews (from 2000 through 2002) and altered what fit as a "Best" picture to make room for the addition of new ones. Almost every cast box of leading players and production staffs has been expanded.

The new "Introduction" by A.O. Scott offers some clever opinions about changes in movie appreciation over seven decades. Reading long ago reviews of favorite films can be as entertaining — it's as though you're watching the pictures all over again — as it is edifying. Some 50-year-old reviews seem as through they were written yesterday; others remind you to keep them within the context of their times, which may be part of their charm. "While the Times critics only occasionally refer to events taking place off screen or in other sections of the paper," Scott writes, "you can frequently make out the shadowy newsreel images of the 20th century flickering between their lines."

The format is reader-friendly, listing movies alphabetically and also by genre, and foreign films by country of origin. The uncut reviews are extensive — Scott's take on Spike Jonze's Adaptation (2002), for example, runs four columns — and, for the most part, offer incisive observations on various directors' creativity.

It is sheer pleasure to read the bright words of such Grand Old Men of film criticism as Bosley Crowther, Vincent Canby and Frank S. Nugent (Nugent was also a successful screenwriter, most notably for John Ford). In addition to its practical reference value, the Guide provides a unique perspective on film history. As editor Peter M. Nichols suggests, "unedited reviews ... leave no way to wriggle out of judgments made on deadline years ago. Are these really the 1,000 best films? An impossible question, of course, but from the accumulated evidence, it's apparent that Times critics knew a great movie when they saw one."