& The Film Noir Heritage
American Film Noir Titles:
British Film Noir
Neo-Noir and Noir-Inspired Films
TV Noir
Documentaries about Film Noir
- Web articles on Film Noir
Film genre page (via Tim Dirks' Greatest Films web site)
Information about specific noir works from the Internet Movie Database
Noir links (via Google)
- Abenteuer in Wien (Gefährliches Abenteuer) / Stolen Identity(Austria / USA, 1952)
- Director: Emil E. Reinert (Abenteur in Wien); Gunther von Fritsch (Stolen Identity. Abenteuer in Wien: Gustave Fröhlich, Cornell Borchers, Franz Lederer.; Stolen Identity: Donald Buka, Joan Camden, Francis Lederer. The films Abenteuer in Wien and Stolen identity, are two Austrian/US co-productions with the same story produced in the same year but with different leading actors and director. These noir-styled films concern a jealous concert pianist who murders his wife's lover and then frames an innocent taxi driver for the crime. Based on the book Ich war Jack Mortimer by Alexander Lernet-Holenia. 84 min; 86 min. DVD X778
Abenteuer in Wien - Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
Stolen Identity - Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Act of Violence(1948)
- Directed by Fred Zinnemann. Cast: Van Heflin, Robert Ryan, Janet Leigh, Mary Astor, Phyllis Thaxter.
Ex-World War II pilot Frank Enley is a respected contractor and family man. Then his troubled, gimp-legged bombardier shows up with a gun and a score to settle. Perhaps neither man is what he seems to be. Special features: Film historian commentaries by Dr. Drew Casper on 'Act of violence' and Alain Silver and Elizabeth Ward on 'Mystery street;' new featurettes "Act of violence: dealing with the devil" and "Mystery street: murder at Harvard;" theatrical trailers.
Issued with: Mystery street. 82 min. DVD 8416
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Dixon, Wheeler W. "Act of Violence (1949) and the Early Films of Fred Zinnemann." In: The films of Fred Zinnemann : critical perspectives / edited by Arthur Nolletti, Jr. Albany : State University of New York Press, c1999.
(Main Stack PN1998.3.Z56.F56 1999)
"Fred Zinnemann issue" [12 article special issue]. Film Criticism v. 18-19 (Spring/Fall 1994) p. 1-166
Arthur, Paul. "Noir Happens: Act of violence". Film Comment v. 35 no. 4 (July/August 1999) p. 56-8
UC users only
- Angel Face (1950)
- Directed by Otto Preminger. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Jean Simmons, Mona Freeman, Herbert Marshall, Leon Ames, Barbara O'Neil. When Mrs. Tremayne is mysteriously poisoned with gas, ambulance driver Frank Jessup meets her refined but sensuous stepdaughter Diane, who quickly pursues and infatuates him. Under Diane's seductive influence, Frank is soon the Tremayne chauffeur, but he begins to suspect danger under her surface sweetness. When he shows signs of pulling away, Diane schemes to get him in so deep he'll never get out. 92 min. DVD 6848
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Lippe, Richard. "At the margins of film noir : Preminger's Angel face." In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- Arson, Inc. (1949)
- Directed by William Berke. Cast: Robert Lowery, Anne Gwynne, Edward Brophy, Marcia Mae Jones, Douglas Fowley, Maude Eburne.
A Bureau of Fire Investigation agent goes under cover to confront a ruthless arson ring that has left a trail of bodies and burned out buildings with various and sundry carnage! 63 min. DVD 8238 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Asphalt Jungle (1950)
- Directed by John Huston. Cast: Sterling Hayden, Louis Calhern, Jean Hagen, James Whitmore, Sam Jaffe, John McIntire, Marc Lawrence, Barry Kelley, Anthony Caruso, Teresa Celli, Marilyn Monroe. When criminal mastermind Doc Riedenschneider is released from prison, he approaches lawyer Alonzo Emmerich with a plan for the biggest jewel heist in history. Doc carefully selects and rehearses his team, but Emmerich is planning to double-cross the thieves and flee the country with the loot. 112 min. DVD 2717; vhs 999:1236
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The asphalt jungle : a screenplay Carbondale : Southern Illinois University Press ; London : Feffer & Simons, c1980 (MAIN: PN1997 .A78 1980; MOFF: PN1997 .A78 1980)
- Behind Locked Doors (1948)
- Directed by Oscar Boetticher. Cast: Richard Carlson, Lucille Bremer, Dickie Moore, Thomas Browne Henry, Tor Johnson, Douglas Fowley.Private dectective Ross Stewart checks himself into a mental hospital in an attempt to locate a corrupt judge hiding from justice. But before Stewart can reveal the truth, his true identity is discovered. With the help of a deranged ex-prizefighter the doctors at the sanitarium concoct a plan to make Stewart a permanent resident and the only person who can rescue him is the scheming woman who sent him there. Based on the story by Malvin Wald. 62 min. DVD 3826; vhs 999:2696 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Beware My Lovely (1952)
- Directed by Harry Horner. Cast: Ida Lupino, Robert Ryan, Taylor Holmes, Barbara Whiting, James Williams, O.Z. Whitehead, Dee Pollack. A rambling mansion becomes the setting for blood-curdling terror in this 1950's thriller. Ida Lupino is a wealthy widow looking for a hired hand to help clean up her huge, badly neglected estate. But when she employes drifter Robert Ryan, he turns out to be dangerously insane, and she suddenly finds herself a hunted prisoner in her own home. 77 min. 999:3715 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Georgakas, Dan. "Ida Lupino: Doing It Her Way." Cineaste, vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 32-36, 2000
UC users only
- The Big Chase (1954)
- Directed by Arthur D. Hilton. Cast: Glenn Langan, Adele Jergens, Lon Chaney, Jim Davis, Douglas Kennedy. As his expectant wife enters the hospital in anticipation of the blessed event, cop Glenn Lanan is off to the races, trailing payroll robbers (including Jim Davis and Lon Changey, Jr.) on a mad chase that goes from cars to rowboat to motoroat to helicopter. The chase sequence, captured in all its bullet-to-bullet glory, comprises a third of the film. 88 min. DVD X906
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Big Clock (1948)
- Directed by John Farrow. Cast: Ray Milland, Charles Laughton, Maureen O'Sullivan, George Macready, Rita Johnson, Elsa Lanchester, Harold Vermilyea. A hotshot crime magazine editor inadvertently becomes the subject of a murder investigation after spending an evening with his boss' mistress. She ends up dead and he is being framed by the actual killer. As his competent staff scurries for clues the description they uncover of the murderer matches himself! 95 min. DVD 2745; vhs 999:1879
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Big Combo (1955)
- Directed by Joseph Lewis. Cast: Cornel Wilde, Jean Wallace, Brian Donlevy, Richard Conte, Earl Holliman. Discouraged by his superior officers, but helped by a gangster's former girl friend, a dedicated detective lieutenant doggedly continues his investigation to obtain evidence that would convict the head gangster of a crime syndicate. 88 min. DVD 684; VHS 999:2502 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Capp, Rose. "First Is First and Second Is Nobody: Hoodlums and Heroines in Joseph H. Lewis' The Big Combo." Senses of Cinema, vol. 25, pp. (no pagination), Mar 2003
Thompson, Rick J. "Joseph H. Lewis." Senses of Cinema, Issue No. 10, Nov 2000
Routt, William D. "A Tribute to Joseph H. Lewis." Senses of Cinema, Issue No. 10, Nov 2000
- Big Heat (1953)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Glenn Ford, Gloria Grahame, Jocelyn Brando, Alexander Scourby, Lee Marvin. A crime melodrama about an honest police sergeant who risks his life and his job when his investigations lead to the exposure of the crime syndicate that controls the city administration. Based on the Saturday Evening Post serial by William P. McGivern. DVD 987; VHS 999:3
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Big Knife (1955)
- Directed by Robert Aldrich. Cast: Jack Palance, Ida Lupino, Wendell Corey, Jean Hagen, Rod Steiger, Ilka Chase, Everett Sloane, Shelley Winters. Charles Castle is a Hollywood actor whose career needs to rebound after several flops. When he sees his marriage and career crumbling before him, the last thing he needs is more headaches. And then along comes a blackmailer, who threatens to push Castle's sanity over the edge. 104 min. DVD 4938 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Aldrich, Robert. Robert Aldrich : interviews
Jackson : University Press of Mississippi, 2004. (GRDS: PN1998.3.A44 A5 2004)
Arnold, Edwin T. The films and career of Robert Aldrich Knoxville : University of Tennessee Press, c1986. (MAIN: PN1998.A3 A559271 1986; MOFF: PN1998.A3 A55927 1986)
Georgakas, Dan. "Ida Lupino: Doing It Her Way." Cineaste, vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 32-36, 2000
UC users only
Ross, T. J. "Ambiguity as Subversion in the Films of Robert Aldrich." In: Ambiguities in literature and film : selected papers from the Seventh Annual Florida State University Conference on Literature and Film / edited by Hans Braendlin. Gainesville, FL : University Presses of Florida ; Tallahassee : Florida State University Press, c1987. (Main Stack PN56.A55.F551 1987)
Silver, Alain. Robert Aldrich : a guide to references and resources Boston : G. K. Hall, c1979 (MAIN: PN1998.A3A12 .S56; Storage Info: B 3 569 820)
Williams, Tony. Body and soul : the cinematic vision of Robert Aldrich Lanham, Md. : Scarecrow Press, 2004. (MAIN: PN1998.3.A44 W55 2004)
- Big Sleep (1946)
- Directed by Howard Hawks. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Martha Vickers, Dorothy Malone, Regis Toomey. Detective Philip Marlowe is hired to find out who is blackmailing a wealthy young woman with pornographic pictures and becomes entangled with her sister. Based on the novel by Raymond Chandler. DVD 174 offers two versions: the familiar 1946 theatrical version (Side A) full of reshot scenes of incendiary Bogart/Bacall chemistry, and the less-familiar 1945 prerelease version (Side B), which recently resurfaced and whose plot and resolution are more linear in fashion.
Special features: Documentary "The Big Sleep comparisons 1945/1946," featuring Robert Gitt of UCLA analyzing scene differences between versions; interactive menus, production notes, theatrical trailer, scene access. 114 min. DVD 174; VHS 999:10
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Big Steal (1949)
- Directed by Don Siegel. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, William Bendix, Patric Knowles, Ramon Novarro, Don Alvarado, John Qualen.
Jane and Duke (alias Capt. Blake) accidently meet in Vera Cruz while chasing flim-flam man Fiske. Soon the local Inspector General (El Gato) is involved. Fiske races across Mexico, pursued by Jane and Duke, trailed by the real Capt. Blake. The crafty Inspector General is waiting for them in Tihuacan but they all give him the slip. Special features: Commentaries by Nina Foch and film historian Patricia King Hanson on 'Illegal' and film historian Richard B. Jewell on 'The big steal;' vintage "Behind the cameras" segment with Edward G. Robinson from the 'Warner Bros. presents' TV series; new featurettes: "Illegal: marked for life" and "The big steal: look behind you;" theatrical trailers. 72 min. DVD 8414 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Bogdanovich, Peter. "Don Siegel." In: Who the devil made it New York : Alfred A. Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 1997 (Main Stack PN1995.9.P7.B58 1997; Moffitt PN1995.9.P7.B58 1997)
Lovell, Alan. Don Siegel : American cinema
London : British Film Institute, 1975.
(MAIN: PN1998.A3 S542 1975; PFA : PN1998.3.S54 L69 1975)
Sarris, Andrew. "Don Siegel: The Pro." Film Comment. New York: Sep 1991. Vol. 27, Iss. 5; p. 34 (4 pages) UC users only
Sheehan, Henry. "Dark worlds." Sight & Sound; Jun91, Vol. 1 Issue 2, p28-30, 2p
- Black Angel (1946)
- Directed by Roy William Neill. Cast: Dan Duryea, June Vincent, Peter Lorre, Broderick Crawford, Constance Dowling, Wallace Ford. When a beautiful blackmailer is murdered, the wife of the accused murderer sets out to clear her husbnd's name in this film noir classic. Includes original theatrical trailer. Based on the novel by Cornell Woolrich. 81 min. DVD 2742; vhs 999:973 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Payne, Kenneth. "The Angel as Anti-Detective in Cornell Woolrich's The Black Angel."
Lamar Journal of the Humanities, vol. 25, no. 1, pp. 35-52, Spring 2000
Payne, Kenneth. "Ontological Disruptions in Cornell Woolrich's The Black Angel."
Notes on Contemporary Literature, vol. 27, no. 2, pp. 3-6, Mar 1997
Phelps, Donald. "Cinema Gris: Woolrich/Neill's Black Angel."
Film Comment, vol. 36, no. 1, pp. 64-69, January 2000UC users only
Renzi, Thomas C. Cornell Woolrich: from pulp noir to film noir Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland & Co., c2006. (MAIN: PS3515.O6455 Z85 2006)
- Blackboard Jungle (1955)
- Directed by Richard Brooks. Cast: Glenn Ford, Anne Francis, Louis Calhern, Margaret Hayes, Sidney Poitier, Vic Morrow. Film about life in an inner city high school in the 50's that was the first to utilize a rock 'n' roll soundtrack. A dedicated young teacher soon loses his idealism when he has to deal with the tensions that threaten to destroy his classroom. Based on a novel by Evan Hunter (MAIN: PS3558.Hu58 B5) DVD 3821; vhs 999:973 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Blue Dahlia (1946)
- Directed by George Marshall. Cast: Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, William Bendix, Howard Da Silva, Doris Dowling. Johnny, a returning Navy veteran, finds his wife cheating on him. When she is killed with his gun, he tries to find the real killer. In the meantime Johnny meets Joyce, a woman discontented with her husband but interested in Johnny. Joyce helps Johnny look for the killer and sticks around for romance. 100 min. 999:2207 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Chandler, Raymond. The blue dahlia : a screenplay Carbondale : Southern Illinois University Press, c1976 (MAIN: PN1997 .B6781; GRDS: XMAC.C456.B55 Modern Authors Collection)
- Brewer, Gay. "Raymond Chandler without his knight: contracting worlds in 'The Blue Dahlia' and 'Playback.'" Literature-Film Quarterly v23, n4 (Oct, 1995):273 (6 pages).UC users only
- The Blue Gardenia (1953)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Anne Baxter, Richard Conte, Ann Sothern, Raymond Burr, Jeff Donnell, Richard Erdman, George Reeves, Ruth Storey, Ray Walker, Nat 'King' Cole. Norah Larkin is a working girl who wakes up a murderess after passing out in the apartment of brutish playboy Harry Prebble. Branded "The Blue Gardenia" by a sensational columnist, Norah dodges dragnets,informants and the cruel hand of fate as she struggles to conceal her involvement with Prebble, and to remember the details of her ill-fated night. As her hopes for justice fade, she decides to gamble her future on the journalist who transformed her into such a notorious figure. 88 min. DVD 1433; vhs 999:3401
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Bob Le Flambeur (Bob the Gambler) (France, 1955)
- Directed by Jean-Pierre Melville. Bob the Gambler finds out that the Deauville Casino expects to pull in 800 million francs on a certain date. On the night of the heist, Bob plays at the casino tables where before dawn breaks some of the men and women will win, some will lose and some will die. 95 min. DVD 1264; also vhs 999:413Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Body and Soul (1947)
- Directed by Robert Rossen. Screenplay by Abraham Polonsky. Cast: John Garfield, Lilli Palmer, Hazel Brooks, Anne Revere, William Conrad, Joseph Pevney, Lloyd Goff, Canada Lee. Charley has become the middleweight champion of the world by winning a "fixed" fight. In his devious climb to the top, Charley has become hard and arrogant, and has estranged both his mother and the girl he loves. 104 min. DVD 164
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Casty, Alan. "The Films of Robert Rossen."
Film Quarterly Vol. 20, No. 2 (Winter, 1966), pp. 3-12UC users only
Casty, Alan. The films of Robert Rossen. New York, Museum of Modern Art; distributed by New York Graphic Society, Greenwich, Conn. [1969]
(MAIN: PN1998.A3 R673; Storage Info: B 3 569 727 )
Grindon, Leger. "Body and Soul: The Structure of Meaning in the Boxing Film Genre." Cinema Journal Vol. 35, No. 4 (Summer, 1996), pp. 54-69
UC users only
Neve, Brian. "The Hollywood Left: Robert Rossen and Postwar Hollywood." Film Studies Volume 7, Winter 2005, pp 54-65
Neve, Brian. "Red Hollywood in Transition: the Case of Robert Rossen." In: "Un-American" Hollywood : politics and film in the blacklist era / Edited by Frank Krutnik ... [et al.]. New Brunswick, N.J. : Rutgers University Press, c2007.
(MAIN: PN1995.9.P6 U5 2007; MOFF: PN1995.9.P6 U5 2007)
- Boomerang (1947)
- Directed by Elia Kazan. Cast: Dana Andrews, Jane Wyatt, Lee J. Cobb, Cara Williams, Arthur Kennedy.
Based on a true story this film noir tells of a prosecutor's fight to prove the innocence of a man accused of a notorious murder. 88 min. DVD X104
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Border Incident (1949)
- Directed by Anthony Mann. Cast: Ricardo Montalban, George Murphy, Howard Da Silva, James Mitchell, Arnold Moss, Alfonso Bedoya. The Mexico-California border is the power-keg setting for a tale of government agents versus greed and murder. 95 min. DVD 5848
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Auerbach, Jonathan. "Noir Citizenship: Anthony Mann's Border Incident." Cinema Journal. Summer 2008. Vol. 47, Iss. 4; p. 102 (19 pages) UC users only
Basinger, Jeanine. Anthony Mann Twayne Publishers, 1979 (MAIN: PN1998.A3 .M321143; MOFF: PN1998.A3 .M321143)
Smith, Robert E. "Mann in the dark : the films noir of Anthony Mann."
In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- Born to be Bad (1950)
- Directed by Nicholas Ray. Cast: Joan Fontaine, Robert Ryan, Zachary Scott, Joan Leslie, Mel Ferrer. Using her charm and beauty like a scalpel, Christabel Caine skillfully removes whatever she needs from each man she seduces. Her web of deceit threatens to shatter, however, when both men discover her plans. Based on the novel "All kneeling" by Anne Parrish. 90 min. 999:3576
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Born to Kill (1947)
- Directed by Robert Wise. Cast: Lawrence Tierney, Claire Trevor, Walter Slezak. A suspense thriller dealing with two ruthless people who both want to win. A cold-hearted divorcee wants her step-sister's husband for herself, until she finds out the truth about him. A brutal killer on the run marries one woman to get her money, and discovers another is as ruthless as he. 83 min. DVD 4114
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Brute Force (1947)
- Directed by Jules Dassin. Cast: Burt Lancaster, Hume Cronyn, Charles Bickford, Yvonne DeCarlo, Ann Blyth, Ella Raines, Anita Colby, Sam Levene, Howard Duff, Art Smith, Jeff Corey. Joe Collins of Cell R-17 in Westgate Penitentiary is planning a mass breakout. The warden, Capt. Munsey, gets wind of this plan and seeks to further his career by crushing it, meeting the break with machine guns as Collins and Munsey come face to face with each other. 102 min. DVD 404
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- McGilligan, Patrick.
"I'll always be an American: Jules Dassin interviewed." Film Comment. Nov/Dec 1996. Vol. 32, Iss. 6; p. 34 (15 pages)UC users only
- To the top
- Call Northside 777 (1948)
- Directed by Henry Hathaway. Cast: James Stewart, Richard Conte, Lee J. Cobb, Helen Walker. Acclaimed for its authenticity, realism and suspense, this documentary-style drama is the powerful true story of a newspaper reporter who corrects a miscarriage of justice. Assigned to investigate a murder case, he uncovers evidence indicating that the convicted man is innocent and then convinces the governor to hold a hearing. Based on articles by James P. McGuire. 111 min. DVD 7671; vhs 999:325
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Lipkin, S. N. "Real emotional logic: persuasive strategies in docudrama." Cinema Journal v. 38 no. 4 (Summer 1999) p. 68-85
Rosenberg, Norman
"Law Noir." In: Legal reelism: movies as legal texts Edited by John Denvir. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, c1996. (Main Stack PN1995.9.J8.L45 1996; Moffitt PN1995.9.J8.L45 1996)
- Cape Fear (1962)
- Directed by J. Lee Thompson. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Gregory Peck, Polly Bergen, Lori Martin, Martin Balsam, Telly Savalas, Barrie Chase. An ex-con is determined to wreak bloody revenge on the small-town lawyer who helped send him to jail. Based on a screenplay by James R. Webb and "The Executioners," a novel by John D. MacDonald (MAIN: PS3563.A28 E9 1958). 128 min. DVD 3820; vhs 999:2161
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Cape Fear (1962)
- Directed by Martin Scorsese. SEE Neo-Noir
- Cat People (1942)
- Directed by Jacques Tourneu; produced by Val Lewton. Cast: Simone Simon, Kent Smith, Tom Conway. The story of a tortured young woman whose lovers and rivals are stalked and done in by a leopard. DVD 4472; vhs 999:76
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Newman, Kim. Cat People London: British Film Institute, 1999. BFI film classics. (Main Stack PN1997.C365.N49 1999)
- Caught (1949)
- Directed by Max Ophuls. Cast: James Mason, Barbara Bel Geddes, Robert Ryan. Leonora Eames fulfills her life's dream when she marries a millionaire but she soon discovers that her husband is mentally unstable. She resents being used as his business hostess and leaves him. 999:120
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Champion(1949)
- Directed by Mark Robson. Cast: Kirk Douglas, Marilyn Maxwell, Arthur Kennedy. Midge Kelly is a fun-loving former navy man whose life is made complex by his sudden rise to fame in professional boxing. He becomes popular after months of training and a series of fixed fights. But the champion falls from the top when he beats the prize fighter, Johnny Dunne, when he has been instructed by the syndicate to lose the fight. 100 min. DVD 165
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- City for Conquest(1940)
- Directed by Anatole Litvak. Cast: James Cagney, Ann Sheridan, Frank Craven, Donald Crisp, Frank McHugh, Arthur Kennedy, George Tobias, Jerome Cowan, Elia Kazan, Anthony Quinn, Lee Patrick. Ex-golden gloves fighter Danny Kenny turns pro to bankroll his brother's dream of writing a symphonic paean to New York City. Life changes quickly when he's blinded during a brutal 15-round welterweight title bout. 104 min. DVD 5836
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- City That Never Sleeps (1953)
- Directed by John H. Auer. Cast: Gig Young, Mala Powers, Edward Arnold, William Talman. Chicago police officer Johnny Kelly falls for a dancer, leaves his wife, and begins a new life by making a deal with a corrupt criminal lawyer. 999:1234
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Clash by Night (1952)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Paul Douglas, Robert Ryan, Marilyn Monroe, J. Carroll Naish, Silvio Minciotti, Keith Andes. Bitter and lonely, big city girl Mae Doyle, returns home to the sleepy fishing village of her childhood where she meets and marries Jerry, a local fisherman. Mae attempts to settle into her marriage and motherhood, but old habits die hard. Soon boredom and frustration take over and Mae finds herself entangled in an affair with a man she knows is no good--her husband's best friend. Based on the play by Clifford Odets (MAIN: PS3529.D46 C5 1942; GRDS: XMAC.O23.C54 ) 105 min. DVD 4117; vhs 999:2351
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Conflict (1945)
- Directed by Curtis Bernhardt. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Alexis Smith, Sydney Greenstreet, Rose Hobart, Charles Drake, Grant Mitchell, Pat O'Moore, Ann Shoemaker. When a man murders his wife because his affections have turned to her younger sister, it appears he has executed the perfect crime until a minor slip-up arouses the suspicions of a family friend who is a psychiatrist. 86 min. 999:620
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Cornered (1945)
- Directed by Edward Dmytryk. Cast: Dick Powell, Walter Slezak, Morris Carnovsky, Edgar Barrier. A Canadian airman vows to track down the Nazis who killed his beautiful French wife. Relentless in his pursuit, the suspense never lets up as the trail leads from France to Switzerland and finally to a violent climax in Buenos Aires. 102 min. 999:3568
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Crack-Up (1946)
- Directed by Irving Reis. Cast: Pat O'Brien, Claire Trevor, Herbert Marshall. A respected art critic and historian believes that priceless works of art are being stolen, but everyone else thinks that he's insane. From beginning to end the suspense and action never let up in this fast-paced, thrilling mystery. 93 min. 999:3748
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Crime of Passion (1956)
- Directed by Gerk Oswald. Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Sterling Hayden, Raymond Burr, Fay Wray, Virginia Grey, Royal Dano. Kathy Ferguson is smart, witty, and an ace at her job as an advice columnist at a San Francisco newspaper with her name on billboards all over town. But Kathy makes a big mistake, she falls in love and marries Bill Doyle, a Los Angeles detective, and begins to realize that Bill wants nothing more than this domesticity for her, forever. Kathy's thwarted ambition turns ugly, and before long this capable career woman is capable of anything. 86 min. DVD 3484; VHS 999:2413
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Crime Wave (1954)
- Directed by André de Toth. Cast: Sterling Hayden, Gene Nelson, Phyllis Kirk.
