C.C. Baxter (Jack Lemmon) fights to get even a single decent night’s sleep in his own apartment. His problem: he’s got a great apartment in New York City and all the top executives at his workplace want to use it to conduct their extramarital affairs. Winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1960, The Apartment has stood time’s test, and is universally acclaimed. The film will play at the Museum of the Moving Image on March 20^th as part of their series Required Viewing: Mad Men's Movie Influences and here are five reasons why you simply can not miss it:

Outstanding cinematography
The film is full of artfully composed shots that convey the drudgery of office life. Desk after desk of drones pounding about on typewriters breaks away to wistful shots of Ms. Kubelik’s (Shirley MacLaine) pretty face, or close-ups of Baxter and Kublik together. Frames which make their hum drum lives look majestic on the big screen.

It’s not what you know, but who
As horrible boss Mr. Sheldrake (Fred McMurray) says, “Normally it takes years to work your way up the 27^th floor, but only 30 seconds to be out on the street again.” C.C Baxter finally makes it to the top, but it only takes a moment to remind him how he got there. Not because of his competency but because of his participation in backdoor negotiations. In this ultra-competitive city, there’s nothing more frustrating than knowing that you’re perfect for the job, but you’re still not going to get it.

It’s a great apartment, so there must be a catch
Finding a great apartment in New York is like winning the lottery, so although Baxter seems to have a great apartment in upper Manhattan, we soon see his great find becomes more trouble then it’s worth. New Yorkers will sympathize with Baxter as we all know that when it comes to apartments, if it seems “to good to be true,” in New York, it always is!

An all-around hit
While the film parades as comedy, its scathing underlying criticisms are hardly veiled. As straight-up tough talking on issues can be boring, director Billy Wilder bundles them up— corporate bureaucracy and the abuse of power, the subjugation of women, the turning of the proletariat into automatons—into a comic, lighthearted package. Jack Lemmon’s portrays Baxter in such a way that we can’t help but cheer for him, and since this is after all entertainment, everything comes together nicely in the end.

A visit from Mad Men’s Matthew Weiner
As part of the Man Men exhibition at the Museum of the Moving Image, Mr. Weiner has chosen a selection of films that have been influential to the AMC series Man Men. For this screening of The Apartment Mr. Weiner will appear in person to discuss why he made his cast and crew watch this and 9 other films in order for them to get in the spirit of the show.

Matthew Weiner's Mad Men will run at the Museum of the Moving Image from March 14 - June 14. For tickets and more information click here.