There's an outstanding shot in Jean-Luc Godard's "Alphaville" (1965) where the stationary camera is placed at the back of an elevator looking toward the door. The elevator door opens, the character gets into the elevator and it closes with people chasing him. The elevator goes up several flights and it opens to reveal the elevator across the lobby opening up with the bad guys. They grab the protagonist, throw him back into the first elevator, and as the elevator goes down they beat him up/throw him around the elevator (in front of the camera so that he bounces out-of-view to the left, to the right, etc.)
Then when the elevator gets back to the first floor he spills onto the ground and they arrest him.

Also, it just came to mind, there's a crucial elevator scene in Billy Wilder's The Apartment (
http://us.imdb.com/board/10053604/
), when Bud (Jack Lemmon) discovers the cracked handmirror used by Fran (Shirley MacLaine) and thereby discovers she has a fling with his boss, to whom he sublets his apartment.

There's a Dutch film, a horror movie, called De Lift (The Elevator -
http://us.imdb.com/board/10087622/
)about an elevator going beserk and killing people. It was released in 1983, and actually it was quite a big hit, not only in Holland, if memory serves me well. You should use this for your piece on Elevators.
Also, may I remind you of a famous elevator scene in Charade (
http://us.imdb.com/board/10056923/
) in which actor Ned Glass meets his death classic!

Awesome, thanks you guys I will be getting onto it. Thanks for the suggestions too leforcat, between Speed and Die Hard I was getting a little panicky that my essay would end up being all about men with buzzcuts and terrorists. Hopefully this will give me something to quot ethat isn't Keanue Reeves going "wooahhh".
Thanks again!

As JackBlack has said, of course, an elevator is in the film and it plays a vital role in the plot as well - I forgot to mention it.
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Yeah, the lead character spends most of the movie trapped in an elevator.

There are elevators in Antonioni's "La Notte" and in "Beyond the Clouds", you can always start with that!
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