Three San Quentin escapees kill a cop in a gas-station holdup. Wounded, one of the escapees flees through black-shadowed streets to the handiest refuge: with former cellmate Steve Lacey. Steve is paroled, with a new life and lovely wife, and can't afford to be caught associating with old cronies. But homicide detective Sims wants to use Steve to help him catch the other two escapees, who in turn extort his help in a bank job. Special features: Commentaries by James Ellroy and film historian Eddie Muller on 'Crime wave' and writer Stabley Rubin and film historian Glenn Erickson on 'Decoy;' new featurettes: "Crime wave: the city is dark" and "Decoy: a map to nowhere;" 'Crime wave' theatrical trailer. 74 min. DVD 8415 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Criss Cross (1948)
- Directed by Robert Siodmak. Cast: Burt Lancaster, Yvonne DeCarlo, Dan Duryea. An armored car driver secretly meets his ex-wife and then tries to convince her hoodlum husband that he met her only to get her husband's help in an upcoming robbery. DVD 2743; vhs 999:679
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Alpi, Deborah Lazaroff. Robert Siodmak : a biography, with critical analyses of his films noirs and a filmography of all his works Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland, c1998.
(MAIN: PN1998.3.S54 A46 1998)
Koepnick, Lutz. "Doubling the Double: Robert Siodmak in Hollywood." New German Critique: An Interdisciplinary Journal of German Studies, vol. 89, pp. 81-104, Spring 2003
UC users only
Koepnick, Lutz. "Berlin Noir: Robert Siodmak’s Hollywood." In: The dark mirror: German cinema between Hitler and Hollywood / Berkeley: University of California Press, c2002.
(MAIN: PN1993.5.G3 K645 2002; Moffitt PN1993.5.G3 K645 2002
; Full-text of this book available online via ebrary - UC Berkeley users only)
Walker, Michael. "Robert Siodmak." In: The Book of film noir / edited by Ian Cameron.
Place/Publisher New York : Continuum, c1993. (Moffitt PN1995.9.F54.B66 1993; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 M68 1992)
- The Crooked Way (1949)
- Directed by Robert Florey. Cast: John Payne, Sonny Tufts, Ellen Drew, Rhys Williams, Percy Helton. John Payne plays a wounded WWII veteran who has lost his memory. As he heads to Los Angeles to try and figure out his identity, two police detectives arrest him. When he is framed for a murder he must find the real killer and clear his name by navigating through the crooked underbelly of Los Angeles. 86 min. DVD 4961
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Crossfire (1947)
- Directed by Edward Dmytryk. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Robert Ryan, Robert Young, Gloria Grahame. A police captain methodically unravels the truth behind the brutal murder of an innocent Jewish man by a World War II soldier with a rabid hatred of Jews. DVD 4115; vhs 999:1027
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Cry Danger (1950)
- Directed by Robert Parrish. Cast: Dick Powell, Rhonda Fleming, William Conrad, Richard Erdman, Jean Porter. Rocky Mulloy, a bookie who was framed, tried and sent to jail for a holdup and murder he didn't commit is surprisingly released from prison with the help of a phony alibi. Now his eyes are focused on sweet revenge and the $100,000 stolen payroll stashed five years ago. 80 min. 999:2359
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- To the top
- The Damned Don't Cry (1950)
- Directed by Vincent Sherman. Cast: Joan Crawford, David Brian, Steve Cochran, Kent Smith, Selena Royle. Ethel Whitehead moves from the wrong side of the tracks to a mobster's mansion in high society one man at a time. Some of those men love her. Some use her. And one, a high-rolling racketeer, abuses her. When the racketeer murders his rival in Ethel's swanky living room, she flees a sure murder rap, right back to the poverty she thought she had escaped. And this time there may not be a man to pick up the pieces of her shattered life. 103 min. DVD 4048
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Dark Corner (1946)
- Directed by Henry Hathaway. Cast: Lucille Ball, Clifton Webb, William Bendix, Mark Stevens. Lucille Ball has a change of pace role in this sizzling film noir where she plays the secretary of a private eye who is framed for the murder of his ex-partner. Based on a story by Leo Rosten. Special DVD features: Commentary by film historians Alain Silver and James Ursini ; theatrical trailer. 99 min. DVD 7670; vhs 999:2362
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Dark Mirror (1946)
- Directed by Robert Siodmak. Cast: Olivia De Havilland, Lew Ayres, Thomas Mitchell. A prying neighbor, a jilted paramour and a seasoned detective all point to a woman as a killer until her twin sister disappears. 999:180
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Alpi, Deborah Lazaroff. Robert Siodmak : a biography, with critical analyses of his films noirs and a filmography of all his works Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland, c1998.
(MAIN: PN1998.3.S54 A46 1998)
Koepnick, Lutz. "Doubling the Double: Robert Siodmak in Hollywood." New German Critique: An Interdisciplinary Journal of German Studies, vol. 89, pp. 81-104, Spring 2003
UC users only
Koepnick, Lutz. "Berlin Noir: Robert Siodmak’s Hollywood." In: The dark mirror: German cinema between Hitler and Hollywood / Berkeley: University of California Press, c2002.
(MAIN: PN1993.5.G3 K645 2002; Moffitt PN1993.5.G3 K645 2002
; Full-text of this book available online via ebrary - UC Berkeley users only)
Walker, Michael. "Robert Siodmak." In: The Book of film noir / edited by Ian Cameron.
Place/Publisher New York : Continuum, c1993. (Moffitt PN1995.9.F54.B66 1993; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 M68 1992)
- Dark Passage (1947)
- Directed by Delmer Daves. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Bruce Bennett, Agnes Moorehead, Tom D'Andrea. After successful plastic surgery on his face, a man wrongly convicted of murder hides out in an apartment in San Francisco. Tension builds in this tale of a fugitive hiding from the law as he feverishly works to prove his innocence. DVD 3485; VHS 999:1229
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Dark Waters (1944)
- Directed by André de Toth. Cast: Merle Oberon, Franchot Tone, Thomas Mitchell, Fay Bainter. A psychological thriller about a nervous young heiress driven to attempt suicide by a fake aunt and uncle who want to collect her estate. Aided by the oppressive vegetation and stifling heat, the would-be killers methodically implement a series of terrifying ploys to suffocate the young girl in her own madness. 90 min. DVD 3796; vhs 999:3432
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Danks, Adrian. "Driftin': In Tribute to André de Toth."
Senses of Cinema vol. 25, pp. (no pagination), March 2003
Silver, Alain. "André de Toth (1913-2002): An Interview." Senses of Cinema vol. 25, pp. (no pagination), March 2003
UC users only
- Dead Reckoning (1946)
- Directed by John Cromwell. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Lizabeth Scott, Morris Carnovsky, Charles Kane, William Prince, Marvin Miller, Wallace Ford, James Bell. An ex-G.I. tries to find out who framed his pal for murder--and then rubbed him out! While tracking his war buddy's shadowy past, the G.I. becomes involved with the mysterious night club singer who had once been his pal's sweetheart. 105 min. DVD 3828; vhs 999:2275
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Decoy (1946)
- Directed by Jack Bernhard. Cast: Jean Gillie, Edward Norris, Robert Armstrong, Herbert Rudley, Sheldon Leonard, Marjorie Woodwarth.
Gangster Frank Olins is about to die in the gas chamber much to the dismay of his girlfriend Margot Shelby. Only Frank knows the location of $400,000. Margot seduces gangster Jim Vincent to get him to engineer the removal of Olins' body from the prison immediately after he dies. She forces the prison doctor to administer an antidote for cyanide gas poisoning to Olins. The revived Olins gives Margot half of a map showing the money location and Vincent, in a fit of jealousy, kills Olins and takes the other half. Because the doctor's plates on his car will get them through the police roadblocks, Vincent and Margot take him with them on the money hunt. Special features: Commentaries by James Ellroy and film historian Eddie Muller on 'Crime wave' and writer Stabley Rubin and film historian Glenn Erickson on 'Decoy;' new featurettes: "Crime wave: the city is dark" and "Decoy: a map to nowhere;" 'Crime wave' theatrical trailer. 76 min. DVD 8415
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Desperate (1947)
- Directed by Anthony Mann. Cast: Steve Brodie, Audrey Long, Raymond Burr, Douglas Fowley. An innocent man is framed for the murder of a police officer, but his framers don't know how dangerous a desperate man can be. When he escapes, both the police and the mob are after him. 999:476
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Basinger, Jeanine. Anthony Mann Twayne Publishers, 1979 (MAIN: PN1998.A3 .M321143; MOFF: PN1998.A3 .M321143)
Smith, Robert E. "Mann in the dark : the films noir of Anthony Mann."
In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- Desperate Hours (1955)
- Directed by William Wyler. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Fredric March, Arthur Kennedy, Martha Scott. Tells the harrowing story about an escaped convict who breaks into a suburban home and takes a family hostage. Adapted from the novel and play by Joseph Hayes (MOFF: PS3515.A942 D4; MAIN: 960.H417.des; Storage Info: B 3 342 433). 112 min. DVD 3818
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Detour (1946)
- Directed by Edgar G. Ulmer. Cast: Tom Neal, Ann Savage, Claudia Drake, Edmund MacDonald, Tim Ryan, Esther Howard, Pat Gleason. After his girlfriend Sue has left for the West Coast, Al Roberts decides to join her and starts a journey hitchhiking westwards. When he finds a driver who'd given him a lift dead, he decides to get rid of the body and take the man's identity, fearing he'd be accused of murder if he would go to the police. However, Vera, a hitchhiking girl Al picks up, sees through him and starts blackmailing him into going along with her schemes which get him deeper and deeper into trouble. [From the Internet Movie Database] DVD 391; DVD 2746; VHS 999:723
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- D.O.A. (1949)
- Directed by Rudolph Mate. Cast: Edmond O'Brien, Pamela Britton, Luther Adler, Beverly Campbell, Neville Brand, Lynn Baggett, William Ching. Small-town accountant Frank Bigelow goes to San Francisco for a week's fun prior to settling down with fiancée Paula. After a night on the town, he wakes up with more than just a hangover; doctors tell him he's been given a "luminous toxin" with no antidote and has, at most, a week to live! Not knowing who did it or why, Bigelow embarks on a frantic odyssey to find his own murderer. 83 min. DVD 2746; DVD 178; VHS 999:1237
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Belton, John. Howard Hawks, Frank Borzage, Edgar G. Ulmer London : Tantivy Press ; New York : A.S. Barnes, 1974. (MAIN: PN1998.A3 H337 1974)
Bogdanovich, Peter. "Edgar G. Ulmer." In: Who the Devil Made It. New York : Alfred A. Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 1997. (Main Stack PN1995.9.P7.B58 1997; Moffitt PN1995.9.P7.B58 1997)
Edgar G. Ulmer the man off-screen [Videorecording] Media Resources Center DVD 6455
Gallagher, Tag. "All lost in wonder: Edgar G.Ulmer." Screening the Past, 1 March 2001 UC users only
Isenberg, Noah. "Perennial Detour: The Cinema of Edgar G. Ulmer and the Experience of Exile." Cinema Journal. Winter 2004. Vol. 43, Iss. 2; pg. 3, 23 pgsUC users only
Osteen, M. "The big secret: film noir and nuclear film." Journal of Popular Film and Television v. 22 (Summer 1994) p. 79-90
Renov, Michael. "D. O. A.: Five Aspects of Textuality." New Orleans Review, vol. 9, no. 2, pp. 65-72, Fall 1982
Turner, George
"'I Want to Report a Murder'." American Cinematographer, LXIX/8, Aug 88; p.35-40. (Production history and detailed plot description of the original version of "D.O.A.")
- Double Indemnity (1944)
- Directed by Billy Wilder. Cast: Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck, Edward G. Robinson. An insurance man and a suburban wife conspire to trick her husband into signing a policy that pays double for accidental death-- then push him from a train. It's an almost perfect crime. DVD 26; VHS 999:126
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Enforcer (1951)
- Director, Bretaigne Windust. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Zero Mostel, Ted de Corsia, Roy Roberts, Everett Sloane. A hard-hitting D.A. is facing the hottest case of the year. Armed with a killer's confession, a score of missing persons and a mob undertaker working full-time, he knows he's onto something. Relentless and determined he tracks down a notorious murder for profit ring, headed by a killer named Mendoza. 87 min. DVD 2193
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- To the top
- Fallen Angel (1945)
- Directed by Otto Preminger. Cast: Dana Andrews, Alice Faye, Linda Darnell, Charles Bickford, Anne Revere. Eric Stanton, a press agent down on his luck, drifts into a small Californian coastal town. He meets June, a wealthy but reclusive woman, and has his eye on Stella, a sultry waitress. In love with Stella but broke, Eric marries June for her money, planning a rapid divorce. However when Stella is murdered, the story takes an unexpected turn. Non-US format (PAL) DVD. 98 min. DVD 3913
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Frischauer, Willi. Behind the scenes of Otto Preminger; an unauthorized biography New York, Morrow, 1974 [c1973] (MOFF: PN1998.A3 .P674 1973)
Pratley, Gerald. The cinema of Otto Preminger London, A. Zwemmer; New York, A. S. Barnes [1971] (MAIN: PN1998.A3 P6831)
Preminger, Otto. Preminger : an autobiography Garden City, N.Y. : Doubleday, 1977. (MAIN: PN1998 A3.P6721 1977; PFA : PN1998.3.P74 P74 1977)
Smith, Imogen Sara. "Dana Andrews: The Forties Hero and His Shadow." Bright Lights Film Journal, November 2008 | Issue 62
- FBI Girl (1951)
- Directed by William A. Berke. Cast: Cesar Romero, George Brent, Audrey Totter, Raymond Burr, Tom Drake, Raymond Greenleaf.
A state governor hires Raymond Burr to steal a file from the FBI that has fingerprint evidence proving he [the governor] previously was a wanted criminal. A clerk in the FBI office is killed, and agent Cesar Romero is hot on the case. 77 min. DVD 8249
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Fingerprints Don't Lie (1951)
- Directed by Sam Newfield. Cast: Richard Travis, Sheila Ryan, Sid Melton, Tom Neal, Margia Dean, Lyle Talbot.
The identity of the murderer of a town's mayor is decided by fingerprints on the weapon ... case closed. But is it? A reporter sets out to prove otherwise. Based on a story by Rupert Hughes. 56 min. DVD 8250
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Force of Evil (1948)
- Directed by Abraham Polonsky. Cast: John Garfield, Thomas Gomez, Beatrice Pearson, Roy Roberts, Marie Windsor. A racketeer's lawyer finds that his boss has found a way to bankrupt New York's numbers banks but gets wedged between the numbers racket and a new prosecutor's anti-crime campaign. 82 min. DVD 3311; vhs 999:1859
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Fury (1936)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Sylvia Sidney, Spencer Tracy, Walter Abel, Bruce Cabot, Edward Ellis, Walter Brennan. An ethical young man is forced to confront his own morality after he becomes a victim of vigilantism. DVD 3808; vhs 999:722
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- To the top
- The Gambler and the Lady (1952)
- Directed by Patrick Jenkins. Cast: Dane Clark, Naomi Chance, Meredith Edwards, Thomas Gallagher, Eric Pohlmann, Anthony Forwood. A greedy but successful professional gambler wants to join the British Establishment when he falls in love with a blue-blooded lady. But first he must mend his ways and then dump his nightclub singer girl friend. She's not so easy to get rid of, and neither is his past. 72 min. DVD 6021 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Gilda (1946)
- Directed by Charles Vidor. Cast: Rita Hayworth, Glenn Ford, George MacReady, Joseph Calleia. A South American casino owner hires a young American to be his right hand man. The owner's bride was at one time the American's lover. DVD 392; VHS 999:59 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Glass Key (1942)
- Directed by Stuart Heisler. Cast: Brian Donlevy, Veronica Lake, Alan Ladd, William Bendix, Bonita Granville, Richard Denning, Joseph Calleia. Intricate mystery about a slightly corrupt politician, accused of murder, who solicits his right-hand man (Ladd) to hunt down the real killer. As he searches Ladd must endure a brutal beating from gangsters, the annoying hindrance of the police and the beguiling advances of his boss' fiancee. Based on the novel by Dashiell Hammett. 85 min. 999:171 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Great St. Louis Bank Robbery(1959)
- Directors, Charles Guggenheim, John Stix. Cast: Steve McQueen, David Clarke, Graham Denton, Molly McCarthy, James Dukas. Psychological drama based on true events that recounts the meticulous planning and thoroughly botched execution of a bank robbery. Actual St. Louis police officers play themselves in the same respective roles of the true story. 85 min. DVD 1151 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Guest in the House (1944)
- Directed by John Brahm. Cast: Ann Baxter, Ralph Bellamy, Ruth Warrick, Marie McDonald, Aline MacMahon, Scott McKay, Jerome Cowan, Margaret Hamilton, Percy Kilbride. An emotionally disturbed girl turns an idyllic household into a chaotic nightmare. 120 min. DVD 7597; vhs 999:3385
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Gun Crazy (aka Deadly Is the Female) (1950)
- Directed by Joseph Lewis. Cast: Peggy Cummins, John Dall. Although Bart is not a violent man at heart, he allows the no-good Laurie to lure him into a life of crime. DVD 2716; vhs 999:517 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Johnson, Gary. "Gun Crazy" (10 Shades of Noir) Images, issue 2.
Martin, Adrian. "Violently Happy: Gun Crazy." Senses of Cinema 10: (no pagination). 2000 Nov.
Ruhmann, Lony. "Gun Crazy, 'The Accomplishment of Many, Many Minds': An Interview with Joseph H. Lewis." The Velvet Light Trap, vol. 20. 1983 Summer. pp: 16-21
- To the top
- Hangmen Also Die (1943)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Brian Donlevy, Walter Brennan, Anna Lee, Dennis O'Keefe. Pursued by the Germans after the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, Dr. Svoboda enlists the aid of a young woman who is oblivious to the lethal crosscurrents that surround her in Czechoslovakia. As she learns more about the mysterious doctor, she grows aware of the involvement of her father and fiance in the resistance, and soon finds herself entangled in the revolution's secret operations. 134 min. DVD 170; VHS 999:719 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- He Walked by Night (1948)
- Directed by Alfred Werker and Anthony Mann. Cast: Richard Basehart, Scott Brady, Roy Roberts, Whit Bissell, Jack Webb, Reed Hadley. Semi-documentary chase drama showing how the Los Angeles police department frantically searches for a cold blooded killer on the loose in Los Angeles. DVD 163; VHS 999:1303 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Basinger, Jeanine. Anthony Mann Twayne Publishers, 1979 (MAIN: PN1998.A3 .M321143; MOFF: PN1998.A3 .M321143)
Smith, Robert E. "Mann in the dark : the films noir of Anthony Mann."
In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- Heat Wave (1942)
- Directed by Ken Hughes. Cast: Alex Nicol, Hillary Brooke, Susan Stephen, Sid James, Alan Wheatley, Paul Carpenter. An American writer living in England gets entangled in a scheme by a beautiful blonde to murder her rich husband. 68 min. DVD 6021 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- High Sierra (1941)
- Directed by Raoul Walsh. Cast: Ida Lupino, Humphrey Bogart, Alan Curtis, Arthur Kennedy, Joan Leslie, Henry Travers. Set against the captivating background of California's High Sierra Montains, the story begins when convicted killer Roy Earle is sprung from jail by mobster "Big Mac", who wants Earle to assist in a California hotel hold-up. As a favor to his old friend, he agrees to pull one more job and then settle down to a normal life. From a novel by W. R. Burnett. 101 min. DVD 3500; VHS 999:1812 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Alley, Kenneth D. "High Sierra: Swan Song for an Era." Journal of Popular Film 1976 5(3-4): 248-262.
Georgakas, Dan. "Ida Lupino: Doing It Her Way." Cineaste, vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 32-36, 2000
UC users only
Simons, John L. "Henry on Bogie: Reality and Romance in 'Dream Song No. 9' and High Sierra." Literature-Film Quarterly, 1977, 5, 269-72.
Utley, Francis L. "Onomastic Variety in the High Sierra." Names: Journal of the American Name Society, vol. 20, pp. 73-82, 1972
- Hi-Jacked(1950)
- Directed by Sam Newfield. Cast: Jim Davis, Marsha Jones, Sid Melton, David Bruce, Paul Cavanagh.
Parolee/truck driver Jim Davis now wants to stick to the straight-and-narrow, but finds himself riding a highway of terror when his truck is hijacked and police suspect him because of his past record. 69 min. DVD X912
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- His Kind of Woman! (1951)
- Directed by John Farrow. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Jan Russell, Vincent Price, Tim Holt, Charles McGraw. Hard-luck gambler Dan Milner is in sudden luck. He'll get $50,000 to hang out at a posh Mexican resort, $5,000 now and the big payoff when the reason he's been sent there is revealed. Of course, the gangsters making the offer don't expect him to live long enough to collect. 120 min. DVD 5847
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Hitch-Hiker (1953)
- Directed by Ida Lupino. Cast: Edmond O'Brien, Frank Lovejoy, William Talman. The only true 'film noir' ever directed by a woman, this tour de force thriller is a classic, tension-packed, three-way dance of death about two middle-class American homebodies on vacation in Mexico on a long-awaited fishing trip. Suddenly their car and their very lives are commandeered by a psychopathic serial killer. 70 min. DVD 169; VHS 999:2777
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Armstrong, Richard. "South of the Chocolate Mountains: Scattered Impressions of The Hitch-Hiker."
