Jankp's 10 Favorite, Less Popular Film Noir Flicks
Jul 14 '03 (Updated Jul 16 '03)
The Bottom Line Watch for my coming list of thrillers!
At first I was just going to compile my favorite thrillers, but then I realized that half of them belonged to the Film Noir category, that being classic movies mostly from the 40s and 50s with a fatalistic, shadowy quality about them. So it might be more helpful to separate them, for some people won't be in the mood for both doomed love and happy ending thrillers. I deliberately left out the top-selling film noir movies and those most searched for online, which include: Sunset Blvd., Double Indemnity, The Third Man, Touch Of Evil, Strangers On A Train, Big Sleep, White Heat, Night of the Hunter, Key Largo, The Maltese Falcon, Shadow of a Doubt, Spellbound, Laura and Gilda. I've greatly enjoyed many of those, but they're not necessarily my favorites and I do think you may find new discoveries even more enjoyable.
Listed in order of the year they came out:
The Lady Vanishes (1938): Alfred Hitchcock, director. Ethel Lina White, novel, and Sidney Gilliat, screenplay. Margaret Lockwood, Michael Redgrave and Dame May Whitty head a rascally bunch of characters in a tantalizing mystery thriller that starts out bizarrely light-hearted, then delves into sinister underpinnings on a train. Silly British humor, charming characters to fall in love with and a well-executed, noirish thriller.
Rebecca (1940): Alfred Hitchcock, director. Daphne du Maurier, novel, and Philip MacDonald, adaptation. Laurence Olivier's elusive character marries Joan Fontaine's shy character without coming clean about his first wife Rebecca and soon the new wife feels the ominous presence of Rebecca trying to destroy her. Dame Judith Anderson plays evil personified and George Sanders keeps everyone on their toes.
Suspicion (1941): Alfred Hitchcock, director. Anthony Berkeley, novel,and Samson Raphaelson, screenplay. Cary Grant plays a dashingly handsome bum living off friends, who marries Joan Fontaine's innocent character. Suspicious things start happening to cause her to think he's trying to murder her. Cedric Hardwicke and Nigel Bruce add to the deliciously off-kilter tone of the movie.
Detour (1945): Edgar G. Ulmer, director. Martin Goldsmith, novel and screenplay. Tom Neal narrates and stars in a classic Film Noir as a drifter who gets into trouble when he hitches a ride with a guy who dies unexpectedly. Ann Savage sinks her teeth into her role of a steely-eyed b!tch. "Fate, or some mysterious force, can put its finger on you for no good reason at all" is one of numerous quotes to relish.
Mildred Pierce (1945): Michael Curtiz, director. James M. Cain, novel, and Ranald MacDougal, screenplay. Joan Crawford in an Oscar-winning role of a strong, protective mother used to getting her way with men, but she discovers that not all is right with her world. Jack Carson and Ann Blyth among others contribute to her dangerous awakening.
The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946): Tay Garnett, director. James M. Cain, novel, and Harry Ruskin, screenplay. Lana Turner's seductive character implores her lover, a love-frenzied John Garfield, to knock off her husband, but it doesn't end their problems as hoped. It's steamy, terrifying and gorgeous to take in!
Dark Passage (1947): Delmer Daves, director and screenwriter. David Goodis, novel. This isn't Casablanca, but still Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall in their first appearance together certainly sizzle. Bogie plays the classic Film Noir character who is wrongly accused of murdering his wife and after breaking out of jail, he undergoes plastic surgery for a disguise. Bacall is the unlucky nurse who falls for him. It frustrated me not to see his face before surgery, then not 'til his bandages were off, but that gave it a greater noir mood.
Sudden Fear (1952): David Miller, director. Lenore J. Coffee and Edna Sherry, novel, and Robert Smith, screenplay. Joan Crawford plays a strong-minded, rich playwright who rejects Jack Palance's character for romantic leading man in her new play, but is bewitched by him on the train so they marry. Gloria Grahame adds to the intrigue as his needy girlfriend and together they plot against his wife. They thought it would be easy!
The Big Heat (1953): Fritz Lang, director. William P. McGivern, serial, Sydney Boehm, screenplay. Glenn Ford, Gloria Grahame, Lee Marvin and Jeanette Nolan are major players in a mobster flick where good guys may be bad and bad guys turn out good. Tension rises when Ford's no-nonsense, grieving character seeks revenge on the baddies.
After Dark My Sweet (1990): James Foley, director. Jim Thompson, novel, and Robert Redlin, screenplay. Even though the blazing sun leads our drifter/ex-mental patient/hero to a sultry widow's house for help, this is a dark, foreboding picture with Jason Patric, Rachel Ward and a slimy Bruce Dern. Our hero is lured into intrigue that only becomes more harrowing and doomed "love" that threatens his sanity.
Read my full review of this at:
http://www.epinions.com/content_72857194116
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
jankp
|
 in Movies, Books |
 - Top 100 |
|
Member: Jan Peregrine
Location: Lincoln, NE
Reviews written: 1567
Trusted by: 500 members
About Me:
Peregrine 10 write-off in progress: http://www.epinions.com/content_5367242884
|
|
|
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.