This is the third of a weekly column of random things I love from movies I’ve seen over the years. And tell me in the comments something you’ve never forgotten from a movie.

I LOVE Christina Ricci as Wednesday Addams in the 1991 and 1993 feature film versions of the Charles Addams New Yorker comics and the mid-1960s television sitcom. Ricci is so perfectly cast, so marvellously deadpan, as the darkly serious daughter in a family full of eccentric misfits, it’s really no wonder Hollywood has had no idea how to cast her in films since — to many, she’ll ALWAYS be Wednesday Addams (it’s the Anthony Perkins/Norman Bates Syndrome). The actress was only 11 when she first portrayed Wednesday, but she demonstrated natural talent and the camera loves her dinstinct feature … I truly hope she has a future in the movies.

 
 
I LOVE the stunning cinematography of the 1955 movie THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER. That this incredible film was the only one ever directed by English actor Charles Laughton is a mystery … the director’s vision is inspired and wholely unique, and he is supported by a literate script, superb actors and, most critically, gorgeous photography by camera master Stanley Cortez. Laughton and Cortez looked back to the German expressionism of the 1920s and ’30s to tell this dark fairy tale, using the same shadows, nightmarish sets and distorted arrangements that were popular in horror and noir. This is such a great movie that almost any facet of it — Robert Mitchum’s evil preacher, Shelley Winters’ widowed mother, Lillian Gish’s take-no-guff redneck, the love-hate knuckle tattoos, the menacing hymn “Leaning on the Everlasting Arms” — could make my 10 Things I Love list. But the cinematography, that is what has haunted and affected me for decades.

 
 
I LOVE Sting’s fabulously tricked-out Vespa in the 1979 feature film adaptation of The Who’s rock opera QUADROPHENIA. The film producers wanted Sting’s character, Ace Face, the “ultimate Mod”, to ride a vintage Vespa 160, but the model had been discounted years earlier and the scooter company couldn’t find enough identical bikes to satisfy the filmmakers’ continuity needs. More modern scooters were rebuilt to replicate the rare GS, which makes the tragic end of Sting’s beautiful set of wheels much more easy to bear.

 
 
I LOVE the twisted relationship in THE GRIFTERS between Lilly, Roy and Myra, a trio of con artists who scam, cheat and deceive their way into the mother of all Greek tragedies. Anjelica Huston, John Cusack and Annette Bening are aces in this 1990 crime drama. It breaks my heart that this movie is all but forgotten today; it’s ripe for rediscovery … and just try to predict the outcome of this con game, based on a hard-boiled novel by tough guy Jim Thompson.

 
 
I LOVE that California new wave/ska/rock band Oingo Boingo starred in the movie FORBIDDEN ZONE one year before the release of their first album, ONLY A LAD. And if you’re familiar with Oingo Boingo, you’ll guess that this is one crazy frigging movie. What do you expect? — Hervé Villechaize, Tattoo from FANTASY ISLAND, is also in it, as is Susan Tyrell, the oddball actress from Andy Warhol’s circle. Boingo’s lead singer, Danny Elfman, is now one of the most sought-after film composers in Hollywood. This is his first score. Of course, mainstream audiences found the movie offensive, but it has since become a midnight cult favorite.

 
 
I LOVE the fantastic opening scene of Orson Welles’ TOUCH OF EVIL. For three-and-a-half minutes the camera tracks both a car with a ticking bomb and a couple walking through the streets of Tijuana. There is no trickery and no film edits. The camera glides over rooftops, around corners, alongside moving cars and pedestrians, all while staying in perfect step with Henry Mancini’s hip jazzy score. This is the kind of filmmaking that invigorates my love affair with the silver screen.

 
 
I LOVE that the best thing about JAWS 2 is a 13-word tagline … one still used by people who weren’t even born yet in 1978.

 
 
I LOVE Bernard Herrmann’s woozy score for Hitchcock’s VERTIGO.

 
 
I LOVE Edward Norton’s incredible film debut in the 1996 courtroom drama PRIMAL FEAR. Norton introduces himself with a powerful performance that will leave you guessing until the end, and he has certainly made good on this calling card. The last two movies I’ve seen him in have both been directed by Wes Anderson — MOONRISE KINGDOM and THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL — and Norton has thrived in that director’s rarefied world. In this PRIMAL FEAR clip, Norton manages to hold attention in the company of some terrific co-stars, including my favorite, Laura Linney, and Frances McDormand, Alfre Woodard and Richard Gere.

 
 
I LOVE BEAUTY AND THE BEAST. Not the Disney animated musical. I’ve never seen that version. I’m talking about the breathtaking 1946 French version, LA BELLE ET LA BÊTE. This was directed by Jean Cocteau, a hypnotic, romantic, visually enchanting masterpiece — yes, I’ll say it: One of the greatest motion pictures ever made. It’s one of the few I watch annually, a movie that always delights, always entertains, always restores a bit of childlike wonder.