Bright Lights Film Journal, vol. 37, pp. (no pagination), August 2002
Georgakas, Dan. "Ida Lupino: Doing It Her Way."Cineaste 25:3 [Summer 2000] p. 32-36
UC users only
Queen of the 'B's: Ida Lupino behind the camera / edited by Annette Kuhn. Westport, Conn : Greenwood Press, 1995. (Main Stack PN1998.3.L89.Q44 1995)
- Hollow Triumph (The Scar) (1948)
- Directed by Steve Sekelye. Cast: Paul Henreid, Joan Bennett, Eduard Franz, Leslie Brooks, John Qualen. An ex-medical student in trouble with gambling debts kills a psychiatrist who is his exact look-alike, except for a scar on the doctor's cheek. The student impersonates the dead psychiatrist, but mistakenly makes his own scar on the wrong cheek. It is not long before the doctor's secretary is on to him and he discovers the doctor had a few gambling debts himself. Originally made in 1948 as a motion picture under the title Hollow Triumph. Based on the novel by Murray Forbes. 83 min. DVD 3657; also VHS 999:2245
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- House By the River (1950)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Louis Hayward, Lee Bowman, Jane Wyatt. Stephen Byrne is so caught up in murder that it finally catches up with him. From a novel by A.P. Herbert. 85 min. DVD 4918; vhs 999:667
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- House of Bamboo (1955)
- Directed by Samuel Fuller. Cast: Robert Ryan, Robert Stack, Shirley Yamaguchi, Cameron Mitchell, Brad Dexter, Sessue Hayakawa.
Filmed on location in Tokyo, Japan.
Sandy Dawson has assembled a platoon of ex-Army thugs to run pachinko parlors while pulling off bloody heists and armed robbery. The murder of a friend brings Eddie Spanier into the group, along with his beautiful mistress. But Spanier's behavior grows treacherous, and his loyalties become questionable, leading to a breathless, murderous conclusion high above the ancient city of Tokyo. 102 min. DVD 4215
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Canham, Kingsley. "Samuel Fuller's Action Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
McArthur, Collin. "Samuel Fuller's Gangster Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
- House of Strangers (1949)
- Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz. Cast: Edward G. Robinson, Susan Hayward, Richard Conte, Luther Adler. Set in the rich historical atmosphere of New York's turn-of-the century Lower East Side, this is the powerful story of Gino Monetti, a ruthless immigrant who builds a banking empire on fraud and exploitation which is eventually destroyed by hate and greed. DVD special features: Audio commentary with film author & historian Foster Hirsch; poster gallery; production stills gallery; unit photography gallery; theatrical trailer; Fox flix. Based on the novel I'll never go there any more, by Jerome Weidman. 101 min. DVD 7668; vhs 999:3100
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The House on 92nd Street (1945)
- Directed by Henry Hathaway. Cast: William Eythe, Lloyd Nolan, Signe Hasso, Gene Lockhart, Leo. G. Carroll, Lydia St. Clair, William Post. When a young German American is solicited as a Nazi spy during WWII, he accepts the job after agreeing to go undercover for the FBI. Once he learns that his mission is to send atomic bomb secrets to the German government, the FBI chief works relentlessly to prevent this while not giving his agent's identity away. 89 min. DVD 4382
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The House on Telegraph Hill (1951)
- Directed by Robert Wise. Cast: Richard Basehart, Valentina Cortesa, William Lundigan, Fay Baker, Gordon Gebert. Victoria Kowelska has lived through World War II bombings and relocation camps, and has finally emigrated to San Francisco. She has assumed her dead friend's identity and now lives among her family, including a young boy who is to inherit a fortune. She falls for the boy's guardian but soon learns that she may be in danger again. 93 min. DVD 5258
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Human Desire (1954)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Glenn Ford, Gloria Grahame, Broderick Crawford, Edgar Buchanan. Upon discovering that his seductive, young wife Vicki has done more than just talk with a railroad official, former railroader Carl Buckley knifes his rival. Jeff Warren sees Vicki emerge from the murder compartment, but because of mutual attraction, refuses to testify against her. Based on a novel by Emile Zola. 81 min. 999:680
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Fritz Lang bibliography
Callahan, Dan. "Fatal Instincts: The Dangerous Pout of Gloria Grahame." Bright Lights Films Journal, August 2008 | Issue 61
- To the top
- I Wake Up Screaming (1941)
- Directed by Bruce Humberstone. Cast: Betty Grable, Victor Mature, Carole Landis, Laird Cregar. Murder mystery about Vicky Lynn, a waitress who becomes a cafe society celebrity only to be killed just before her departure to Hollywood. The main suspect is sports promoter Frankie Christopher who engineered Vicky's rise to fame, but Vicky's sister Jill is also a suspect and things become further complicated when she and Frankie fall in love. DVD Special features: Audio commentary with film noir historian Eddie Muller; "Daddy" deleted scene; poster gallery; production stills gallery; unit photography gallery; theatrical trailer; Fox flix. 82 min. DVD 5634; vhs 999:2778
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Illegal (1955)
- Directed by Lewis Allen. Cast: Edward G. Robinson, Nina Foch, Hugh Marlowe, Jayne Mansfield.
Ambitious D.A. Victor Scott zealously prosecutes Ed Clary for a woman's murder. But as Clary walks to the electric chair, Scott receives evidence that exonerates the condemned man. Realizing that he's made a terrible mistake he tries to stop the execution, but is too late. Scott resigns as a prosecutor and enters private practice. He draws the attention of mob kingpin Frank Garland. Scott represents one of Garland's stooges on a murder rap and Scott, in a grand display of courtroom theatrics, wins the case. Embroiled in dirty mob politics, the situation becomes intolerable when his former protege is charged with a murder that seems to implicate her as an informant to the Garland mob. Special features: Commentaries by Nina Foch and film historian Patricia King Hanson on 'Illegal' and film historian Richard B. Jewell on 'The big steal;' vintage "Behind the cameras" segment with Edward G. Robinson from the 'Warner Bros. presents' TV series; new featurettes: "Illegal: marked for life" and "The big steal: look behind you;" theatrical trailers. 88 min. DVD 8414
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Impact (1949)
- Directed by Arthur Lubin. Cast: Brian Donlevy, Ella Raines, Charles Coburn, Helen Walker, Anna May Wong. Millionaire industrialist Walter Williams is marked for murder by his wife and her lover. When the plot ends in a fiery disaster, Williams is thought dead. In reality, he finds himself without a clue of who he is or what happened. As his memory returns, his life becomes a roller coaster ride of suspense and excitement. 111 min. DVD 2152
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- In a Lonely Place (1950)
- Director, Nicholas Ray. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Gloria Grahame, Frank Lovejoy, Carl Benton Reid, Art Smith, Jeff Donnell, Martha Stewart. A hotheaded Hollywood screenwriter, questioned for murder, is drawn to his neighbor when she confirms his alibi. His volatile nature eventually threatens to destroy their one last chance for real love. DVD 3486; also VHS 999:974
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- To the top
- Kansas City Confidential (1952)
- Directed by Phil Karlson. Cast: John Payne, Coleen Gray, Preston Foster, Neville Brand, Lee Van Cleef, Jack Elam, Dona Drake, Mario Siletti. In this film noir a bitter ex-cop turns criminal mastermind, pulling off a huge armored car robbery. A reformed con man turns investigator when he is unwittingly framed for the robbery. 98 min. DVD 3809; vhs 999:2870
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Key Largo (1948)
- Directed by John Huston. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson and Lauren Bacall. A returning war veteran fights gangsters who take over a hotel in the Florida Keys in an effort to clandestinely re-enter the country. DVD 294; vhs 999:638
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Killers (1946)
- Directed by Robert Siodmak. Cast: Burt Lancaster, Ava Gardner, Edmond O'Brien, Albert Dekker, Sam Levene, William Conrad, Jack Lambert, Jeff Corey. After killing a man, two killers dig into their victim's past to discover who hired them and why. Based on a story by Ernest Hemingway. The DVD includes the 1964 version of "The Killers," and Andrei Tarkovsky's 1956 student film version (19 min.), plus other special features. 102 min. DVD 1567; vhs 999:1857
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Alpi, Deborah Lazaroff. Robert Siodmak : a biography, with critical analyses of his films noirs and a filmography of all his works Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland, c1998.
(MAIN: PN1998.3.S54 A46 1998)
Koepnick, Lutz. "Doubling the Double: Robert Siodmak in Hollywood." New German Critique: An Interdisciplinary Journal of German Studies, vol. 89, pp. 81-104, Spring 2003
UC users only
Koepnick, Lutz. "Berlin Noir: Robert Siodmak’s Hollywood." In: The dark mirror: German cinema between Hitler and Hollywood / Berkeley: University of California Press, c2002.
(MAIN: PN1993.5.G3 K645 2002; Moffitt PN1993.5.G3 K645 2002
; Full-text of this book available online via ebrary - UC Berkeley users only)
Walker, Michael. "Robert Siodmak." In: The Book of film noir / edited by Ian Cameron.
Place/Publisher New York : Continuum, c1993. (Moffitt PN1995.9.F54.B66 1993; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 M68 1992)
- The Killers (aka Ernest Hemingway's The Killers) (1964)
- Directed by Don Siegel. Cast: Lee Marvin, Angie Dickinson, John Cassavettes, Clu Gulager, Ronald Reagan. Melodramatic thriller based on the Hemingway story about two hit men who become curious about the life and death of the man they were hired to kill. The DVD includes the 1946 version of "The Killers," and Andrei Tarkovsky's 1956 student film version (19 min.), plus other special features. 94 min. DVD 1567
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
Ernest Hemingway and the Movies bibliography
- Killer's Kiss (1956)
- Directed by Stanley Kubrick. Cast: Frank Silvera, Jamie Smith, Irene Kane, Ruth Sobotka. Film noir about a struggling boxer in New York City who protects a nightclub dancer from her boyfriend and boss, unaware that he is a gangster. DVD 561; VHS 999:1239
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Killing (1956)
- Directed by Stanley Kubrick. Cast: Sterling Hayden, Coleen Gray, Vince Edwards, Jay C. Flippen, Ted DeCorsia, Marie Windsor, Elisha Cook, Jr., Kola Kwariani, Timothy Carey, Joe Sawyer. A group of small-time crooks plan and execute a daring race-track robbery--but their well-laid plans go awry. DVD 720; VHS 999:660
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- A Kiss Before Dying (1955)
- Director, Gerd Oswald. Cast: Robert Wagner, Jeffrey Hunter, Virginia Leith, Joanne Woodward, Mary Astor. Troubled by the death of her twin sister, a young woman unwittingly falls in love with an ambitious man. As she investigates her sister's death, she discovers that what she doesn't know about her boyfriend may kill her. 95 min. DVD 2035
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Kiss Me Deadly (1955)
- Directed by Robert Aldrich. Cast: Ralph Meeker, Paul Stewart, Albert Dekker. A detective gives a ride to a half-naked girl, who is abruptly killed by thugs. Almost killed himself, the detective tries to solve the murder. Along the way, he is told to back off by the Feds, a bomb is placed in his car, a friend is killed, and he himself is beaten, drugged, and held hostage. DVD 1077; vhs 999:146
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Kiss of Death (1947)
- Directed by Henry Hathaway. Cast: Victor Mature, Brian Donlevy, Coleen Gray, Richard Widmark. This gripping crime melodrama set a new standard for realism in Hollywood. Victor Mature is Nick Bianco, a two-bit crook who is trying to go straight. He has a wife and two girls to feed, but nobody hires ex-cons. Nick cooperates with the D.A. (Brian Donlevy) to save his family. The D.A. wants Nick to squeal on up-and-coming hood Tommy Udo (Richard Widmark), but that could be very unhealthy -- for Nick and his two young daughters. Special DVD features: Commentary by James Ursini and Alain Silver, theatrical trailer, still gallery.
DVD 7669; vhs 999:471
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye (1950)
- Directed by Gordon Douglas. Cast: James Cagney, Barbara Payton, Helena Carter, Ward Bond. "From the trial of the survivors, we flash back to amoral crook Ralph Cotter's violent prison break, assisted by Holiday Carleton, sister of another prisoner...who doesn't make it. Soon Ralph manipulates the grieving Holiday into his arms, and two crooked cops follow her into his pocket. Ralph's total lack of scruple brings him great success in a series of robberies. But his easy conquest of gullible heiress Margaret Dobson proves more dangerous to him than any crime." [from Internet Movie Database] 102 min. DVD 3816; vhs 999:2370
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Monk, Philip. Double-cross : the Hollywood films of Douglas Gordon Toronto: Power Plant, c2003. (PFA: N6797.G67 M65 2003)
- Knock on Any Door (1949)
- Directed by Nicholas Ray. Cast: Rachel Ward, Jeff Bridges, James Woods, Alex Karras, Jane Greer, Richard Widmark. Andrew Morton is an attorney who made it out of the slums while his client, Nick Romano, has a long string of crimes behind him. After Nick lost his paycheck gambling, his wife announces she is pregnant and later he finds her dead from suicide. When he turns again to robbery he's caught by a cop and Nick pumps all his bullets into him in frustration. Film is notable for Morton's appeal to the court which emphasizes the evils of the slums. 100 min. 999:2335
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
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- Lady From Shanghai(1948)
- Directed by Orson Welles. Cast: Welles, Rita Hayworth, Everett Sloane, Glenn Anders, Ted de Corsia. An Irish seaman becomes involved in a web of intrigue when he is hired to work on a yacht owned by a crippled lawyer and his beautiful, mysterious wife. 87 min. DVD 332; VHS 999:63
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Lady in the Lake (1947)
- Directed by Robert Montgomery. Cast: Robert Montgomery, Audrey Totter, Lloyd Nolan, Tom Tully, Leon Ames. Philip Marlowe searches for a missing wife--and discovers a different woman's corpse in a mountain lake. Film utilizes a daring technique in which the subjective camera becomes the "I" and viewers experience the action--socks to the jaw and all--from Marlowe's viewpoint. See the clues as Marlowe sees them and maybe solve the case before he does. DVD 5849; vhs 999:1529
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Gernalzick, Nadja. "To Act Or To Perform: Distinguishing Filmic Autobiography." Biography: An Interdisciplinary Quarterly, vol. 29, no. 1, pp. 1-13, Winter 2006UC users only
Telotte, J. P. "The Detective As Dreamer: The Case of The Lady in the Lake." Journal of Popular Film and Television, vol. 12 no. 1. 1984 Spring. pp: 4-15.
Williamson, Catherine. "'You'll see it just as I saw it': voyeurism, fetishism, and the female spectator in Lady in the Lake." Journal of Film and Video (48:3) 1996, 17-29.
- Lady on a Train (1945)
- Directed by Charles David. Cast: Deanna Durbin, Ralph Bellamy, David Bruce, George Coulouris, Allen Jenkins, Dan Duryea, Edward Everett Horton. A young woman on a New York-bound train is witness to a murder outside her compartment window. When police refuse to believe her story, she draws on her penchant for reading mystery novels and sets out to solve the case herself. 95 min. 999:2306
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Laura (1944)
- Directed by Otto Preminger. Cast: Gene Tierney, Dana Andrews, Clifton Webb, Vincent Price, Judith Anderson. Cynical detective investigates the murder of a beautiful girl, but finds himself falling in love with the dead woman through her striking portrait. DVD 3643; vhs 999:678
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Frischauer, Willi. Behind the scenes of Otto Preminger; an unauthorized biography New York, Morrow, 1974 [c1973] (MOFF: PN1998.A3 .P674 1973)
Pratley, Gerald. The cinema of Otto Preminger London, A. Zwemmer; New York, A. S. Barnes [1971] (MAIN: PN1998.A3 P6831)
Preminger, Otto. Preminger : an autobiographyGarden City, N.Y. : Doubleday, 1977.
(MAIN: PN1998 A3.P6721 1977; PFA : PN1998.3.P74 P74 1977)
- Leave Her to Heaven (1945)
- Directed by John M. Stahl. Cast: Gene Tierney, Cornel Wilde, Jeanne Crain, Vincent Price. Melodrama with Tierney as a psychopathic young wife whose jealous, obsessive love for her husband leads to murder, treachery, and suicide. Includes rare Movietone news footage. 111 min. DVD 3807; vhs 999:1763
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Deutelbaum, Marshall. "Costuming and the Color System of Leave Her to Heaven." Film Criticism, vol. 11, no. 3, pp. 11-20, Spring 1987
Turim, Maureen. "The Question of Ideology: Fictive Psyches: The Psychological Melodrama in 40s Films." boundary 2, Vol. 12, No. 3, (Spring - Autumn, 1984), pp. 321-331. UC users only
- The Letter (1940)
- Directed by William Wyler. Cast: Bette Davis, Herbert Marshall, James Stephenson, Frieda Inescort, Gale Songergaard. A rubber plantation owner's wife kills a man in what seems to have been self-defense but a letter from her which proves it to have been a crime of passion, becomes an instrument of blackmail. 95 min. DVD 3431; VHS 999:2356
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Heil, Douglas. "The Construction of Racism through Narrative and Cinematography in The Letter." Literature/Film Quarterly, vol. 24, no. 1, pp. 17-25, 1996
- The Limping Man (1953)
- Directed by Charles De Latour [Cy Endfield]. Cast: Bette Davis, Herbert Marshall, James Stephenson, Frieda Inescort, Gale Songergaard. An ex G.I. returns to England to look up a wartime girlfriend and rekindle their romance. He soon realizes that she has become involved with racketeers but before he can untangle her mess, he helps the local police track down a deadly sniper. 76 min. DVD 3657
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Loan Shark (1952)
- Directed by Seymour Friedman. Cast: George Raft, Dorothy Hart, John Hoyt, Paul Stewart, Helen Westcott.
Tough ex-con George Raft is hired by a factory owner and a union leader to help smash a loan-sharking mob preying on their employees. To obtain the necessary evidence, Raft puts his life on the line by joining the gang. 74 min. DVD 8238 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Long Night (1947)
- Directed by Anatole Litvak. Cast: Henry Fonda, Barbara Bel Geddes, Vincent Price, Ann Dvorak, Elisha Cook Jr. Joe Adams, a factory worker pinned inside his third-floor apartment after gunning down a mysterious gentleman, reconstructs the events leading up to the shooting through an intricate series of flashbacks. 97 min. DVD 634
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Lost Weekend (1945)
- Directed by Billy Wilder. Cast: Ray Milland, Jane Wyman, Phillip Terry, Howard da Silva, Doris Dowling, Frank Faylen. A would-be writer's dissatisfaction with his life leads him on a three-day binge. This film gives an uncompromising look at the devestating effects of alcoholism. DVD 535; vhs 999:433
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Lured (1947)
- Directed by Douglas Sirk. Cast: George Sanders, Lucille Ball, Boris Karloff, Charles Coburn, Sir Cedric Hardwick. A serial killer terrorizes London by luring women into meeting with him through the personal ads in the newspaper and taunting the police with gruesome poems. A Scotland Yard detective enlists the aid of a feisty American redhead (Lucille Ball) to draw the murderer into the dragnet. 100 min. DVD 2043
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
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- Macao (1952)
- Directed by Josef von Sternberg. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Jane Russell, William Bendix. A story of crime, passion, and international intrigue played out in the infamous Portuguese island off the south coast of China. 80 min. DVD 6849; vhs 999:2875
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Maltese Falcon (1941)
- Directed by John Huston. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, Gladys George, Sidney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre. Centers around an unrelenting search for a valuable and elusive falcon statuette. 100 min. DVD 173; VHS 999:17 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Man from Cairo (Dramma nella Kasbah) (Italy / UK / USA, 1953)
- Directed by Ray Enright. Cast: George Raft, Gianna Maria Canale, Leon Lenoir, Alfredo Varelli, Irene Papas.
Tough-guy Raft investigates the wartime theft of 100 million dollars in gold hidden somewhere in the Algerian desert. Solid film noir with action, adventure and ...Irene Papas in a hot tub! 82 min. DVD 8248
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Mask of Dimitrios (1944)
- Directed by Jean Negulesco. Cast: Sydney Greenstreet, Zachary Scott, Faye Emerson, Peter Lorre, Victor Francen. When the body of Dimitrios Makropoulos washed up ashore in Istanbul, there is cause for celebration all across Europe. The devious sociopath has left as his legacy an array of crimes including blackmail, thievery, murder and high treason. Interested in chronicling his unscrupulous exploits, a mystery writer takes up his trail, aided by a mysterious man. 96 min. 999:2347
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Mask of the Dragon (1951)
- Directed by Sam Newfield. Cast: Richard Travis, Sheila Ryan, Sid Melton, Michael Whalen, Lyle Talbot, Charles Iwamoto.
An American soldier in Korea agrees to deliver a jade dragon to a curio shop in Los Angeles. Soon after his return to the States, he is murdered in this tale of intrigue and mystery produced on a dime store budget! 55 min. DVD 8248
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Mildred Pierce (1945)
- Directed by Michael Curtiz. Cast: Joan Crawford, Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, Eve Arden, Ann Blyth. The story of a self-made woman's attempt to provide her daughter with luxuries and social status only to see the daughter become spoiled and unscrupulous and eventually murder her own stepfather. 111 min. DVD 1689; vhs 999:215
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Ministry of Fear (1944)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Ray Milland, Marjorie Reynolds, Carl Esmond, Hillary ) Brooke, Percy Waram, Dan Duryea, Alan Napier, Erskine Sanford. A man is released into World War II England after 2 years in an asylum, but the outside world does not seem so sane either. On his way back to London to rejoin civilization, he stumbles across a murderous spy ring and does not quite know to whom to turn. Based on a novel by Graham Greene. 87 min. 999:1858
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Mr. Arkadin (1955)
- Directed by Orson Welles. Cast: Welles, Paola Mori, Robert Arden, Patricia Medina, Michael Redgrave. Set in Spain, Mr. Arkadin tells the story of a reclusive billionaire who, faking a case of amnesia, hires a young adventurer who has been seeing his daughter to investigate his own past. As the inquiries begin unraveling, Arkadin's sordid history, the young man realizes he's being used to keep the truth from Arkadin's daughter and that his own life is in danger. 93 min. DVD 465; VHS 999:492
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Murder My Sweet (1945)
- Directed by Edward Dmytryk. Cast: Dick Powell, Claire Trevor, Anne Shirley, Otto Kruger, Mike Mazurki. The story of a private detective who gets drawn into a complex web of murder, blackmail, and double-dealing while searching for a missing jade necklace. Based on Raymond Chandler's "Farewell My Lovely." DVD 2718; vhs 999:584
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Mystery Street (1950)
- Directed by John Sturges. Cast: Ricardo Montalban, Sally Forrest, Bruce Bennett, Elsa Lanchester, Marshall Thompson.
Vivian is being brushed off by her rich, married boyfriend. To confront him, she hijacks Henry Shanway and his car from Boston to Cape Cod. Once there, she strands Henry. Months later, a skeleton is found on a lonely Cape Cod beach. Using the macabre expertise of Harvard forensic specialist Dr. McAdoo, Lt. Pete Morales must work back from bones to find the victim's identity and killer. Special features: Film historian commentaries by Dr. Drew Casper on 'Act of violence' and Alain Silver and Elizabeth Ward on 'Mystery street;' new featurettes "Act of violence: dealing with the devil" and "Mystery street: murder at Harvard;" theatrical trailers. 93 min. DVD 8416
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
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- Naked City(1948)
- Directed by Jules Dassin. Cast: Barry Fitzgerald, Howard Duff, Dorothy Hart, Don Taylor, Ted DeCorsica. In this film-noir thriller, one of the first pictures filmed on location in New York City, a squad of homicide detectives roams through the seamier parts of the City as they solve a murder case. Through the use of a hidden camera, the movie gives viewers an unvarnished look at life in the city using the technique neorealism. DVD 403; Video Disc 171; VHS 999:1134
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Wald, Malvin. The Naked City: A Screenplay / by Malvin Wald and Albert Maltz; story by Malvin Wald; edited by Matthew J. Bruccoli; afterword by Malvin Wald. Carbondale : Southern Illinois University Press, [1979] c1948. ( PN1997 .N324 Main Stack)
- Kozloff, Sarah. "Humanizing 'The Voice of God': Narration in The Naked City." Cinema Journal, vol. 23 no. 4. 1984 Summer. pp: 41-53.UC users only
McGilligan, Patrick.
"I'll always be an American: Jules Dassin interviewed." Film Comment. Nov/Dec 1996. Vol. 32, Iss. 6; p. 34 (15 pages)UC users only
Prime, Rebecca. "Cloaked in Compromise: Jules Dassin's "Naked" City."
In: "Un-American" Hollywood : politics and film in the blacklist era / Edited by Frank Krutnik ... [et al.]. New Brunswick, N.J. : Rutgers University Press, c2007.
(MAIN: PN1995.9.P6 U5 2007; MOFF: PN1995.9.P6 U5 2007)
- Naked Kiss(1964)
- Directed by Samuel Fuller. Cast: Constance Towers, Anthony Eisley, Michael Dante, Virginia Grey. Kelly, a prostitute, shows up in the town of Grantville, where she engages in a tryst with sheriff Griff, who then tells her to get out of town. Instead, she decides to give up her illicit lifestyle, and becomes involved in working with handicapped children. Griff doesn't trust her, and continues trying to run her out of town. Kelly falls in love with Grant, scion of the town's founding family and Griff's best friend. Just as Griff begins to believe that Kelly may be on the level, a murder and perversion scandal threaten to destroy Kelly's new life [from Internet Movie Database]. DVD 1079; vhs 999:495
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Canham, Kingsley. "Samuel Fuller's Action Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
Fuller, Samuel. A Third face : my tale of writing, fighting and filmmaking / Samuel Fuller with Christa Lang Fuller and Jerome Henry Rude. New York : Alfred A. Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 2002. (Main Stack PN1998.3.F85.A3 2002)
Garnham, Nicholas. Samuel Fuller.
New York, Viking Press [1972, c1971] ( MAIN: PN1993 .C45 v.15 [another edition]; MOFF: PN1998.A3 F843 1972)
Hardy, Phil. Samuel Fuller.
[New York] Praeger [1970] (MAIN: PN1998.A3F845 H3; MOFF: PN1998 A3 F845)
McArthur, Collin. "Samuel Fuller's Gangster Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
Sanjek, David. 'Torment Street between Malicious and Crude': Sophisticated Primitivism in the Films of Samuel Fuller. Literature/ Film Quarterly, vol. 22 no. 3. 1994. pp: 187-94.
Server, Lee. Sam Fuller : film is a battleground : a critical study, with interviews, a filmography, and a bibliography Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland, c1994. (MAIN: PN1998.3.F85 S47 1994)
- The Narrow Margin (1952)
- Directed by Richard Fleischer. Cast: Charles McGraw, Marie Windsor, Jacqueline White. A hard-boiled cop, transporting a gangster's widow to a trial in which she'll testify, must dodge three hitmen aboard their train who are trying to kill her. 71 min. DVD 4116; vhs 999:469
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Nightfall(1956)
- Directed by Jacques Tourneur. Cast: Aldo Ray, Brian Keith, Anne Bancroft, Jocelyn Brando, James Gregory. When a commercial artist meets and befriends a woman at a bar, as they are leaving they are accosted by two crooks who abduct the artist thinking he has a bag containing $300,000 stolen in a bank robbery. Eventually he escapes and he and his woman companion find the loot in a ghost town where the crooks are also hiding resulting in a final confrontation. 999:1262
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Fujiwara, Chris. Jacques Tourneur : the cinema of nightfall Published: Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000.
(PFA : PN1998.3.T68 F84 2000; MAIN: PN1998.3.T6 F85 1998 [Earlier edition])
- Nightmare Alley (1947)
- Directed by Edmund Goulding. Cast: Tyrone Power, Joan Blondell, Coleen Gray, Helen Walker, Taylor Holmes, Mike Mazurki, Ian Keith. "Circus geeks — those lowdown human wrecks willing to bite the heads off live chickens for sensation-seeking crowds — aren't exactly au courant on the entertainment circuit these days, but there's a doozy in Nightmare Alley. Though he's only seen in shadow, his creepy image and maniacal laughter dominate this rarest of film noirs, unseen for many years in any format due to a rights problem. Set in a cheesy carnival, the film presents an unforgettable gallery of grotesques whose lives intertwine romantically, criminally, and, ultimately, fatally. There's a con-artist drifter (Tyrone Power), a phony mind-reader (Joan Blondell), her alcoholic husband (Ian Keith), a brutal strongman (Mike Mazurki), and an unscrupulous shrink (Helen Walker), all players in a dance-of-death, shadow-drenched scenario of infidelity, mayhem, and murder. The grim atmosphere, razor-sharp dialogue, and sordid doings are rendered in high studio style courtesy of waspish director Edmund Goulding, who worked with Garbo and Crawford; screenwriter Jules Furthman (To Have and Have Not); and Dietrich's cinematographer, Lee Garmes. The author of the source novel, William Lindsay Gresham, eventually committed suicide. You'll understand why when (if) you see the film." [Morris, Gary. "Little Stabs of Happiness (and Horror)." Bright Lights,August 2004 | Issue 45 ] 111 min. DVD 4028
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- No Way Out (1950)
- Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz. Cast: Richard Widmark, Linda Darnell, Stephen McNally, Sidney Poitier. When a young African-American doctor operates on two white brothers brought in for gunshot wounds, it sets off a chain of violent confrontations between a vicious psychopath, his gang and the black community. DVD special features: Commentary by film historian Eddie Muller, still gallery, Fox Movietone news, original theatrical trailer. 106 min. DVD 7667; vhs 999:2450
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Porfino, Robert. "No way out : existential motifs in the film noir." In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- Nocturne (1947)
- Directed by Edwin L. Marin. Cast: George Raft, Lynn Bari, Virginia Huston, Joseph Pevney, Myrna Dell. Mystery surrounds the death of a womanizing composer named Vincent. Tough homicide detective Joe Warne believes Vincent's death was no suicide... that he was murdered and Joe now has 10 beautiful suspects in the crime! He finds himself in deep trouble investigating the strangest, most dangerous case he's ever worked on! If he's not careful, he's going to end up like Vincent! 87 min. 999:3565
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
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- Odds Against Tomorrow (1959)
- Directed by Robert Wise. Cast: Harry Belafonte, Robert Ryan, Shelley Winters, Ed Begley, Gloria Grahame. A bigoted ex-con slumming through life with a patronizing girlfriend, an obliging neighbor and zero expectations agrees to be part of a bank job planned by former cop Burke. Until, that is, he finds out one of his partners will be a black man. Earl's desperate need for cash, however, leads him to reconsider. For the job only, he'll put his racism aside ... until moments away from the score, hatred erupts. In this film to obtain the edgy look desired by the director a rare filming technique was used: infrared photography. DVD 2229; vhs 999:1843
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- On Dangerous Ground(1951)
- Directed by Nicholas Ray. Cast: Ida Lupino, Robert Ryan, Ward Bond, Charles Kemper. Hard, withdrawn city cop Jim Wilson roughs up one too many suspects and is sent upstate to help investigate the murder of a young girl in the winter countryside. There he meets Mary Malden, whom he finds attractive and independent. However, Mary's brother is chief suspect in the killing. And Mary herself is blind [Internet Movie Database]. DVD 5850; vhs 999:140
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Out of the Past (1947)
- Directed by Jacques Tourneur. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Kirk Douglas, Jane Greer, Rhonda Fleming. Jeff (Robert Mitchum), a former private detective, is hired by a gangster (Kirk Douglas) to find his former girlfriend (Jane Greer) whom he still loves, who took 10,000 from him and disappeared. Jeff not only finds the girl, but falls in love with her as well, thus, making the gangster very jealous. During the investigation and the unexpected love affair several murders occur which ultimately lead to further tragedies. DVD 2720; vhs 999:657
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
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- Panic In the Streets (1950)
- Directed by Elia Kazan. Cast: Richard Widmark, Paul Douglas, Barbara Bel Geddes. Classic crime melodrama about a twisted killer who harbors bubonic plague -- a deadly disease that could wipe out an entire city. DVD 3848; vhs 999:472
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Party Girl (1958)
- Directed by Nicholas Ray. Cast: Robert Taylor, Cyd Charisse, Lee J. Cobb, John Ireland, Kent Smith, Claire Kelly, Corey Allen. Lawyer Thomas Farrell has made a career defending crooks in trials. He has never realised that there is a downside to his success, until he meets the dancer Vicki Gayle. She makes him decide to get out of the business, but mob king Rico Angelo insists that he continue his services. 99 min. 999:3570
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Phantom Lady (1943)
- Directed by Robert Siodmak. Cast: Richard Widmark, Paul Douglas, Barbara Bel Geddes. An unhappily married man spends the evening on a no-names basis with a woman he picks up at a bar. He later returns home, only to find the police present and his wife strangled. Every effort to establish his alibi fails; oddly, no one seems to remember seeing the phantom lady. In prison, the man gives up hope, but his secretary (secretly in love with him) doggedly follows clues through shadowy nocturnal streets hoping to clear her employer. 87 min. 999:1855
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Williams, Tony. "Phantom lady, Cornell Woolrich, and the masochistic aesthetic." In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- Alpi, Deborah Lazaroff. Robert Siodmak : a biography, with critical analyses of his films noirs and a filmography of all his works Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland, c1998.
(MAIN: PN1998.3.S54 A46 1998)
Koepnick, Lutz. "Doubling the Double: Robert Siodmak in Hollywood." New German Critique: An Interdisciplinary Journal of German Studies, vol. 89, pp. 81-104, Spring 2003
UC users only
Koepnick, Lutz. "Berlin Noir: Robert Siodmak’s Hollywood." In: The dark mirror: German cinema between Hitler and Hollywood / Berkeley: University of California Press, c2002.
(MAIN: PN1993.5.G3 K645 2002; Moffitt PN1993.5.G3 K645 2002
; Full-text of this book available online via ebrary - UC Berkeley users only)
Walker, Michael. "Robert Siodmak." In: The Book of film noir / edited by Ian Cameron.
Place/Publisher New York : Continuum, c1993. (Moffitt PN1995.9.F54.B66 1993; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 M68 1992)
- Pickup on South Street (1953)
- Directed by Samuel Fuller. Cast: Richard Widmark, Jean Peters, Thelma Ritter. "Petty crook Skip McCoy (Richard Widmark) has his eyes fixed on the big score. When the cocky three-time convict picks the pocketbook of unsuspecting Candy (Jean Peters), he finds a haul bigger than he could have imagined: a strip of microfilm bearing confidential U.S. secrets. Tailed by manipulative Feds and the unwitting courier’s Communist puppeteers, Skip and Candy find themselves in a precarious gambit that pits greed against redemption, Right versus Red, and passion against self preservation. With its dazzling cast and director Samuel Fuller’s signature raw energy and hardboiled repartee, Pickup on South Street is a true film noir classic by one of America’s most passionate cinematic craftsmen." [Criterion catalog] DVD 2709; vhs 999:516
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Canham, Kingsley. "Samuel Fuller's Action Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
McArthur, Collin. "Samuel Fuller's Gangster Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
- Pier 23 (1951)
- Directed by William Berke. Cast: J Hugh Beaumont, Ann Swayze, Edward Brophy, Richard Travis, Margia Dean, Mike Mazurki. In the first of two separate stories, Private-Detective Dennis O'Brien becomes involved with a gang that uses a rigged wrestling match as a means for murder. In the second story O'Brien tries to discourage a convict from making an escape-attempt from Alcatraz. Later O'Brien mistakes another man for the convict, and winds up charged with a murder. 59 min. DVD X919
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Pitfall(1948)
- Directed by Andre de Toth. Cast: Dick Powell, Jane Wyatt, Raymond Burr, Elizabeth Scott. A happily married insurance salesman becomes bored with his perfect wife and ideal son. When he succumbs to the advances of a pretty younger woman, it leads to a complicated web of intrigue, jealousy and murder. 999:1238
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Danks, Adrian. "Driftin': In Tribute to André de Toth."
Senses of Cinema vol. 25, pp. (no pagination), March 2003
Silver, Alain. "André de Toth (1913-2002): An Interview." Senses of Cinema vol. 25, pp. (no pagination), March 2003
UC users only
- Port of New York (1949)
- Directed by Laslo Benedek. Cast: Scott Brady, Richard Rober, K.T. Stevens, Yul Brynner, Arthur Blake, Lynne Carter, John Kellog, William Chalee. Two narcotics agents go after a gang of murderous drug dealers who use ships docking at the New York harbor to smuggle in their drugs. Shot on location in 1949, film is notable for great shots of old New York, including street scenes, harbor and skyline shots. 83 min. 999:3573
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Portland Expose (1957)
- Directed by Harold D. Schuster. Cast: Edward Binns, Carolyn Craig, Virginia Gregg, Lawrence Dobkin, Frank Gorshin.
The story concentrates on an honest tavern owner named George Madison who is involuntarily sucked into the city's rotten-to-the-core political machine. When Madison refuses to allow his establishment to serve as the gathering place for hoods and delinquents, the powers-that-be threaten to harm his family. Only after his daughter is attacked by a syndicate flunkey does Madison decide to fight back. At great personal risk, he manages to tape-record damning evidence against Portland's 'untouchable' criminal kingpin. 72 min. DVD 8237 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Possessed (1947)
- Directed by Curtis Bernhardt. Cast: Joan Crawford, Van Heflin, Raymond Massey, Geraldine Brooks, Stanley Ridges, John Ridgely, Moroni Olsen, Gerald Perreau. A solitary, emotionally unstable private nurse obsessively attempts to regain the love of a callous bachelor, which ultimately drives her into madness--and murder. DVD 4047; vhs 999:1085
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946)
- Directed by Tay Garnett. Cast: Lana Turner, John Garfield, Cecil Kellaway, Hume Cronyn, Leon Ames, Audrey Totter, Alan Reed. Steamy tale of a drifter offered a job at a roadside diner by the owner, an easy-going older man. When the drifter and the owner's voluptuous wife fall in love, they plot to kill her husband and run away together. DVD 2232; vhs 999:902
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981)
- See Neo-Noir
- Private Hell 36 (1954)
- Directed by Don Siegel. Cast: Ida Lupino, Howard Duff, Steve Cochran, Dean Jagger, Dorothy Malone. After receiving a stolen $50 bill from a patron, night club singer Lilli Marlow joins with two detectives to identify the criminal. During a high-speed car chase up a mountain road the fugitive crashes over an embankment and the detectives and Lilli find a box beside his body full of money -- enough money to lure the trio into a web of greed that will eventually cost one man his life. 81 min. 999:2756
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Bogdanovich, Peter. "Don Siegel." In: Who the devil made it New York : Alfred A. Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 1997 (Main Stack PN1995.9.P7.B58 1997; Moffitt PN1995.9.P7.B58 1997)
Georgakas, Dan. "Ida Lupino: Doing It Her Way." Cineaste, vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 32-36, 2000
UC users only
Lovell, Alan. Don Siegel : American cinema
London : British Film Institute, 1975.
(MAIN: PN1998.A3 S542 1975; PFA : PN1998.3.S54 L69 1975)
Sarris, Andrew. "Don Siegel: The Pro." Film Comment. New York: Sep 1991. Vol. 27, Iss. 5; p. 34 (4 pages) UC users only
Sheehan, Henry. "Dark worlds." Sight & Sound; Jun91, Vol. 1 Issue 2, p28-30, 2p
- Quai des Orfèvres (France, 1947)
- Director, Henri-Georges Clouzot. Cast: Louis Jouvet, Simone Renant, Bernard Blier, Pierre Larquey, Suzy Delair. "Blacklisted for his daring "anti-French" masterpiece, Le corbeau, Henri-Georges Clouzot returned to cinema four years later with the 1947 crime fiction adaptation, Quai des Orfèvres. Set within the vibrant dance halls and crime corridors of 1940s Paris, Quai des Orfèvres follows ambitious performer Jenny Lamour (Suzy Delair), her covetous husband Maurice Martineau (Bernard Blier), and their devoted confidante Dora Monier (Simone Renant) as they attempt to cover one another's tracks when a sexually orgreish high-society acquaintance is murdered. Enter Inspector Antoine (Louis Jouvet), whose seasoned instincts lead him down a circuitous path in this classic whodunit murder mystery." [Criterion catalog] 106 min. DVD 1816
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Mayne, Judith. "Dora the Image-Maker, and Henri-Georges Clouzot's Quai des Orfèvres." Studies in French Cinema, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 41-52, 2004
- Quicksand (1950)
- Directed by Irving Pichel. Cast: Mickey Rooney, Jeanne Cagney, Barbara Bates, Peter Lorre, Taylor Holmes, Art Smith, Wally Cassell. A law-abiding citizen "borrows" a few dollars to go out on a date. As fast as quicksand, his first minor criminal act turns into tragedy. Every means he tries to get out of trouble only gets him deeper into crime, while everyone he meets is out for what they can get. 79 min. DVD 2133
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- To the top
- The Racket (1947)
- Directed by John Cromwell. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Lizabeth Scott, Robert Ryan. A straight-arrow cop and an old-school gangster find a common foe: big shots who run crime like a corporation. 89 min. DVD 5851 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Railroaded (1951)
- Directed by Anthony Mann. Cast: John Ireland, Sheila Ryan, Hugh Beaumont, Jane Randolph, Ed Kelly. A detective attempts to clear his girlfriend's brother of a murder rap and find the real killer. In the process he uncovers the hidden workings of the city's seedy underworld. 74 min. DVD 166; VHS 2865 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Basinger, Jeanine. Anthony Mann Twayne Publishers, 1979 (MAIN: PN1998.A3 .M321143; MOFF: PN1998.A3 .M321143)
Smith, Robert E. "Mann in the dark : the films noir of Anthony Mann."
In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- Raw Deal (1948)
- Directed by Anthony Mann. Cast: Dennis O'Keefe, Claire Trevor, Marsha Hunt, Raymond Burr, John Ireland. Film noir involving a gangster seeking revenge afer being framed and sent to prison. With help from an innocent woman, the ex-con carries out his murderous plan of vengeance, eventually coming face-to-face with the pyromaniac responsible for his stay in prison. DVD 163; 999:1261 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Basinger, Jeanine. Anthony Mann Twayne Publishers, 1979 (MAIN: PN1998.A3 .M321143; MOFF: PN1998.A3 .M321143)
Renov, Michael. "Raw Deal: The Woman in the Text." Wide Angle, vol. 6 no. 2. 1984. pp: 18-22.
Smith, Robert E. "Mann in the dark : the films noir of Anthony Mann."
In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- The Reckless Moment (1949)
- Directed by Max Opuls. Cast: Joan Bennett, James Mason, Geraldine Brooks, Henry O'Neill, Shepperd Strudwick, David Bair, Ray Roberts. With her husband out of town, Lucia Harper has her hands full keeping her household in order. Her headstrong daughter, Bea, has taken up with a louse named Ted Darby and persists in meeting him despite her mother's warnings. During one tryst, Bea and Darby quarrel violently. Bea accidentally kills Darby and runs away. To protect her family, Lucia disposes of the body. Because of this rash act, she faces not only a murder investigation, but two ruthless blackmailers, Donnelly and Nagle. Fortunately for the Harper family, Donnelly has a change of heart and becomes their savior. Non-US format DVD (PAL, region 2). 79 min. DVD 6370 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Red House (1947)
- Directed by Delmer Daves. Cast: Edward G. Robinson, Judith Anderson, Lon McCallister, Allene Roberts. A farmer tries to keep the curious away and protect the secret of the sinister decaying old house deep in the woods. In order to fend off trespassers, he hires Teller to stand guard. Teller lives with his sister and his adopted daughter Meg. When they hire Meg's friend Nath to help out on the farm, the two kids start to wonder about the mysterious red house and decide to investigate. Features an eerie original score by Miklos Rozsa. 100 min. DVD 2134
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Riff-Raff (1947)
- Director, Ted Tetzlaff. Cast: Pat O'brien, Walter Slezak, Anne Jeffreys, George Givot. A mysterious map holds the key to billions of dollars worth of crude oil, and there's nothing that some men won't do to possess it. 80 min. 999:3711
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Rififi (Du rififi chez les hommes) (France, 1955)
- Directed by Jules Dassin. Cast: Jean Servais, Carl Mohner, Robert Manuel, Perlo Vita (i.e. Jules Dassin), Marie Sabouret, Janine Darcy, Claude Sylvain, Marcel Lupovici, Pierre Grassel, Robert Hossein, Magali Noel, Dominique Maurin. A suspenseful story of a successful jewel robbery engineered by an aging ex-con in which the four thieves betray each other. The film ends in an orgy of torture, murder, kidnapping and retribution. One of the greatest crime capers, it set the standard for all others that followed. Most notable is Dassin's exquisitely intense silent burglary sequence which runs nearly half an hour. "After making such American noir classics as The Naked City and Brute Force, blacklisted director Jules Dassin went to Paris and embarked on his masterpiece: a twisting, turning tale of four ex-cons who hatch one last glorious heist in the City of Lights. At once naturalistic and expressionistic, this melange of suspense, brutality, and dark humor was an international hit and earned Dassin the Best Director prize at the Cannes Film Festival." [Criterion catalog] 117 min. DVD 3903; vhs 999:2779 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Arthur, Paul. "Rififi." (motion picture review) Cineaste v 26 no1 2000. p. 52-4
McGilligan, Patrick.
"I'll always be an American: Jules Dassin interviewed." Film Comment. Nov/Dec 1996. Vol. 32, Iss. 6; p. 34 (15 pages)UC users only
Sragow, Michael. "A Noir Classic Makes It Back From the Blacklist." New York Times (Late Edition (East Coast)). New York, N.Y.: Jul 16, 2000. p. 2.7UC users only
- Road House (1948)
- Directed by Jean Negulesco. Cast: Ida Lupino, Cornel Wilde, Celeste Holm, Richard Widmark. da Lupino plays a sexy singer trying to make a quick buck as the star "attraction" at a roadside cocktail lounge and bowling alley. Richard Widmark plays a psychotic rich kid who wants to marry her. 95 min. DVD X105; vhs 999:478
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Georgakas, Dan. "Ida Lupino: Doing It Her Way." Cineaste, vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 32-36, 2000
UC users only
- Ruthless (1948)
- Directed by Edgar G. Ulmer. Cast: Zachary Scott, Louis Hayward, Diana Lynn, Edith Barrett, Sydney Greenstreet, Raymnd Burr, Lucille Bremer. Horace Vendig portrays himself as a rich philanthropist to the world but in fact, he has a jaded past and a pathalogical streak of hurting those closest to him. His ex-best friend has come back to see him, and his girlfriend has a haunting resemblance to the woman who severed their friendship. Horace's obsessive tendencies come into play as he tries to win over the new girl. 104 min. 999:3567 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Belton, John. Howard Hawks, Frank Borzage, Edgar G. Ulmer London : Tantivy Press ; New York : A.S. Barnes, 1974. (MAIN: PN1998.A3 H337 1974)
Bogdanovich, Peter. "Edgar G. Ulmer." In: Who the Devil Made It. New York : Alfred A. Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 1997. (Main Stack PN1995.9.P7.B58 1997; Moffitt PN1995.9.P7.B58 1997)
Edgar G. Ulmer the man off-screen [Videorecording] Media Resources Center DVD 6455
Gallagher, Tag. "All lost in wonder: Edgar G.Ulmer." Screening the Past, 1 March 2001 UC users only
Isenberg, Noah. "Perennial Detour: The Cinema of Edgar G. Ulmer and the Experience of Exile." Cinema Journal. Winter 2004. Vol. 43, Iss. 2; pg. 3, 23 pgsUC users only
- To the top
- The Scar (Hollow Triumph) (1948)
- Directed by Steve Sekelye. Cast: Paul Henreid, Joan Bennett, Eduard Franz, Leslie Brooks, John Qualen. An ex-medical student in trouble with gambling debts kills a psychiatrist who is his exact look-alike, except for a scar on the doctor's cheek. The student impersonates the dead psychiatrist, but mistakenly makes his own scar on the wrong cheek. It is not long before the doctor's secretary is on to him and he discovers the doctor had a few gambling debts himself. Originally made in 1948 as a motion picture under the title Hollow Triumph. Based on the novel by Murray Forbes. 83 min. DVD 3657; also VHS 999:2245 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Scarlet Street (1945)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Edward G. Robinson, Joan Bennett, Dan Duryea, Margaret Lindsay. The story of a middle-aged bookkeeper who gets involved with a femme fatale, her boy friend and murder. DVD 4911, DVD 2746; vhs 999:331 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Second Woman(1951)
- Directed by James V. Kern. Cast: Robert Young, Betsy Drake, John Sutton, Florence Bates, Morris Carnovsky, Henry O'Neill. A suspense-filled psychological melodrama of an architect whose life suddenly turns upside-down with the accidental death of his fiance. As the community suspects him of being responsible, he begins to doubt his own innocence. 91 min. DVD 3904; vhs 999:2873
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Secret Beyond the Door (1948)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Joan Bennett, Michael Redgrave, Anne Revere, Barbara O'Neil, Natalie Schafer. While on vacation, Celia, a wealthy heiress, meets and marries an architectural editor named Mark. They travel to Mark's New England mansion where Celia meets Mark's domineering older sister and son from a previous marriage. Celia is shocked to learn that her new husband collects rooms where murders have been committed, and adds them to his mansion. As more bizzare facts are revealed, Celia is determined to stay and find the cause of her husband's strange fascination with murder, even though she must risk her own life to do so. 99 min. 999:3101
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Set-Up (1949)
- Directed by Robert Wise. Cast: Robert Ryan, Audrey Totter, George Tobias, Alan Baxter, Wallace Ford. An over-the-hill boxer thinks he can still win a bout, despite doubts from his wife and his manager. He goes into his next fight determined to beat his opponent, not realizing his manager has taken money for a 'dive' from a tough gambler. 72 min. DVD 2719 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Seventh Victim (1953)
- Directed by Mark Robson; produced by Val Lewton. Cast: Kim Hunter, Jean Brooks, Tom Conway. During the 1940's, producer Val Lewton created a style of horror film that remains an important influence on the genre even today. His speciality: psychological terror, relying on the powers of his viewer's imagination. And nowhere is his hand more evident than in this mystery revolving around devil worship. When Jean Brooks disappears, her innocent sister (Kim Hunter) sets out to find her in the seamier regions of Greenwich Village. What she finds instead is a satanic cult with the intent of applying the title to her. 99 min. DVD 4481; vhs 999:3101 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Ashbery, John. "The Seventh Victim." Modern Painters v. 16 no. 3 (Aut 2003) p. 98-100UC users only
Siegal, Joel E. Val Lewton: the reality of terror London, Secker and Warburg; British film Institute, 1972. Cinema one, 22. (Main Stack PN1993.C45 v.22)
Telotte, J. P. Dreams of darkness: fantasy and the films of Val Lewton / Urbana, IL : University of Illinois Press, c1985. (Main Stack PN1998.A3.L488 1985)
- Shadow of a Doubt(1943)
- Directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Cast: Teresa Wright, Joseph Cotten, MacDonald Carey, Patricia Collinge. Joseph Cotten stars in this understated thriller as a beguiling murderer who charms his unsuspecting family, but soon his niece and namesake begins to suspect her uncle is hiding a terrible secret. DVD 638; also on VHS 999:292
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Shanghai Gesture(1941)
- Directed by Josef von Sternberg. Cast: Gene Tierney, Walter Huston, Victor Mature, Ona Munson, Phyllis Brooks, Albert Basserman. A film masterpiece of corruption and degradation long suppressed and censored. The terraced pit of Mother Gin Sling's gambling room with the whirling roulette wheel at the core, is her domain. The gamblers are her creatures in this melodrama of decadence and sexual guilt that uses Oriental motifs as a cypher for all that is unknowable. DVD 2998; also vhs 999:1257 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Shock (1946)
- Director, Alfred Werker. Cast: Vincent Price, Lynn Bari, Frank Latimore, Anabel Shaw, Michael Dunne, Reed Hadley. Vincent Price is Dr. Cross, a psychiatrist who murders his wife and discovers that the only witness is a neighbor who goes into shock after witnessing the carnage. Her well-meaning husband has her committed to the sanitarium run by Dr. Cross, who resolves to silence her forever by shocking her to death with an overdose of insulin. 70 min. DVD 2036 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Shock Corridor (1963)
- Directed by Samuel Fuller. Cast: Peter Breck, Constance Towers, James Best, Hari Rhodes. A journalist gets himself admitted to a mental hospital to solve the murder of an inmate, but as he closes in on the killer, madness closes in on him. DVD 1076; vhs 999:494 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Canham, Kingsley. "Samuel Fuller's Action Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
Fuller, Samuel. A Third face : my tale of writing, fighting and filmmaking / Samuel Fuller with Christa Lang Fuller and Jerome Henry Rude. New York : Alfred A. Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 2002. (Main Stack PN1998.3.F85.A3 2002)
Garnham, Nicholas. Samuel Fuller.
New York, Viking Press [1972, c1971] (MAIN: PN1993 .C45 v.15 [another edition]; MOFF: PN1998.A3 F843 1972)
Hardy, Phil. Samuel Fuller.
[New York] Praeger [1970] (MAIN: PN1998.A3F845 H3; MOFF: PN1998 A3 F845)
McArthur, Collin. "Samuel Fuller's Gangster Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
Sanjek, David. 'Torment Street between Malicious and Crude': Sophisticated Primitivism in the Films of Samuel Fuller. Literature/ Film Quarterly, vol. 22 no. 3. 1994. pp: 187-94.
Server, Lee. Sam Fuller : film is a battleground : a critical study, with interviews, a filmography, and a bibliography Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland, c1994. (MAIN: PN1998.3.F85 S47 1994)
- Side Street (1950)
- Directed by Anthony Mann. Cast: Farley Granger, Cathy O'Donnell, James Craig, Paul Kelly.
Joe Norson, a poor letter carrier with a sweet, pregnant wife, yields to momentary temptation and steals $30,000 belonging to a pair of ruthless blackmailers who won't stop at murder. After a few days of soul-searching, Joe offers to return the money, only to find that the "friend" he left it with has disappeared. Now every move Joe makes plunges him deeper into trouble, as he's pursued and pursuing through the shadowy, sinister side of New York. Special features: Commentaries by Farley Grange and film historian Eddie Muller on 'They live by night' and historian/critic Richard Schickel on 'Side street;' new featurettes: "They live by night: the twisted road" and "Side street: where temptation lurks;" 'Side street' theatrical trailer. 82 min. DVD 8400
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Basinger, Jeanine. Anthony Mann Twayne Publishers, 1979 (MAIN: PN1998.A3 .M321143; MOFF: PN1998.A3 .M321143)
Smith, Robert E. "Mann in the dark : the films noir of Anthony Mann."
In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- Somewhere in the Night (1946)
- Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz. Cast: John Hodiak, Nancy Guild, Lloyd Nolan, Richard Conte, Josephine Hutchinson, Fritz Kortner, Margo Woode, Sheldon Leonard, Lou Nova. A man awakens in a Honolulu hospital with no memory of his identity. He has three personal items : a wallet, a letter from an angry ex-lover, and a note from one Larry Cravat, an apparent business associate. Searching for Cravat, the amnesiac heads to Los Angeles, enlisting the help of a saloon singer, her boss and a police lieutenant. When he starts asking questions, he's blindsided by goons and chased by cops, but ultimately makes a shocking discovery. 108 min. DVD 4381Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Sorry, Wrong Number(1948)
- Directed by Anatole Litvak. Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Burt Lancaster, Wendell Corey, Harold Vermilyea, Ann Richards. Young, rich, bedridden Barbara Stanwyck dials a telephone number one night and overhears two men plotting the murder of an unidentified woman. She becomes frantic. Her terror is intensified by mysterious calls from an old college rival and a friend of her father. With time running out, Stanwyck pieces evidence together that leads her to suspect that it is her husband who wants her murdered. 89 min. DVD 3908; vhs 999:1300Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Lawrence, Amy. "Sorry, Wrong Number": The Organizing Ear."
Film Quarterly Vol. 40, No. 2 (Winter, 1986), pp. 20-27UC users only
Telotte, J. P. "The Call of Desire and the Film Noir." Literature/ Film Quarterly, vol. 17 no. 1. 1989. pp: 50-58.
Telotte, J. P. "Tangled Networks and Wrong Numbers." Film Criticism, vol. 10 no. 3. 1986 Spring. pp: 36-48.
- Strange Affair of Uncle Harry (1945)
- Directed by Robert Siodmak. Cast: George Sanders, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Ella Raines. Film about a young man whose jealous sister Lettie interferes with his romance. When he tries to poison Lettie, he kills his sister Hester by mistake. Ironically, Lettie is blamed for Hester's death and Harry decides he has committed the perfect crime. 999:676 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Alpi, Deborah Lazaroff. Robert Siodmak : a biography, with critical analyses of his films noirs and a filmography of all his works Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland, c1998.
(MAIN: PN1998.3.S54 A46 1998)
Koepnick, Lutz. "Doubling the Double: Robert Siodmak in Hollywood." New German Critique: An Interdisciplinary Journal of German Studies, vol. 89, pp. 81-104, Spring 2003
UC users only
Koepnick, Lutz. "Berlin Noir: Robert Siodmak’s Hollywood." In: The dark mirror: German cinema between Hitler and Hollywood / Berkeley: University of California Press, c2002.
(MAIN: PN1993.5.G3 K645 2002; Moffitt PN1993.5.G3 K645 2002
; Full-text of this book available online via ebrary - UC Berkeley users only)
Walker, Michael. "Robert Siodmak." In: The Book of film noir / edited by Ian Cameron.
Place/Publisher New York : Continuum, c1993. (Moffitt PN1995.9.F54.B66 1993; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 M68 1992)
- Strange Illusion (1947)
- Directed by Edgar G. Ulmer. Cast: James Lydon, Sally Eilers, Warren William, Regis Toomey, Charles Arnt. A son is haunted by dreams of the mysterious death of his father, dreams which he fears portend future events. The noir tone of the film is accentuated by the claustrophobic atmosphere of the mental hospital where the son is incarcerated with its controlled vision of chaos and corruption. DVD 863; VHS 999:682 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Belton, John. Howard Hawks, Frank Borzage, Edgar G. Ulmer London : Tantivy Press ; New York : A.S. Barnes, 1974. (MAIN: PN1998.A3 H337 1974)
Bogdanovich, Peter. "Edgar G. Ulmer." In: Who the Devil Made It. New York : Alfred A. Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 1997. (Main Stack PN1995.9.P7.B58 1997; Moffitt PN1995.9.P7.B58 1997)
Edgar G. Ulmer the man off-screen [Videorecording] Media Resources Center DVD 6455
Gallagher, Tag. "All lost in wonder: Edgar G.Ulmer." Screening the Past, 1 March 2001 UC users only
Isenberg, Noah. "Perennial Detour: The Cinema of Edgar G. Ulmer and the Experience of Exile." Cinema Journal. Winter 2004. Vol. 43, Iss. 2; pg. 3, 23 pgsUC users only
- Strange Impersonation (1946)
- Directed by Anthony Mann. Brenda Marshall stars as Nora Goodrich, a scientist working on an anesthesiology project. Her lab partner sabotages an experiment leaving Nora's face badly scarred. After her face is surgically altered, she plots revenge on her enemies. Based on a story by Anne Wigton and Lewis Herman. DVD 3849; vhs 999:2695 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Basinger, Jeanine. Anthony Mann Twayne Publishers, 1979 (MAIN: PN1998.A3 .M321143; MOFF: PN1998.A3 .M321143)
Smith, Robert E. "Mann in the dark: the films noir of Anthony Mann." In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions, 1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)
- Directed by Lewis Milestone. Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Van Heflin, Lizabeth Scott, Kirk Douglas, Judith Anderson. When streetwise gambler Sam Masterson returns to his home town, childhood sweetheart Martha assumes he has come to blackmail her over the suspicious death of her aunt, which he witnessed years earlier. Thus begins a deadly game of cat and mouse, in which the wealthy and powerful Martha, whose husband is the local district attorney, attempts to threaten, connive and seduce the truth from Sam's clenched lips. 118 min. DVD 685; VHS 999:1860 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Stranger (1946)
- Directed by Orson Welles. Cast: Edward G. Robinson, Loretta Young, Orson Welles, Philip Merivale, Richard Long, Konstantin Shayne, Byron Keith, Billy House, Martha Wentworth. An ex-Nazi is allowed to escape from a German war crimes prison after WWII to lead the Allies to a notorious spy planning to revive the Third Reich. The trail leads to a small Connecticut town where intrigue and murder combine for a tense situation. 95 min. DVD 1262; DVD 2746; vhs 999:1906
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Stranger on the 3rd Floor (1940)
- Directed by Boris Ingster. Cast: Peter Lorre, John McGuire, Elisha Cook, Jr., Margaret Tallichet, Charles Waldron. An innocent man, framed and imprisoned for a series of mysterious murders, is released from prison. He seeks his persecutors with a vengeance and finally discovers it was the maniacal Lorre that sent him up. 999:1235 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Duncan, Paul. "Force of Evil." In: Film Noir Trafalgar Square Pub., North Pomfret, VT: 2000. Full-text of this book available online via ebrary [UC Berkeley users only]
Turner, George. "Wrap shot." (origins of film noir)
American Cinematographer v 78 Oct 1997. p. 112
- Stray Dog (1949)
- Directed by Akira Kurosawa. Cast: Toshiro Mifune, Takashi Shimura, Ko Kimura, Keiko Awaji. Set in Tokyo during the late 1940's, the film captures the chaos and humiliation that existed in Japan immediately after World War II. When detective Murakami loses his revolver, he must descend into Tokyo's underworld and face the killer who has taken it. 122 min. 999:2243 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Maxfield, J. "The Moral Ambiguity Of Kurosawa Early Thrillers." Film Criticism 18: (1) 20-35 Fal 1993
Silverstein, Norman. "Kurosawa's Detective-Story Parables." Japan Quarterly 12:3 (1965:July/Sept.) 351
- Street With No Name (1948)
- Directed by William Keighley. Cast: Mark Stevens, Richard Widmark, Lloyd Nolan. Richard Widmark is Stiles, an up-and-coming crime boss trying to stake his claim in the criminal underworld. DVD 4069; vhs 999:470 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Sudden Fear (1952)
- Directed by David Miller. Cast: Joan Crawford, Jack Palance, Gloria Grahame, Bruce Bennett, Virginia Huston, Touch Conners. Myra Hudson (Joan Crawford) is a successful Broadway playwright who rejects Lester Blaine (Jack Palance) as the lead in her new play. Later, she meets Lester on a train bound for San Francisco, is swept off her feet, and, after a brief courtship, marries him. When Lester learns Myra is writing her will and plans to leave the bulk of her fortune to a foundation, he plots her murder in cahoots with Irene Neves (Gloria Grahame), an old girlfriend hiding in the wings. Myra discovers their plans and concocts a diabolical scheme to kill Lester and place the blame on Irene. Lester learns of Myra's intention and accidentally kills Irene and himself in an attempt on Myra's life. Myra hears the two pronounced dead and breathes a sigh of relief. 110 min. DVD 680
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Suddenly (1954)
- Directed by Lewis Allen. Cast: Frank Sinatra, Sterling Hayden, James Gleason, Nancy Gates, Kim Charney. Frank Sinatra's chilling central performance as a cold-blooded assassin with a heart of steel sparks this explosive thriller about a trio of hired gunmen who plan to murder the President of the United States during his stopover in a small town. 75 min. DVD 3906; vhs 999:2866
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Sunset Boulevard (1950)
- Directed by Billy Wilder. Cast: William Holden, Gloria Swanson, Erich von Stroheim. A harsh look at Hollywood in which an aging silent-movie queen makes a tragic attempt to return to stardom. 110 min. DVD 1476; vhs 999:182
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Sweet Smell of Success (1957)
- Directed by Alexander Mackendrick. Cast: Burt Lancaster, Tony Curtis, Susan Harrison, Martin Milner, Sam Levene. Film about a popular and powerful newspaper columnist and a slimy press agent in New York City. The columnist is obsessed with dominating the city, his readers and his lovely young sister. 97 min. DVD 1883; vhs 999:2262
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Sweet smell of success : the short fiction of Ernest LehmanWoodstock : Overlook Press, 2000. (MAIN: PS3562.E4283 A6 2000)
- To the top
- T-Men (1947)
- Directed by Anthony Mann. Cast: Dennis O'Keefe, June Lockhart, Alfred Ryder, Mary Meade, Wally Ford, Charles McGraw, Jane Randolph. There's plenty of action when two treasury agents infiltrate the ranks of a notorious counterfeiting ring known as the Vantucci Gang in this stylish film noir. DVD 163; VHS 999:710
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Basinger, Jeanine. Anthony Mann Twayne Publishers, 1979 (MAIN: PN1998.A3 .M321143; MOFF: PN1998.A3 .M321143)
Osteen, Mark. "Face Plates: T-Men and the Problem of Noir Counterfeiting." Quarterly Review of Film and Video, Volume 24, Issue 2, 2007, Pages 125 – 142 UC users only
Smith, Robert E. "Mann in the dark : the films noir of Anthony Mann."
In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
White, Susan. "T(He)-Men's Room: Masculinity and Space in Anthony Mann's T-Men." In: Masculinity : bodies, movies, culture / edited by Peter Lehman.
New York : Routledge, 2001. (Main Stack PN1995.9.M46.M34 2001)
- Tension (1950)
- Directed by John Berry. Cast: Richard Basehart, Audrey Totter, Cyd Charisse, Barry Sullivan.
A drugstore manager turns attempted killer after his conniving wife leaves him for another man. He devises a complex plan, which involves assuming a new identity, to make it look like someone else murdered her new boyfriend. Things take an unexpected turn when someone else commits the murder first and he becomes the prime suspect. Special features: Film historian commentaries by Alain silver and James Ursini on Where danger lives and Alain Silver and Elizabeth Ward with Audrey Totter on Tension; new featurettes: "Where danger lives: white rose for Julie" and "Tension: who's guilty now?;" theatrical trailers. 91 min. DVD 8401
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- They Drive by Night (1940)
- Directed by Raoul Walsh. Cast: George Raft, Ann Sheridan, Ida Lupino, Humphrey Bogart, Gale Page, Alan Hale, Roscoe Karns. Paul Fabrini and his brother Joe are wildcat drivers-- men who buy their trucks on installment plans and then worry that loan sharks will repossess their trucks. As they drive their truck over rough California roads, night after night, their rough life gets even tougher when they get involved with murder and the mob. 94 min. DVD 3905; vhs 999:2532
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Georgakas, Dan. "Ida Lupino: Doing It Her Way." Cineaste, vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 32-36, 2000
UC users only
- They Live By Night (1948)
- Directed by Nicholas Ray. Cast: Cathy O'Donnell, Farley Granger, Howard da Silva, Jay C. Flippen, William Phipps, Ian Wolfe, Helen Craig.
Three prisoners flee from a state prison farm in Mississippi. Among them is 23-years-young Bowie, who spent the last seven years in prison and now hopes to be able to prove his innocence or retire to a home in the mountains and live in peace together with his new love, Kitty. But his criminal companions persuade him to participate in several heists, and soon the police believe him to be their leader and go after "Bowie the Kid" harder than ever. Special features: Commentaries by Farley Grange and film historian Eddie Muller on 'They live by night' and historian/critic Richard Schickel on 'Side street;' new featurettes: "They live by night: the twisted road" and "Side street: where temptation lurks;" 'Side street' theatrical trailer. 95 min. DVD 8400
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Thief (1952)
- Director, Russell Rouse. Cast: Ray Milland, Martin Gabel, Rita Gam, Harry Bronson, John McKutcheon, Rita Vale, Rex O'Malley, Joe Conlin. An atomic scientist and communist agent is caught by an FBI man while stealing vital documents, and is forced to kill him. While on the run from government agents he kills another man when cornered by the FBI, is overcome with remorse and turns himself in. The whole film is without dialogue, with only the musical score and magnified sound effects to create the feeling of tension and danger. 86 min. DVD 2042
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- This Gun for Hire (1942)
- Directed by Frank Tuttle. Cast: Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, Robert Preston, Laird Cregar. This film noir is a hard-edged story of love, power, and betrayal set in the seamy underworld of the 1940's. Ladd portrays a cold-blooded professional killer who's been double-crossed by his client. DVD 2744; vhs 999:1706
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Too Late for Tears (Killer Bait) (1949)
- Directed by Byron Haskin. Cast: Lizabeth Scott, Don DeFore, Arthur Kennedy, Dan Duryea. A bag containing $60,000 is thrown into the convertible of a young couple. The wife murders her husband to keep the money and is prepared to murder anyone who gets in her way. 98 min. DVD 2746; also DVD X971; vhs 999:2876
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Touch of Evil (1958)
- Directed by Orson Welles. Cast: Charlton Heston, Janet Leigh, Orson Welles, Marlene Dietrich, Joseph Calleia, Ray Collins, Akim Tamiroff, Zsa Zsa Gabor. An elaborate mystery involving a corrupt police official in a squalid town on the Mexican border and a murder that ensnares a narcotics agent and his wife. DVD 382 (Restored version); VHS 999:645
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Tough Assignment (1949)
- Directed by William Beaudine. Cast: Don "Red" Barry, Steve Brodie, Marjorie Steele, Marc Lawrence, Iris Adrian.
A newspaper reporter pursues a modern-day rustling gang whose truck driving 'cowboys' are far more dangerous than their horse riding counterparts. 66 min. DVD 8249
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- To the top
- Undercurrent (1946)
- Directed by Vincente Minnelli. Cast: Katharine Hepburn, Robert Taylor, Robert Mitchum, Edmund Gwenn, Marjorie Main, Jayne Meadows. The young bride of a power hungry husband, who is driven to madness and murder, desperately attempts to unravel the cause of her brooding husband's problems. A desperate search for the key to his unbridled hatred for his missing brother takes her down a dark road of twisted emotions, culminating in an unexpected and unforgettable climactic sequence. 126 min. DVD 7602; vhs 999:2350
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Underworld Story (1950)
- Directed by Cyril Endfield. Cast: Dan Duryea, Herbert Marshall, Gale Storm. Powerful indictment of sensationalist journalism, Dan Duryea portrays an unscrupulous reporter who stumbles onto a cover-up that may get him killed. 999:468
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Underworld U.S.A. (1961)
- Directed by Samuel Fuller. Cast: Cliff Robertson, Dolores Dorn, Beatrice Kay, Paul Dubov, Robert Emhardt, Larry Gates. Cliff Robertson is caught between the government and organized crime. After witnessing the brutal murder of his father, Robertson's vow to avenge this death leads him into a violent underworld, where even the toughest criminals must fight to stay alive. 999:493
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Canham, Kingsley. "Samuel Fuller's Action Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
Fuller, Samuel. A Third face : my tale of writing, fighting and filmmaking / Samuel Fuller with Christa Lang Fuller and Jerome Henry Rude. New York : Alfred A. Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 2002. (Main Stack PN1998.3.F85.A3 2002)
Garnham, Nicholas. Samuel Fuller.
New York, Viking Press [1972, c1971] (MAIN: PN1993 .C45 v.15 [another edition]; MOFF: PN1998.A3 F843 1972)
Gordon, Marsha. "What makes a girl who looks like that get mixed up in science?": gender in Sam Fuller's films of the 1950s." Quarterly Review of Film and Video v. 17 no. 1 (2000) p. 1-17
Hardy, Phil. Samuel Fuller.
[New York] Praeger [1970] (MAIN: PN1998.A3F845 H3; MOFF: PN1998 A3 F845)
McArthur, Colin. Underworld U.S.A. New York, Viking Press [1972]. (PN1995.9.G3 M3 Moffitt; Main PN1993 .C45 v.20)
McArthur, Collin. "Samuel Fuller's Gangster Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
Sanjek, David. 'Torment Street between Malicious and Crude': Sophisticated Primitivism in the Films of Samuel Fuller. Literature/ Film Quarterly, vol. 22 no. 3. 1994. pp: 187-94.
Server, Lee. Sam Fuller : film is a battleground : a critical study, with interviews, a filmography, and a bibliography Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland, c1994. (MAIN: PN1998.3.F85 S47 1994)
- To the top
- Wages of Fear (Le Salaire de la peur) (France / Italy, 1952)
- Directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot. A study of courage and cowardice in the face of almost insurmountable odds. After establishing the characters of the protagonists in a long prologue, director Clouzot follows them as they transport a cargo of nitroglycerin over a primitive mountain road to a conclusion of high suspence and final irony. 148 min. DVD 431; VHS 999:683
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Where Danger Lives (1950)
- Directed by John Farrow. Cast: Maureen O'Sullivan, Charles Kemper, Robert Mitchum, Claude Rains, Faith Domergue.
Jeff Cameron, a young intern at the beginning of his career, links his destiny to that of a patient who is brought to the hospital after a suicide attempt. Jeff dumps the secure, rather plain nurse Julie, for the passionate but perplexing Margo. Confused and caught up in Margo's deceptions, Jeff loses his sense of reality and finds himself fleeing with her for the Mexican border. Special features: Film historian commentaries by Alain silver and James Ursini on Where danger lives and Alain Silver and Elizabeth Ward with Audrey Totter on Tension; new featurettes: "Where danger lives: white rose for Julie" and "Tension: who's guilty now?;" theatrical trailers. 80 min. DVD 8401
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Where the Sidewalk Ends (1950)
- Directed by Otto Preminger. Cast: Dana Andrews, Gene Tierney, Karl Malden, Gary Merrill. Cop Mark Dixon is already in trouble with his superiors for his brutal tactics when he accidentally kills a murder suspect. To protect himself, he decides to cover it up and pin the killing on a racketeer he hates and knows has committed many crimes like this in the past.148 min. DVD 3481
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Wegner, Hart. "From Expressionism to Film Noir: Otto Preminger's Where the Sidewalk Ends." Journal of Popular Film and Television, vol. 11, no. 2, pp. 56-65, Summer 1983
UC users only
- Frischauer, Willi. Behind the scenes of Otto Preminger; an unauthorized biography New York, Morrow, 1974 [c1973] (MOFF: PN1998.A3 .P674 1973)
Pratley, Gerald. The cinema of Otto Preminger London, A. Zwemmer; New York, A. S. Barnes [1971] (MAIN: PN1998.A3 P6831)
Preminger, Otto. Preminger : an autobiography
Garden City, N.Y. : Doubleday, 1977.
(MAIN: PN1998 A3.P6721 1977; PFA : PN1998.3.P74 P74 1977)
Smith, Imogen Sara. "Dana Andrews: The Forties Hero and His Shadow." Bright Lights Film Journal, November 2008 | Issue 62
- Whirlpool (1950)
- Directed by Otto Preminger. Cast: Gene Tierney, Richard Conte, Jose Ferrer, Charles Bickford. Ann Sutton, the wealthy wife of a remote psychoanalyst, is caught shoplifting and is rescued from certain scandal by a suave and sinister hypnotist. She is soon in his power and enmeshed in a web of blackmail and murder. 93 min. DVD 4410; Non-US (PAL) format DVD 4126
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Frischauer, Willi. Behind the scenes of Otto Preminger; an unauthorized biography New York, Morrow, 1974 [c1973] (MOFF: PN1998.A3 .P674 1973)
Pratley, Gerald. The cinema of Otto Preminger London, A. Zwemmer; New York, A. S. Barnes [1971] (MAIN: PN1998.A3 P6831)
Preminger, Otto. Preminger : an autobiography
Garden City, N.Y. : Doubleday, 1977.
(MAIN: PN1998 A3.P6721 1977; PFA : PN1998.3.P74 P74 1977)
- White Heat (1949)
- Directed by Raoul Walsh. Cast: James Cagney, Virginia Mayo, Edmond O'Brien, Fred Clark. Cody Jarrett is a psychopathic gangster and a ruthless killer who is anything but rational with his fierce headaches and strong mother-fixation. DVD 3513; also vhs 999:817
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Fischer, Lucy. "Mama's Boy: Filial Hysteria in White Heat." In: Screening the Male: Exploring Masculinities in Hollywood Cinema / edited by Steven Cohan and Ina Rae Hark. pp: 70-83. London; New York: Routledge, c1993. (Main Stack PN1995.9.M46.S36 1993; Moffitt PN1995.9.M46.S36 1993)
- Why Won't They Believe Me (1947)
- Directed by Irving Pichel. Cast: Susan Hayward, Robert Young, Rita Johnson, Jane Greer, Tom Powers, George Tyne, Don Beddoe, Frank Ferguson, Harry Harvey.
On trial for murder, Larry Ballantyne regurgitates an unbelievable story. He recounts how he philanders to other women while his rich loving wife Gretta tries to keep him in line. According to Larry, his girlfriend Verna dies accidentally in a car crash and his distraught wife tosses herself over a cliff after he runs out on her. The jury has a tough decision on this one. 80 min. DVD 9597
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Woman in the Window (1945)
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Edward G. Robinson, Joan Bennett, Raymond Massey, Edmund Breon, Dan Duryea. Professor Richard Wanley, with his wife and kids out of town, engages in an innocent flirtation with a chance acquaintance and inadvertently commits a shocking crime! But that's just the beginning of his problems, for as the cunning D.A. gets closer to identifying the killer, Wanley finds he's more and more willing to resort to desperate measures to avoid being caught. Based on the novel Once off guard by J.H. Wallis. 99 min. DVD 8253; vhs 999:2677
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- A Woman's Secret (1949)
- Directed by Nicholas Ray. Cast: Maureen O'Hara, Melvyn Douglas, Gloria Grahame, Bill Williams, Victor Jory. Susan, a successful radio songstress is shot following a quarrel with her closest friend Marian, who calmly admits the crime. While Susan fights to recover and Marian is held in custody, Luke, who is in love with Marian, tries to justify through flashback his belief in Marian's innocence. 85 min. 999:3605
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- You and Me
- Directed by Fritz Lang. Cast: Sylvia Sidney, George Raft, Barton MacLane, Harry Carey, Roscoe Karns. In this unusual film noir a group of ex-cons work in a department store whose owner believes in rehabilitation. Projecting the message that "crime doesn't pay," this is a romantic crime story, laced with comedy and social commentary. 94 min. 999:2871
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
British Film Noir
- Bibliography of articles and books about British Film Noir
Hammer Films bibliography
Hammer Films web site
- Bad Blonde (aka The Flanagan Boy) (UK, 1953)
- Directed by Reginald Le Borg. Cast: Barbara Payton, Frederick Valk, John Slater, Sid James, Tony Wright. A scheming blonde seduces a fighter and convinces him to murder her husband, a fight manager who is promoting the young man's career. 81 min. DVD 6021 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Black Glove (aka Face the Music) (UK, 1954)
- Directed by Terence Fisher. Cast: Eleanor Summerfield, John Saley, Paul Carpenter, Geoffrey Keen.
A famed trumpet player is suspected of murdering a blues singer. Using only two minor clues, he narrows the suspects to four people, but only after surviving poison placed on the mouthpiece of his trumpet. 84 min. DVD 8360 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Blackout (aka Murder by Proxy) (UK, 1954)
- Directed by Terence Fisher. Cast: Dane Clark, Belinda Lee, Betty Ann Davies, Eleanor Summerfield, Andrew Osborn. An American drifter in London meets a stunning blonde while on a bender at a bar. The girl tricks him into marrying her while he is in a drunken stupor. When he wakes up he finds 500 pounds in his pocket and discovers he is involved in a murder and an inheritance scam. 87 min. DVD 6021 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Deadly Game (aka Third Party Risk) (UK, 1954)
- Directed by Daniel Birt. Cast: Simone Silva, Finlay Currie, Maureen Swanson, Ferdy Mayne.
Vacationing at a resort hotel in Spain, Phil runs into an old friend and agrees to drive his car to London for him. After saying goodbye to his old buddy, another hotel guest, the enigmatic Mr. Darius, as well as a local police inspector, tell Phil that his old friend has become involved in criminal enterprises. When Phil finds him murdered upon returning to Britain, he finds himself in possession of an envelope filled with mysterious microfilm that everyone seems to want. 63 min. DVD 8360 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Gambler and the Lady (1952)
- Directed by Patrick Jenkins. Cast: Dane Clark, Naomi Chance, Meredith Edwards, Thomas Gallagher, Eric Pohlmann, Anthony Forwood. A greedy but successful professional gambler wants to join the British Establishment when he falls in love with a blue-blooded lady. But first he must mend his ways and then dump his nightclub singer girl friend. She's not so easy to get rid of, and neither is his past. 72 min. DVD 6021 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Glass Tomb (aka The Glass Cage) (UK, 1955)
- Directed by Montgomery Tully. Cast: John Ireland, Honor Blackman, Geoffrey Keen, Eric Pohlman, Sidney James.
A circus barker stages a sensational new act, the world's longest fast undertaken by "Sapolio", on view in a glass cage. But this act also results in several murders, a kidnapping, and a poisoning. 59 min. DVD 8346
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Heat Wave (aka The House Across the Lake) (1954)
- Directed by Ken Hughes. Cast: Alex Nicol, Hillary Brooke, Susan Stephen, Sid James, Alan Wheatley, Paul Carpenter.
An American writer living in England gets entangled in a scheme by a beautiful blonde to murder her rich husband. 68 min. DVD 6021
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- I'll Get You (aka Escape Route) (UK, 1952)
- Directed by Seymour Friedman and Peter Graham Scott. Cast: George Raft, Sally Grey, Frederick Piper, Reginald Tate, Clifford Evans.
An F.B.I. agent illegally enters England following the disappearance of several noted atomic scientists. He promptly 'disappears' himself and is dogged by trouble and the Scotland Yard. 79 min. DVD 8250
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Man Bait (aka The Last Page) (UK, 1952)
- Directed by Terence Fisher. Cast: George Brent, Marguerite Chapman, Raymond Huntley, Diana Dors. The married owner of a bookstore is attracted to his sexy blonde clerk. He finally gives in to temptation and makes a pass at her, but that only results in his entanglement in blackmail and murder. 84 min. DVD 6021 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Night and the City (UK, 1950)
- Directed by Jules Dassin. Cast: Richard Widmark, Gene Tierney, Googie Withers, Hugh Marlowe, Francis L. Sullivan, Herbert Lom. "Two-bit hustler Harry Fabian (Richard Widmark) aches for a life of ease and plenty. Trailed by an inglorious history of go-nowhere schemes, he stumbles upon a chance of a lifetime in the form of legendary wrestler Gregorius the Great (Stanislaus Zbyszko). But there is no easy money in this underworld of shifting alliances, bottomless graft, and pummeled flesh––and Fabian soon learns the horrible price of his ambition. Luminously shot in the streets of London, Jules Dassin’s Night and the City is film noir of the first order and one of the director’s crowning achievements." [Criterion catalog] 96 min. DVD 3579
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Erickson, Glenn. "Expressionist doom in Night and the city." In: Film noir reader / edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini. 1st Limelight ed. New York : Limelight Editions,
1996. (MAIN: PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996; PFA : PN1995.9.F54 F57 1996)
- Paid to Kill (aka Five Days) (UK, 1954)
- Directed by Montgomery Tully. Cast: Dane Clark, Paul Carpenter, Thea Gregory, Cecile Chevreau.
A man's business deal fails and to provide for his "adoring" wife, he hires his best friend to kill him so his wife can collect on his insurance. The business deal comes through at the last minute, but he finds he can't call off the murder. His treacherous double-crossing wife has different ideas. 71 min. DVD 8346
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Race for Life (aka Mask of Dust) (UK, 1954)
- Directed by Terence Fisher. Cast: Richard Conte, Mari Aldon, George Coulouris, Peter Illing, Alec Mango.
An idol of auto-racing fans attempts a comeback after serving in the Air Force. When his former rival lies dying in the hospital, he must decide whether to continue in the Grand Prix or make peace with his adversary. 65 min. DVD 8361
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Stolen Face (UK,1952)
- Directed by Terence Fisher. Cast: Paul Henreid, Lizabeth Scott, Mary Mackenzie, Andre Morell, John Wood. A plastic surgeon has a brief fling with a concert pianist, who leaves him to return to her previous boyfriend. He finds a horribly scared patient and fashions her face into the image of his former lover and enters into a marriage that is disappointing. 72 min. DVD 6021 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Terror Street (aka 36 Hours) (UK, 1953)
- Directed by Montgomery Tully. Cast: Elsy Albin, Ann Gudrun, Eric Polmann, Dan Duryea.
U.S. Air Force pilot becomes the logical suspect after his wife is shot and killed. The thirty-six hours he has to clear himself are filled with twists and turns culminating in an exciting climax. 85 min. DVD 8345
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- They Made Me a Fugitive (UK, 1947)
- Directed by Alberto Cavalcanti. Cast: Sally Gray, Trevor Howard, Griffith Jones, Rene Ray. Ex-RAF flyer Morgan, bored with civilian life, joins a gang led by Narcy. On his first job, a policeman is killed, Morgan is framed for the killing and jailed. He escapes and makes it to London, where he is sheltered by Sally, who falls in love with him. Seeking revenge, he confronts Narcy and the gang in an abandoned warehouse. 103 min. DVD 3951; vhs Video/C 999:3232
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Unholy Four (aka A Stranger Came Home) (UK, 1954)
- Director, Terence Fisher. Cast: Paulette Goddard, William Sylvester, Patrick Holt, Paul Carpenter.
Someone knocked a man out and left him for dead during a fishing trip in Portugal. That someone is either his fetching wife or two business partners, all sporting guilty faces after his unexpected return. Two more murders and a frame-up befall the quartet before an inspector closes the case. 80 min. DVD 8361
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Wings of Danger (UK, 1952)
- Directed by Terence Fisher. Cast: Zachary Scott, Robert Beatty, Kay Kendall, Naomi Chance, Arthur Lane.
A former pilot suffering from blackouts discovers that a fellow flyer is supected of being mixed up with a web of smugglers. While searching for his missing buddy, he unwittingly becomes entangled in a morass of suspicion. 73 min. DVD 8345 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
Neo-Noir and Noir-Inspired Films
- After Dark, My Sweet (1990)
- Directed by James Foley. Cast: Jason Patric, Rachel Ward, Bruce Dern. An ex-boxer seems the perfect pawn to pull off a kidnapping planned by a sexy widow and a cop-turned-con man. What they don't know is that he is an escapee from a mental institution. When he realizes he's been manipulated, he turns the tables with a game of deceit and raw desire that can only end in death. 114 min. DVD 2005
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Against All Odds (1984)
- Directed by Taylor Hackford. Cast: Rachel Ward, Jeff Bridges, James Woods, Alex Karras, Jane Greer, Richard Widmogan, a cynical ex-football star, is hired to find Jessie Wyler, the runaway mistress of a ruthless L.A. nightclub owner, Jake Wise. According to Jake, Jessie had stabbed him and vanished with $50,000. But Terry's mission is soon forgotten when he tracks down the beautiful Jessie on a Mexican island and falls in love with her. 122 min. DVD 3817; vhs 999:2337
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
Movie Review Query Engine- Arnett, Robert. "Eighties noir: the dissenting voice in Reagan's America.(analysis of outstanding film noir works in the 1980s)." Journal of Popular Film and Television 34.3 (Fall 2006): 123(7).
UC users only
- Alphaville (Alphaville, une Ètrange aventure de Lemmy Caution) (1965)
- Directed by Jean-Luc Godard. A story which unfolds in a utopian world of the future. Alphaville is governed by a totalitarian system in which the individual counts for almost nothing, and an alienated society has no use for art, poetry, love, or even thought. People are reduced essentially to the level of robots. 98 min.DVD 86; vhs 999:73
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Angel Heart (1987)
- Directed by Alan Parker. Cast: Mickey Rourke, Robert DeNiro, Lisa Bonet, Charlotte Rampling. A journey of violence and murder that canvasses the streets of Harlem, the jazz clubs of New Orleans, and voodoo rituals in the swamps of Louisiana. From the novel "Falling angel" by William Hjortsberg. 98 min. DVD 3819; vhs 999:2295
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database Movie Review Query Engine
- Bad Influence (1990)
- Directed by Curtis Hanson. Cast: Rob Lowe, James Spader, Lisa Zane. Michael Boll, an ambitious young businessman who seems to have everything, befriends Alex, a mysterious drifter with fatal charm and an insatiable appetite for wine, women and danger ... but Michael soon learns that hanging out with Alex can be murder! 100 min. DVD 2033
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Bad Sleep Well (1960)
- Directed by Akira Kurosawa. Akira Kurosawa, the acclaimed Japanese director, adopts the American gangster-film style to weave a fascinating tale of corporate greed. The story focuses on a grieving son, (Toshiro Mifune), who seeks revenge for his father's murder as he infiltrates the corrupt construction company that was responsible for his father's death. 152 min. DVD 2834; also vhs 999:2283
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Big Easy (1986)
- Directed by Jim McBride. Cast: Dennis Quaid, Ellen Barkin, Ned Beatty, John Goodman. When a hood's murder triggers a bloody gangland drug war, New Orleans detective Remy McSwain, who fits right in with the easy style of Cajun country, meets his match in Anne Osborne, a no-nonsense Assistant D.A. in town to investigate police corruption. At odds from the moment they meet, this is a saucy blend of New Orleans nightlife, romance and suspence. Special features: Cast and crew information, interactive menus, scene access, theatrical trailer. Originally produced as a motion picture in 1986. 100 min. DVD 130
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database Movie Review Query Engine
- Arnett, Robert. "Eighties noir: the dissenting voice in Reagan's America.(analysis of outstanding film noir works in the 1980s)." Journal of Popular Film and Television 34.3 (Fall 2006): 123(7).
UC users only
- The Black Dahlia (2007)
- Directed by Brian De Palma. Cast: Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Eckhart, Hilary Swank, Mia Kirshner, Mike Starr, Fiona Shaw, Patrick Fischler, James Otis.
Set in 1940s Los Angeles, two police officers, Bucky Bleichert and his partner, Lee Blanchard, investigate the death of Elizabeth Short - also known as The Black Dahlia, a young woman who is found brutally murdered. Bucky soon realizes that his girlfriend had ties to the deceased, and soon after that, he begins uncovering corruption and conspiracy within the police department. The case becomes an obsession for the two men as their lives begin to unravel. Special features: "Reality and fiction: the story of 'The Black Dahlia" ; the case file ; the De Palma touch. Based on the novel by James Ellroy. 122 min. DVD 7640
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Black Rain (1989)
- Directed by Ridley Scott. Cast: Michael Douglas, Andy Garcia, Ken Takakura, Kate Capshaw. Two New York cops escort a vicious assassin back to his native Japan where they are led into Osaka's exotic underworld and straight into the center of a raging, brutal "Yakuza" gangland battle. 125 min. DVD 2034
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Black Widow (1987)
- Directed by Bob Rafelson. Cast: Debra Winger, Theresa Russell, Sami Frey, Dennis Hopper, Nicol Williamson. Catharine is a sultry beauty who meticulously sets her traps. Alex is a federal agent who just as meticulously uncovers what no one else suspects--that this woman tricks wealthy men into marrying her, then kills them to inherit their fortunes. 101 min. DVD 3822; vhs 999:2300
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database Movie Review Query Engine
- Arnett, Robert. "Eighties noir: the dissenting voice in Reagan's America.(analysis of outstanding film noir works in the 1980s)." Journal of Popular Film and Television 34.3 (Fall 2006): 123(7).
UC users only
- Blade Runner: The Director's Cut (1982)
- Directed by Ridley Scott. Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, Edward James Olmos, Daryl Hannah. A science fiction film set in Los Angeles in 2019. Deckard, an expert "blade runner," must identify and execute four replicants, genetically engineered beings virtuallyidentical to humans, which have illegally returned to earth from their off-world slave duty. 117 min. DVD 4; VHS 999:540
Another edition: DVD 9222: Disc 1: Blade Runner: the final cut (117 min.) -- Disc 2: Blade Runner: Dangerous days: making Blade Runner (special features) -- Disc 3: Blade Runner (contains U.S. theatrical cut (1982) ; International theatrical cut (1982) ; director's cut (1992) (117 min.) -- Disc 4: Blade Runner: enhancement archive (special features) -- Disc 5: Blade Runner: Workprint (110 min.)
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Gospel According to Philip K. Dick Video/C 7650
- Blood Simple (1983)
- Directed by Joel Coen. Cast: John Getz, Frances McDormand, Dan Hedaya, Samm-Art Williams, M. Emmet Walsh. A jealous husband hires a sleezy private eye to murder his adulterous wife and her lover in this thriller set in rural Texas which combines chilling suspense with offbeat humor to create an all-American version of the classic "film noir." 96 min. DVD 3334; also VHS 999:2120
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- Blue Velvet (1986)
- Directed by David Lynch. Cast: Kyle MacLachlan, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper, Laura Dern, Hope Lange, George Dickerson, Dean Stockwell. A young man finds a severed ear whose trail leads him to a detective's daughter and a mesmerizing beauty in this surreal journey that peeks through the windows and over the well-trimmed hedges of a seemingly serene small town, discovering murder, mystery and perversion. 136 min. DVD 299; VHS 999:1844
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- Body Double (1984)
- Director/producer/story, Brian De Palma. Cast: Craig Wasson, Gregg Henry, Melanie Griffith, Deborah Shelton. A house-sitting actor finds himself obsessed with his beautiful neighbor. When she is brutally murdered, he engages the unwitting key to the crime, porn queen Holly Body, to help him catch the killer. 117 min. DVD 1228Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Arnett, Robert. "Eighties noir: the dissenting voice in Reagan's America.(analysis of outstanding film noir works in the 1980s)." Journal of Popular Film and Television 34.3 (Fall 2006): 123(7).
UC users only
- Body Heat (1981)
- Direced by Lawrence Kasdan. Cast: William Hurt, Kathleen Turner, Richard Crenna, Ted Danson, J.A. Preston, Mickey Rourke. A likable, unambitious Florida attorney and his siren-like lover plot to kill her wealthy husband. 113 min. DVD 3827; vhs 999:2233Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Arnett, Robert. "Eighties noir: the dissenting voice in Reagan's America.(analysis of outstanding film noir works in the 1980s)." Journal of Popular Film and Television 34.3 (Fall 2006): 123(7).
UC users only
- Breathless (A Bout de Souffle) (1960)
- Directed by Jean-Luc Godard. In this groundbreaking new wave classic a playful car thief accidentally shoots a policeman, then hides out in Paris with a hip American girl, trying to hustle enough cash for a getaway. 90 min. DVD 937; vhs 999:417 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Brick (2005)
- Directed by Rian Johnson. Cast: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Lukas Haas, Emilie de Ravin, Noah Fleiss, Matt O'Leary. Brendon Frye is a loner, someone who always knows all the angles but has chosen to stay on the outside. When the girl he loves turns up dead, he is determined to find the 'who' and 'why'. 110 min. DVD 6125 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Cape Fear (1991)
- Directed by Martin Scorsese. Cast: Robert De Niro, Nick Nolte, Jessica Lange, Joe Don Baker, Juliette Lewis. Fourteen years after being imprisoned, psychopath Max Cady emerges with a single-minded mission: to seek revenge on his attorney Sam Bowden. 128 min. DVD 3298; vhs 999:2221Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database Movie Review Query Engine
- Cat Chaser (1988)
- Directed by Abel Ferrara. Cast: Peter Weller, Kelly McGillis, Charles Durning, Frederic Forrest, Tomas Milian, Juan Fernandez. Something was calling former Lance Corporal George "Cat Chaser" Maran away from his quiet retreat-- the haunting memory of his violent brush with death. On a trip to Santo Domingo in search of the woman who saved his life, George Moran instead reunites with the sensual Mary de Boya-- a woman whose love could cost him everything. He's about to pay the steep price for lust, desception and revenge. From the novel by Elmore Leonard. 90 min. 999:107 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Le Cercle rouge (Red Circle) (France / Italy, 1970)
- Directed by Jean-Pierre Melville. Cast: Alain Delon, André Bourvil, Gian Maria Volante, Yves Montand, Paul Crauchet, François Perier. "Master thief Corey (Alain Delon) is fresh out of prison. But instead of toeing the line of law-abiding freedom, he finds his steps leading back to the shadowy world of crime, crossing those of a notorious escapee (Gian Maria Volonté) and alcoholic ex-cop (Yves Montand). As the unlikely trio plots a heist against impossible odds, their trail is pursued by a relentless inspector (Bourvil), and fate seals their destinies. Jean-Pierre Melville's Le cercle rouge combines honorable anti-heroes, coolly atmospheric cinematography, and breathtaking set pieces to create a masterpiece of crime cinema." [Criterion catalog] 140 min. DVD 2201
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- Healey, Michael. "Le Cercle rouge." Senses of Cinema
- China Moon (1991)
- Directed by John Bailey. Cast: Ed Harris, Madeleine Stowe, Benicio Del Toro, Charles Dance. Veteran homicide detective Kyle Bodine must learn the secrets of his lover's sordid past and her role in her husband's mysterious death, before it's too late. 99 min. 999:2874Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Chinatown (1974)
- Directed by Roman Polanski. Cast: Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Hillerman, Perry Lopez, Burt Young, Bruce Glover, Joe Mantell, Roy Jenson, Diane Ladd, Dick Bakalyan, John Huston. The plot is a labyrinth of successive revelations having to do with Los Angeles water reserves, land rights, fraud and intra-family hanky-panky, climaxing in Los Angeles's Chinatown. DVD 162; VHS 999:381 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- City of Industry (1997)
- Directed by John Irvin. Cast: Harvey Keitel, Stephen Dorff, Timothy Hutton. Roy Egan is a master at armed robbery, but he's seen enough and done enough time, that he wants out--until his brother proposes a job he can't resist, which appears to be a sure thing. One of the friends gets greedy, however, and pulls a deadly double-cross. This sets the stage for a pulse-pounding game of cat and mouse, as Roy relentlessly tracks him down, hell-bent on revenge. 97 min. DVD 3829; vhs 999:2328Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database Movie Review Query Engine
- Collateral (2004)
- Directed by Michael Mann. Cast: Tom Cruise, Jamie Foxx, Jada Pinkett Smith, Mark Ruffalo, Peter Berg, Bruce McGill, Irma P. Hall, Barry Shabaka Henley. Vincent is a cool, calculating contract killer at the top of his game. Max is a cabbie with big dreams looking for his next fare. This fateful night, Max becomes Vincent's collateral, and will transport him on his next mission - one night, five stops, five hits and then a perfect getaway. Together, Vincent and Max find themselves in a non-stop race against time. With the LAPD and the FBI after them, they each become dependent on the other to survive. 119 min. DVD 3780Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Coup de Torchon (France, 1981)
- Directed by Bernard Tavernier. Cast: Philippe Noiret, Isabelle Huppert, Jean-Pierre Marielle, Stephane Audran, Eddy Mitchell, Guy Marchand, Irené Skobline. "An inspired rendering of Jim Thompson’s pulp novel Pop. 1280, Bertrand Tavernier’s Coup de torchon (Clean Slate) deftly transplants the story of an inept police chief- turned-heartless killer and his scrappy mistress from the American South to French West Africa. Featuring pitch-perfect performances by Philippe Noiret and Isabelle Huppert, this striking neo-noir straddles the line between violence and lyricism with dark humor and visual elegance, perfectly captured by Criterion’s glorious new anamorphic transfer." [Criterion catalog] 128 min. DVD 1797 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Dark City (Australia / USA, 1998)
- Directed by Alex Proyas. Cast: Rufus Sewell, Kiefer Sutherland, Jennifer Connelly, Richard O'Brien, Ian Richardson, William Hurt. When John Murdoch awakens in a strange hotel room, he finds that he is wanted for a series of brutal murders. The problem is he can't remember a thing. Pursued by the police and haunted by the Strangers, mysterious beings who possess the ability to stop time and alter reality, he seeks to unravel the twisted riddle of his identity. But in a city where reality is the ultimate illusion, discovering the truth could be fatal. 100 min. DVD 6088; vhs 999:2690
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- Devil in a Blue Dress (1995)
- Directed by Carl Franklin. Cast: Denzel Washington, Don Cheadle, Jennifer Beals, Tom Szemore, Mauri Chaykin, Leon Lee. Ezekiel "Easy" Rawlins is a decorated war hero who returns home to work as a private eye. His job of finding a missing socialite puts him between the white power elite and the vibrant black commumnity of Central Avenue. As soon as Easy and his trigger-happy friend Mouse find Daphne Monet, trouble follows. 101 min. DVD 3806; vhs 999:1811
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- Dirty Harry (1971)
- Directed by Don Siegel. Cast: Clint Eastwood, Harry Guardino, Reni Santori, John Vernon, Andy Robinson, John Larch, John Mitchum. A violently inclined San Francisco police inspector is the only cop who is able to arrest a rooftop sniper. When the man is released through lack of evidence, he takes private revenge. 101 min. DVD 3804; vhs 999:500
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- The Dumb Die Fast, The Smart Die Slow! ( Ka lok na ban dia cha, ka lok na dai korn) (Thailand, 1991)
- Directed by Manop Udomdej. Salak and Tuang are two mechanics in Thailand who are tired of eking out a living and decide to rob the house of one of the richest men in town. While breaking into the house, Tuang kills the owner and escapes, while Salak is caught but subsequently escapes. In a small town Boonpreng offers Salak a ride and then a job at his gas station. All goes well until Boonpreng's wife discovers Salak's past and blackmails him into breaking into her husband's safe to steal his money. Then Tuang's car breaks down at the gas station where he discovers Salak and works his way into the already tense situation. 110 min. 999:2210
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- The Element of Crime (Forbrydelsens element) (Denmark, 1984)
- Directed by Lars von Trier. Cast: Cast: Michael Elphick, Esmond Knight, Meme Lai, Jerold Welss, Ahmed El Shenawi, Astrid Henning-Jensen, Janos Hersko, Preben Leerdorff-Rye, Gotha Anderson, Lars von Trier.
The story of an exiled ex-cop who returns to his old beat to catch a serial killer preying on young girls. Set in Germany and shot in sepia tones with brilliant blue flashes, Von Trier boldly reinvents the expressionist style, combining dark mystery and operatic sweep to yield a celluloid nightmare. 104 min. DVD 1568 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Elevator to the Gallows (Ascenseur pour l'échafaud) (France, 1957)
- Directed by Louis Malle. Cast: Jeanne Moreau, Maurice Ronet, Georges Poujouly. "In his mesmerizing debut feature, twenty-four-year-old director Louis Malle brought together the beauty of Jeanne Moreau, the camerawork of Henri Decaë, and a now legendary score by Miles Davis. A touchstone of the careers of both its star and director, Elevator to the Gallows (Ascenseur pour l'échafaud) is a richly atmospheric thriller of murder and mistaken identity unfolding over one restless Parisian night." [Criterion catalog] 87 min. DVD 5933; DVD 9353 (PAL); vhs 999:3729 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Farewell My Lovely (1975)
- Directed by Dick Richards. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Charlotte Rampling, John Ireland, Sylvia Miles. Private eye Philip Marlowe is hired by an ex-con to find the ex-con's missing sweetheart. In the course of Marlowe's search he is beaten unconscious and wakes up next to a corpse. So Marlowe's tasks are multiplying- find the girl, clear himself of the murder and discover the link between the two. 97 min. DVD 295; VHS 999:1880
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- Luhr, William. "Pre-, Prime-, and Post-Film Noir: Raymond Chandler's Farewell, My Lovely and Three Different Film Styles." Michigan Academician, vol. 15 no. 1. 1982 Fall. pp: 125-132.
- Framed (1992)
- Directed by Geoff Sax. Cast: Timothy Dalton, Timothy West, David Morrissey, Annabelle Apsion. Larry Jackson, an ambitious young police officer on holiday in Spain, recognises Eddie Myers, an escaped master criminal and onetime informer, who had been presumed dead. Extradited to London, Myers agrees to cooperate on one condition, Jackson must be his interrogator. So begins a deadly duel of wits between a brilliantly perceptive criminal and his determined adversary. 115 min. DVD 2041
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- Genuine Risk (1990)
- Directed by Kurt Voss. Cast: Terence Stamp, Michelle Johnson, Peter Berg. Emotions sizzle and inhibitions melt when the gorgeous girlfriend of an underworld kingpin seduces his brooding bodyguard. Lust turns to love and love turns to betrayal as the wronged boyfriend determines to keep them apart ... no matter what the cost. 89 min. 999:176
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- The Grifters (1990)
- Directed by Stephen Frears. Cast: John Cusack, Anjelica Huston, Annette Bening. Three con artists walk on the razor's edge of life. Lilly has decided it's time to get out, and wants her son out, too. But Roy has fallen for sleek Myra, who wants him for her partner. Based on the novel by Jim Thompson. 114 min. DVD 3832; vhs 999:2333
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- Gumshoe (1972)
- Directed by Stephen Frears. Cast: Albert Finney, Billie Whitelaw, Franklin Finlay, Janice Rule. A private eye caper loaded with adventure, intrigue and laughs. Part-time comic and full-time dreamer, Ginley places an ad in a Liverpool paper offering his services as a detective. Before you can say "gumshoe," his mundane world turns to mayhem as this newcomer sleuth tangles with a big-time drug operation--and murder. 85 min. 999:2406
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- Hammett (1982)
- Directed by Wim Wenders. Cast: Frederic Forrest, Peter Boyle, Marilu Henner, Roy Kinnear, Lydia Lei. Imaginary story about Dashiell Hammett, a writer who lives the hard-boiled life he writes about. 97 min. DVD 4747; vhs 999:360
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- Hard Eight (2000)
- Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. Cast: Philip Baker Hall, John C. Reilly, Gwyneth Paltrow, Samuel L. Jackson.
Sydney, a poker-faced professional gambler plays guardian angel to unlucky John and his girlfriend. When John's and his bride's honeymoon night leads to a disastrous hostage situation, the gambler takes care of it as usual. But when a slick casino pro threatens to reveal a secret from Sydney's past, Sydney decides to hedge his bets and not leave anything to chance. 101 min. DVD 9292
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- Heat (1995)
- Directed by Michael Mann. Cast: Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Tom Sizemore, Diane Venora, Amy Brenneman, Ashley Judd, Mykelti Williamson, Wes Studi, Ted Levine, Jon Voight, Val Kilmer. Vincent Hanna is a brilliant L.A. cop. following the trail from a deadly armed robbery to a crew headed by master thief Neil McCauley. The trouble is, McCauley's expertise is at least equal to Hanna's. 172 min. DVD 3730
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- High and Low (Tengoku to jigoku) (1963)
- Director: Akira Kurosawa.
"Toshiro Mifune is unforgettable as Kingo Gondo, a wealthy industrialist whose family becomes the target of a cold-blooded kidnapper in Akira Kurosawa’s highly influential High and Low (Tengoku to jigoku). Adapting Ed McBain's detective novel King's Ransom, Kurosawa moves effortlessly from compelling race-against-time thriller to exacting social commentary, creating a penetrating portrait of contemporary Japanese society. Criterion is proud to present High and Low in an all-new high-definition digital transfer." [Criterion catalog]
143 min. DVD 2819; also vhs 999:2284
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Bernstein, Matthew "High and Low: art cinema and pulp fiction in Yokohama." In: Film adaptation / edited and with an introduction by James Naremore. p. 172-189. New Brunswick, NJ.: Rutgers University Press, c2000. (UCB Main PN1997.85 .F55 2000)
Maxfield, J. "The Moral Ambiguity Of Kurosawa Early Thrillers." Film Criticism 18: (1) 20-35 Fall 1993
- A History of Violence (2005)
- Directed by David Cronenberg. Cast: Viggo Mortensen, Maria Bello, Ed Harris, William Hurt, Ashton Holmes, Peter MacNeill, Stephen McHattie, Greg Bryk.
Tom is a loving, well-respected family man from a small Indiana town. When two criminals show up at his diner, Tom is forced to take action and thwart the robbery attempt. Suddenly heralded as a local hero who took the courage to stand up to crime, people look up to Tom as a man of high moral regard. But all the media attention attracts the likes of the mob, who show up at Tom's doorstep. Is it a case of mistaken identity or does Tom have a history that no one knows about? Based on the graphic novel by John Wagner and Vince Locke. 95 min. DVD 5245
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- Hollywoodland (2006)
- Directed by Allen Coulter. Cast: Adrien Brody, Diane Lane, Ben Affleck, Bob Hoskins, Lois Smith, Robin Tunney, Larry Cedar, Jeffrey DeMunn, Brad William Henke, Dash Mihok, Molly Parker, Caroline Dhavernas, Kathleen Robertson, Joe Spano.
Made famous as Superman on television, George Reeves finds it hard to not be typecast because of it. When he is found dead of a gunshot wound, rumors begin to run rampant. Based on Hollywood's most notorious unsolved mystery. 127 min. DVD 7139
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- The Hot Spot (1990)
- Directed by Wim Wenders. Cast: Don Johnson, Virginia Madsen, Jennifer Connelly, Charles Martin Smith. Harry Madox, a charismatic drifter finds work as a car salesman in a small town in Texas. He quickly becomes involved with two beautiful, complex women. When Madox hatches a sure-fire plan to rob the local bank, he becomes enmeshed in a lethal web of lust, greed, and extortion, whose only escape is murder. 129 min. DVD 2021
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- House of Games (1987)
- Director/screenplay, David Mamet. Cast: Lindsay Crouse, Joe Mantegna. A woman psychiatrist, trying to help a patient whose life has been threatened, is drawn into the dangerous but provocative underworld of a smooth-talking con man. 102 min. DVDV 3810; vhs 999:446
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- van Wert, William F. "Psychoanalysis and Con Games: "House of Games"Psychoanalysis and Con Games: "House of Games." Film Quarterly, Vol. 43, No. 4, Summer, 1990 UC users only
- Jagged Edge (1985)
- Directed by Richard Marquand. Cast: Glenn Close, Jeff Bridges, Peter Coyote, Robert Loggia. San Francisco heiress Page Forrester is brutally murdered in her remote beach house. Her husband Jack is devastated by the crime but soon finds himself accused of her murder. He hires lawyer Teddy Barnes to defend him, despite the fact she hasn't handled a criminal case in years. There's a certain chemistry between them and Teddy soon finds herself defending the man she loves. 108 min. 999:2336
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- Arnett, Robert. "Eighties noir: the dissenting voice in Reagan's America.(analysis of outstanding film noir works in the 1980s)." Journal of Popular Film and Television 34.3 (Fall 2006): 123(7).
UC users only
- Kill Me Again (1989)
- Directed by John Dahl. Cast: Val Kilmer, Joanne Whalley-Kilmer, Michael Madsen, Jonathan Gries. A down-and-out private eye is hired by a sexy femme fatale who seduces him, double crosses him, and then sets him up for trouble with the law, her ex-boyfriend, and the mob. 95 min. DVD 3774; vhs 999:2315
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- The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1978)
- Directed by John Cassavetes. Cast: Ben Gazzara, Timothy Agoglia Carey, Seymour Cassell, Robert Phillips, Morgan Woodward. When the gambling losses of nightclub owner Cosmo Vitelli (Gazzara) mount, he is pressured by a gangster to commit a murder to free himself of the debt. Now he is caught in a dangerous game, where every move is a deadly risk, and the only goal is to survive. (Originally released in a 135-min. version in 1976.) 109 min. DVD 2990; vhs 999:2453
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- Klute (1971)
- Directed by Alan J. Pakula. Cast: Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland, Roy Scheider, Charles Cioffi, Dorothy Tristan, Rita Gam. A small-town policeman comes to New York in search of a missing friend, and during his investigation meets and falls in love with a call girl who is being stalked by a vicious psychotic killer. 114 min. DVD 3312; vhs 999:999
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- L.A. Confidential (1997)
- Directed by Curtis Hanson. Cast: Kevin Spacey, Russell Crowe, Guy Pearce, James Cromwell, Kim Basinger, Danny DeVito. Three detectives in the corrupt and brutal L.A. police force of the 1950s use differing methods to uncover a conspiracy behind the shotgun slaying of the patrons at an all-night diner. A lush tribute to tough film-noir crime films. Also includes a behind-the scenes documentary "Off the record'" with the film's creators, lead actors and novelist, James Elroy. 156 min. DVD 3831; vhs 999:1977
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- Last Embrace (1979)
- Directed by Jonathan Demme. Cast: Roy Scheider, Janet Margolin, John Glover, Sam Levene, Charles Napier, Christopher Walken. When Harry Hannan, a government agent, goes to Mexico to meet a contact, he instead meets an ambush in which his wife is assassinated, sending him over the edge. After his stay in a sanitarium, Harry is pushed toward the path of a moving train and then receives a letter that is written in ancient Hebrew and signed "Avenger of Blood." Someone is out to get him, but who? The answer is revealed in one of the most exciting climaxes ever filmed at the rushing Niagara Falls. Based on the novel "The 13th man" by Murray Teigh Bloom. 102 min. 999:2314
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- The Last Seduction (1993)
- Directed by John Dahl. Cast: Linda Fiorentino, Peter Berg, Bill Nunn, Bill Pullman. Bridget Gregory makes her husband Clay steal more than half a million dollars, and then steals it from him. Hiding out in a small town, she grabs the first man she sees, Mike, to keep her cover. When Clay tracks her down, she stands to lose everything unless she can use her sexual power over Mike to lead him to murder. 110 min. DVD 2011
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- The Last Way Out (1997)
- Directed by Mark Steensland. Cast: Kurt Johnson, Kevin Reed, Katie Brown, John Lamb, Karyn Casl. A first class "modern" film-noir drama. For two years, Frank White has kept himself hidden from his former partners in crime, But when an unexpected turn of events thrusts them together again, Frank's new life is turned upside down. Caught in the collision of past and present, Frank is forced to choose between one last heist and the last way out. 88 min. 999:2437
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- Liebestraum (1991)
- Directed by Mike Figgis. Cast: Kevin Anderson, Pamela Gidley, Kim Novak. While visiting his dying mother, Nick Kaminsky discovers Ralston Building is being demolished because of a sexually motivated double murder that occured inside. 113 min. 999:2291
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- Walker, Michael. "A Hollywood Art Film: Liebestraum." In: Style and meaning : studies in the detailed analysis of film / edited by John Gibbs and Douglas Pye. Manchester ; New York : Manchester University Press ; New York : Distributed exclusively in the USA by Palgrave,
2005. (Main Stack PN1995.S778 2005)
- Long Goodbye (1973)
- Directed by Robert Altman. Cast: Elliott Gould, Nina Van Pallandt, Sterling Hayden. Philip Marlowe is an unromanticized snoop for hire in an unromanticized Los Angeles. Working for fifty bucks a day plus expenses, he tries to solve a case which the police have dismissed as a murder/suicide. 113 min. DVD 1334; vhs 999:2276
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- Lost Highway (1996)
- Directed by David Lynch. Cast: Bill Pullman, Patricia Arquette, Balthazar Getty, Robert Blake, Natasha Gregson Wagner, Gary Busey, Robert Loggia. A successful jazz musician whose marriage is on the rocks, a man in black who threatens to expose him, a young mechanic with links to a mobster, and the mobster's moll are the riders on the lost highway, trapped in their worlds of desire, destiny and unknown destination. 134 min. DVD 3916; vhs 999:2226
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- Maiku Hama Private Eye Trilogy
- The Most Terrible Time in My Life (Waga jinsei saiaku no toki) (Japan / China / Taiwan, 1994)
- Director: Kaizo Hayashi. Cast: Masatoshi Nagase, Jo Shishido, Yu Wei Yan, Caroline Lu, Wu Kao Hsiung, Haruko Wanibuchi, Noriko Sengoku, Kaho Minami. Detective Maiku Hama navigates the Yokohama underworld with super cool threads and two-fisted street smarts. But when he comes to the aid of a Taiwanese waiter at a local parlor, the unflappable Hama has no idea what he's in for. Though seemingly a luckless immigrant on the threshold of Yokohama's gutter, Hama's client holds the secret to a ferocious gangland revenge triangle that soon has bullets and fists flying. 92 min. DVD 8330
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- Geller, Theresa L. "Transnational noir : style and substance in Hayashi Kaizo's The most terrible time in my life." In: East Asian cinemas : exploring transnational connections on film / edited by Leon Hunt and Leung Wing-Fai.
London : New York : I.B. Tauris, 2008. (Main Stack PN1993.5.E19.E27 2008)
The Stairway to the Distant Past (Harukana jidai no kaidan o) (Japan, 1995) - Directed by Kaizo Hayashi. Cast: Masatoshi Nagase, Jo Shishido, Kiyotaka Nanbara, Haruko Wanibuchi, Shiro Sano, Eiji Okada, Tetta Sugimoto, Mika Ohmine, Shinya Tsukamoto, Keiji Matsuda. Broke, his vintage Nash convertible repossessed, private eye Mike Hama is reduced to combing the mean streets of the Yokohama waterfront on a borrowed bicycle. But when Lily, a beautiful stripper from out of Hama's past, returns to town, the fuse is lit on a criminal powder keg set to blow the lid off the Yokohama underworld. Hama's search for his long lost parents soon has him up to his neck in a simmering conspiracy pitting corrupt politicians, local Yakuza gangsters and the Taiwanese mafia against the mysterious 'Man in White.' 100 min. DVD 8332
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The Trap (Wana) (Japan 1997) - Directed by Kaizo Hayashi. Cast: Nagase Masatoshi, Natsukawa Yui, Yamaguchi Tomoko, Shishido Jo. In love for the first time, cases booked solidly for months and a brand new fax machine prodding his office into the nineties, down-on-his-luck private eye 'Maiku' Mike Hama has the world on a string at last. Or does he? When a hooded stranger appears in his office with the cryptic challenge "I want you to look for me," Hama is drawn into a string of bizarre serial murders that have Yokohama's police baffled and the city terrified. 100 min. DVD 8331
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database - Director: Kaizo Hayashi. Cast: Masatoshi Nagase, Jo Shishido, Yu Wei Yan, Caroline Lu, Wu Kao Hsiung, Haruko Wanibuchi, Noriko Sengoku, Kaho Minami. Detective Maiku Hama navigates the Yokohama underworld with super cool threads and two-fisted street smarts. But when he comes to the aid of a Taiwanese waiter at a local parlor, the unflappable Hama has no idea what he's in for. Though seemingly a luckless immigrant on the threshold of Yokohama's gutter, Hama's client holds the secret to a ferocious gangland revenge triangle that soon has bullets and fists flying. 92 min. DVD 8330
- The Man Who Wasn't There (2001)
- Directed by Joel Coen. Cast: Billy Bob Thornton, Frances McDormand, Adam Alexi-Malle, Michael Badalucco, Katherine Borowitz, Richard Jenkins, Scarlett Johansson, Jon Polito, Tony Shalhoub, James Gandolfini. In a sleepy Northern California town in the 1940s, Ed Crane, a humble barber, suspects that his wife Doris is having an affair with her boss. When a stranger comes into town hinting that there is a fortune to be made in investing in the new invention of dry cleaning, Ed hatches a blackmail scheme he hopes will make him rich and get him some revenge at the same time. His plan goes horribly awry when he accidentally commits a murder for which Doris is blamed, landing her in jail, and Ed at the mercy of big-city lawyer Freddy Riedenschneider. 116 min. DVD 2063
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- Mona Lisa (1986)
- Directed by Neil Jordan. Cast: Bob Hoskins, Cathy Tyson, Robbie Coltrane, Michael Caine, Clarke Peters, Sammi Davis, Kate Hardie, Zoe Nathenson. "Writer-director Neil Jordan’s breakthrough film is a brilliant, noir-infused love story. Bob Hoskins (who snagged an Oscar nomination for his performance) plays George, a small-time loser employed as a chauffeur to an enigmatic, high-class call girl. His fascination with her leads him on a dangerous quest through the sordid underbelly of London, where love is a weakness to be exploited and betrayed. Criterion is proud to present Mona Lisa in a director-approved special edition." [Criterion catalog] 104 min. DVD 1927
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- Mulholland Drive (2001)
- Directed by David Lynch. Cast: Justin Theroux, Naomi Watts, Laura Elena Harring, Ann Miller, Dan Hedaya, Mark Pellegrino, Brent Briscoe, Robert Forster. A beautiful woman riding in a limosine along Los Angeles' Mulholland Drive is targeted by a would-be shooter, but before he can pull the trigger, she is injured when her limo is hit by another car. The woman stumbles away from the accident and meets up with a plucky ingenue new to L.A. But are things really as they seem? 147 min. DVD 1349
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- The Naked Gun (1988)
- Directed by David Zucker. Cast: Leslie Nielsen, Priscilla Presley, Ricardo Montalban, O. J. Simpson. In this wacko comedy a granite-jawed, rock-brained cop, Frank Drebin, bumbles across a plot to assassinate Queen Elizabeth when she's at a baseball game while visiting in the United States. 85 min. 999:2741
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- The Naked Gun 2-1/2: The Smell of Fear (1991)
- Directed by David Zucker. Cast: Leslie Nielsen, Priscilla Presley, Robert Goulet, O.J. Simpson, George Kennedy. The inept cop, Lt. Frank Drebbin returns to save the day once again. This time he's out to foil the "big boys" in the energy business. A top scientist is about to publish his report on energy for the future and things don't look good for the traditional suppliers of oil and coal. To save their industries, the suppliers kidnap the scientist and replace him with a decoy with a more favourable report. 85 min. 999:2742
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Naked Gun 33-1/3: The Final Insult (1994)
- Directed by Peter Segal. Cast: Leslie Nielsen, Priscilla Presley, George Kennedy, O.J. Simpson, Fred Ward. Lt. Frank Drebin is persuaded out of retirement to go undercover in a state prison. There he is to find out what top terrorist, Rocco, has planned for when he escapes. Eventually they both wind up at the Academy Award ceremony where Drebin blunders his way humiliating the guests while trying to foil Rocco's terrorist plot. 83 min. 999:2743
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Night Moves (1975)
- Directed by Arthur Penn. Cast: Gene Hackman, Jennifer Warren, Edward Binns, Susan Clark, Harris Yulin. A self-styled detective who is scrounging a living out of divorce actions, missing persons, and runaway kids finally gets his first big case. It begins as a search for a runaway teen, but plunges him into a world of intrigue, smuggling and murder. 100 min. 999:3566
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- No Country for Old Men (2007)
- Directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. Cast: Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin, Woody Harrelson, Kelly Macdonald.
One morning while hunting antelope, Vietnam vet Llewelyn Moss spies several trucks surrounded by dead bodies and decides to investigate. He finds a case filled with $2 million and a truck loaded with heroin. Moss takes it with him and hits the road until he can determine his next move. This puts the psychopathic killer, Anton Chigurh, on his trail as he dispassionately murders nearly every rival, bystander and even employer in his pursuit of his quarry and the money. Meanwhile, the laconic Sherrif Ed Tom Bell blithely oversees the investigation even as he struggles to face the sheer enormity of the crimes he is attempting to thwart. Based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy. Special features: "The making of No country for old men" featurette; Working with the Coens: reflections of cast & crew" featurette; "Diary of a country sheriff" featurette. 122 min. DVD 9439
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- The Outfit (1973)
- Directed by John Flynn. Cast: Robert Duvall, Karen Black, Joe Don Baker, Robert Ryan. Earl is a small-time crook targeted by a crime syndicate for knocking over the wrong bank ... theirs! Upon his release from prison, he's informed by his girlfriend that his brother has been executed and that he's next. Earl teams with his former partner Cody seeking retribution but they find themselves engaged in a no-holds-barred blood war. 103 min. 999:2412
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Palmetto (1998)
- Directed by Volker Schlondorff, Cast: Woody Harrelson, Elisabeth Shue, Gina Gershon, Rolf Hoppe, Chloe Sevigny, Tom Wright, Michael Rapaport. Harry, a desperate Florida drifter, goes from perpetrator to patsy when he is lured into an abduction scam proposed by a mysterious blonde. Harry must scramble to untangle a mystery involving three women, false identities, cold corpses, and a string of clues that set him up for a very hard fall. 114 min. 999:2330
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database Movie Review Query Engine
- Philip Marlowe, Private Eye
- Originally produced for television in 1986. 51 min. each installment
- Pickup on Noon Street Cast: Powers Boothe, Robin Givens, Kate Trotter, Christopher Newton, Ken Pogue, Gene Clark, Al Waxman. Originally produced for television in 1986. 51 min. Video/C 7171
Guns at Cyrano's Cast: Powers Boothe, Roxanne Hart, Cec Linder, Mark Humphrey, Angelo Rizacos, John Ireland. Video/C 7171
Trouble is My Business Cast: Powers Boothe, Kate Reid, Jennifer Dale, Booth Savage, Paul Hecht. Video/C 7172
Spanish Blood Cast: Powers Boothe, Helen Shaver, Ron Van Hart, Mavor Moore, Dixie Seatle, John Vernon. Video/C 7172
Blackmailers Don't Shoot Cast: Powers Boothe, Melody Anderson, Allan Royal, Peter Dvorsky, Robert Morelli, John Winston Carroll, August Schellenberg. Video/C 7173
Red Wind Cast: Powers Boothe, Linda Griffiths, Maury Chaykin, Frank Pellegrino, R. H. Thompson. Video/C 7173
- Point Blank (1967)
- Directed by John Boorman. Cast: Lee Marvin, Angie Dickinson, Keenan Wynn, Carroll O'Connor, Lloyd Bochner, Michael Strong. A professional criminal helps pull off an underworld heist, then is gunned down and left for dead on deserted Alcatraz Island. He resurfaces in Los Angeles to track down his share of the loot. Aided by a lovely accomplice, he takes on the sundicate at its own deadly game, doggedly stalking his prey across the backdrop of seething '60's L.A. Based on the novel "The Hunter" by Richard Stark. 89 min. 999:2360
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981)
- Directed by Bob Rafelson. Cast: Jack Nicholson, Jessica Lange, John Colicos. Steamy tale of a drifter offered a job at a roadside diner by the owner, an easy-going older man. When the drifter and the owner's voluptuous wife fall in love, they plot to kill her husband and run away together. Based on the novel by James M. Cain. 121 min. DVD 297Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Pulp Fiction (1994)
- Directed by Quentin Tarantino. Cast: John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, Uma Thurman, Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Amanda Plummer, Maria de Medeiros, Ving Rhames, Eric Stoltz, Rosanna Arquette, Christopher Walken, Bruce Willis. A clever, dark gangster film noir that tells four separate stories that are gradually brought together. Involved are two low-rent men, their boss and his sexy wife, a prizefighter and a pair of desperate robbers. 164 min. DVD 575; also vhs 999:1393Credits and other information from the Internet Movie DatabaseMovie Review Query Engine
- Red Rock West (1992)
- Directed by John Dahl. Cast: Nicholas Cage, Dennis Hopper, Lara Flynn Boyle. An unemployed Texan walks into a tavern in Red Rock, Wyoming, and is mistaken for a professional hit-man. He is offered a "job," to kill the tavern owner's wife. Just as he decides to take the money and run the real hit man shows up. 98 min. DVD 3772Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Reservoir Dogs (1991)
- Directed by Quentin Tarantino. Cast: Harvey Keitel, Michael Madsen, Chris Penn, Steve Buscemi, Lawrence Tierney, Eddie Bunker, Quentin Tarantino, Tim Roth. They were strangers, together to pull off the perfect jewel heist but their simple robbery turns into a bloody ambush when they realize one of them is a police informant. But which one? 100 min. DVD 3850; vhs 999:2154
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- Revenge (1990)
- Directed by Tony Scott. Kevin Costner, Anthony Quinn, Madeleine Stowe. A former fighter pilot meets and falls in love with the beautiful wife of an old friend. When the husband discovers their betrayal he embarks on a terrifying path of retribution. 123 min. 999:2354Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Le Samourai (1967)
- Directed by Jean-Pierre Melville. Cast: Alain Delon, Francois Perier, Nathalie Delon, Cathy Rosier, Jacques Leroy, Michel Boisrond. A steely-eyed and enigmatic hitman is hired to do away with the boss of a nightclub, which places him under total surveillance by police. At the same time, he discovers that the man he is working for has marked him for death. "In a career-defining performance, Alain Delon plays a contract killer with samurai instincts. A razor-sharp cocktail of 1940s American gangster cinema and 1960s French pop culture--with a liberal dose of Japanese lone-warrior mythology--maverick director Jean-Pierre Melville's masterpiece Le Samouraï defines cool." [Criterion catalog] 101 min. DVD 4557; vhs 999:2357Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Sea of Love (1989)
- Directed by Harold Becker. Cast: Al Pacino, Ellen Barkin, John Goodman. A veteran New York City police detective, while working to track down a bizarre serial killer, enters into a passionate affair with a beautiful suspect despite hard evidence linking her to the murders. 113 min. 999:2323 Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Se7en (Seven)
- Directed by David Fincher. Cast: Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman, Gwyneth Paltrow, John C. McGinley. A psychological thriller about two detectives on the trail of a serial killer who chooses his victims according to the seven deadly sins. 127 min. DVD 2014Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Sin City (2005)
- Directed by Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez. Cast: Jessica Alba, Benicio del Toro, Brittany Murphy, Clive Owen, Mickey Rourke, Bruce Willis, Elijah Wood. Welcome to Sin City, the town that beckons to the tough, the corrupt, and the brokenhearted. A universe of unlikely and reluctant heroes still try to do the right thing in a city that refuses to care. 124 min. DVD 4205Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Fuller, Graham; Olsen, Mark. "Colour Me Noir." Sight & Sound v. ns15 no. 6 (June 2005) p. 12-16 UC users only
- Someone to Watch Over Me (1988)
- Directed by Ridley Scott. Cast: Tom Berenger, Mimi Rogers, Lorraine Bracco, Jerry Orbach, John Rubinstein. A stunning New York socialite and a down-to-earth city cop are caught in a deadly web of illicit passion and heart-stopping suspense in this taut thriller as the detective finds his life turned upside down when he is assigned to protect this beautiful eyewitness to a brutal murder. 106 min. DVD 131Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database Movie Review Query Engine
- Street of No Return (1989)
- Directed by Samuel Fuller. Cast: Keith Carradine, Bill Duke, Valentina Vargas, Andrea Ferreol, Bernard Fresson. The story of a former pop star who had it all until he fell in love with the wrong gangster's girl and had his throat cut for his sins. Now a drifter, he lives in a haze of amnesia, alcohol and misery until one day he rediscovers himself and a chance for vengeance. Based on the classic crime novel by David Goodis. 92 min. DVD 6988Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Canham, Kingsley. "Samuel Fuller's Action Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
Fuller, Samuel. A Third face : my tale of writing, fighting and filmmaking / Samuel Fuller with Christa Lang Fuller and Jerome Henry Rude. New York : Alfred A. Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 2002. (Main Stack PN1998.3.F85.A3 2002)
Garnham, Nicholas. Samuel Fuller.
New York, Viking Press [1972, c1971] ( MAIN: PN1993 .C45 v.15 [another edition]; MOFF: PN1998.A3 F843 1972)
Hardy, Phil. Samuel Fuller.
[New York] Praeger [1970] (MAIN: PN1998.A3F845 H3; MOFF: PN1998 A3 F845)
McArthur, Collin. "Samuel Fuller's Gangster Films." Screen 1969 10: 80-92 UC users only
Sanjek, David. 'Torment Street between Malicious and Crude': Sophisticated Primitivism in the Films of Samuel Fuller. Literature/ Film Quarterly, vol. 22 no. 3. 1994. pp: 187-94.
Server, Lee. Sam Fuller : film is a battleground : a critical study, with interviews, a filmography, and a bibliography Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland, c1994. (MAIN: PN1998.3.F85 S47 1994)
- Sudden Impact (1983)
- Directed by Clint Eastwood. Cast: Clint Eastwood, Sondra Locke, Pat Hingle, Bradford Dillman, Paul Drake. In the aftermath of a brutal rape, a beautiful woman has begun to hunt down her attackers. Harry has to find her and stop her before she kills again or her attackers find her. 117 min. DVD 2013Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Tightrope (1984)
- Directed by Richard Tuggle. Cast: Clint Eastwood, Genevieve Bujold, Dan Hedaya, Alison Eastwood, Jennifer Beck. Clint Eastwood is Wes Block, a lawman teetering on a tightrope separating him from the man he strives to be and the man he fears he is. When Block investigates some brutal sex murders, he discovers a chilling link between himself and the suspect. 114 min. DVD 2012Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- True Confessions (1981)
- Directed by Ulu Grosbard. Cast: Robert De Niro, Robert Duvall, Charles Durning, Ed Flanders, Cyril Cusack, Burgess Meredith. An extraordinary tale of two brothers, one a priest, the other a cop, drawn together after many years apart, in the aftermath of the brutal murder of a young prostitute. Based on a true Los Angeles murder case, the still unsolved "Black Dahlia" murder of 1948. Based on the novel by John Gregory Dunne. 108 min. DVD X1042; vhs 999:3564Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- U-Turn (1995)
- Directed by Oliver Stone. Cast: Sean Penn, Jennifer Lopez, Nick Nolte, Powers Boothe, Claire Danes, Joaquin Phoenix, Billy Bob Thornton, Jon Voight. A small-time gambler, with a backpack full of cash and overdue debt in Vegas and a woman caught in the grips of a twisted relationship with her powerful husband, want to get out of the town Superior, Arizona. Based on the book Stray dogs by John Ridley. 125 min. DVD 776
Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Usual Suspects (1995)
- Directed by Bryan Singer. Cast: Stephen Baldwin, Gabriel Byrne, Chazz Palminteri, Kevin Pollak, Pete Postlethwaite, Kevin Spacey. Police investigating an exploded boat on a San Pedro pier discover 27 bodies and $91 million worth of drug money. The only survivors are a severely burned Hungarian terrorist and Roger Kint, a crippled con-man. Reluctantly, Kint is pressured into explaining what happened on the boat. His story begins six weeks earlier with five criminals being dragged in by New York police desparate for suspects in a truck highjacking, and ends with the possible identification of a criminal mastermind. 106 min. DVD 3907; vhs 999:2226
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- Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988)
- Directed by Robert Zemeckis. Cast: Bob Hoskins, Christopher Lloyd, Joanna Cassidy, Charles Fleischer (voice), Stubby Kaye, Kathleen Turner, Amy Irving (voice). The hapless Roger Rabbit is framed for the murder of Marvin Acme, who was photographed "playing patticake" with Roger's wife Jessica. The film is notable for the mixed live and animated action that takes place in Hollywood and next-door "Toontown," where humans and "Toons" co-exist. 104 min. DVD 203; vhs 999:1647
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Television Noir
- Cross Current (The Case of the Forged Passports)
- Classic episodes from the 1950s are presented as prime examples of television film noir. In Cross current, Christopher Storm searches for stolen printing plates being used to forge American passports. Cast: Gerald Mohr and James Daly. Television series. Cross current originally released as Foreign Intrigue by NBC between 1951-1955 and syndicated as Cross Current. 30 min? Video/C 6849
- Dark Stranger(1954)
- Cast: Edmond O'Brien and Joanne Woodward. (supplmentary material accompanying DVD of the motion picture The Scar) DVD 3657
- Dragnet (Volume 1)
- Two episodes from the 1950's TV series Dragnet, which was based on actual cases in the Los Angeles Police Department. In the first (given the title Big girls), a tall beautiful girl beats and robs over a dozen victims. It turns out the "girl" is a female impersonator. In the second (given the title Big boys), attempts are made to catch Army deserters on a robbery spree, originating in the San Francisco area. Originally produced as TV programs by Mark VII Ltd. in 1953. Includes the sponsor's commercials. Video/C 6603
- Dragnet (Volume 3)
- Two episodes from the 1950's TV series Dragnet, which was based on actual cases in the Los Angeles Police Department. In the first (given the title Big Shoplift), swank stores are hit by a thief who then throws the loot away. In the second (given the title Big hit and run), an elderly woman and her grandson are the victims of a hit and run driver. Originally produced as TV programs by Mark VII Ltd. in 1953. Includes the sponsor's commercials. Video/C 6604
- Dragnet (Volume 4)
- Two episodes from the 1950's television series Dragnet, which was based on actual cases in the Los Angeles Police Department. In the first (given the title Big Betty) A gang of con artists prey on relatives of the recently deceased. In the second (given the name Big counterfeit) a clever thief represents himself as a police detective in order to intimidate his victims. Video/C 6611
- Federal Men (The Case of the Forged passports)
- Classic episodes from the 1950s are presented as prime examples of television film noir. In Cross current, Christopher Storm searches for stolen printing plates being used to forge American passports. Cast: Paul Langton, John Stephenson, Dorothy Green, Betty Lou Garson, Walter Greaza, Bob Griffin, Mickey Knox, Lestor Dorr. Federal Men originally released as Treasury Men in Action by ABC (September-December 1950) and then by NBC (1951-1955) and syndicated as Federal men. 30 min? Video/C 6849
- The Naked City.
- Four segments from the New York based television series with Detective Adam Flint. Originally released as segments on the ABC television program The naked city aired in 1961. DVD 1518
A Hole in the City. After holding up an armored car, gang leader Lewis Nunda and his cronies hide out at the home of their leader's aunt where Nunda painfully confronts his past.
Button in the Haystack. When a service station owner fears that he'll be arrested for the murder of a man found nearby, he panics and gets rid of his gun, the only evidence that can save him.
Shoes for Vinnie Winford. When a dance hostess is reported missing, a police investigation links the club's sadistic owner to her disappearance.
Vengeance is a Wheel. Mario Licosa seeks vengeance when the family patriarch is killed, despite his brother's pleas to stay of out it.
- Racket Sqad (Classic Television: Your Favorites From the 1950's)
- Cast: Reed Hadley, Catherine McCleod, Steve Brodie. : An early crime show based on actual case records from police bunko and confidence departments all over the U.S. This episode features a couple trying to pull off a phony injury claim. 30 min. Video/C 6759
- Twilight Zone
- Many installments/episodes. Various directors. Consult GLADIS or MELVYL for specific titles on DVD or VHS videotape.
Documentaries About Film Noir
- American Cinema series (#7): Film Noir. 55 min. Video/C 3715
- Film Noir: Bringing Darkness to Light
- American Cinema series (#7): Film Noir. 55 min. Video/C 3715
- A fascinating look at the film noir genre including clips from noir classics and little-known gems. Interviews with modern noir aficionados like directors Christopher Nolan and Frank Miller, writers James Ellroy and Brian Helgeland and others, shape this multifaceted exploration of the movie style that grew out of the hard realities of post-World War II life.Special features: 5 vintage "Crime does not pay" series shorts: Forbidden passage / director, Fred Zinnemann (1941, 21 min.) -- A gun in his hand / director, Joseph Losey (1945, 19 min.) -- The luckiest guy in the world / director, Joseph M. Newman (1947, 21 min.) -- Women in hiding / director, Joseph M. Newman (1940, 22 min.) -- You, the people / director, Roy Rowland (1940, 21 min.). 2006. 68 min. DVD 5833
- Murder Is My Beat: Classic Film Noir Themes and Scenes [Sound Recording]
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Contents: The asphalt jungle. Main title -- Key Largo. Main title (Cast; Key Largo; The Keys; The bus; Bus stop); Moanin' low -- The Maltese falcon. Main title -- Laura. Main title -- Murder my sweet. Main title/Marlowe -- The postman always rings twice. Main title -- Mildred Pierce. Main title -- The big sleep. Main title (Big sleep; Walking; Flirtation; Marlowe; Carmen; Sternwood) -- The racket. Main title -- Crossfire. Main title; Shine -- Force of evil. Bottom of the world (End title) -- The letter. Main title (Hammond; Plantation; Native) -- Scene of the crime. Main title -- Dark passage. Main title; End title (Baila bailando/Too marvelous for words); Baila bailando; Too marvelous for words -- Born to kill. Main title; End title -- Macao. Main title -- High Sierra. Main title (The Sierras; The pardon; Pastorale; Street cleaner); End title (Apprehended/Melody) -- White heat. Main title (White heat; Locomotive) -- End title (Cody/Cody's end). Sound/D 117
- Pulp Cinema.
- A compilation of 45 original coming attractions from the golden age of film noir. 99 min. DVD 767
- Shades of Noir
- Eliot Ness: an untouchable life -- Matter of principal -- Three women. Commentary: Mickey Spillane, Sara Paretsky, Gar Haywood, Stacy Keach, Otto Penzler, Parnell Hall, Laren Estleman, Walter Mosley,Terry Beatty, Gary Niebuhr, Leonard Maltin, Martin H. Greenberg, Joe Gores, Donald E. Westlake, Lee Meredith, Shirley Eaton. Opens with three short film noirs as examples of the genre (33 min.) "Elliot Ness: an untouchable life" follows a detective in 1920s Chicago making his first move against Al Capone. In "A matter of principal" a retired hitman fights insomnia by interceding in a kidnapping. In "Three women," three women confess to the murder of the same abusive boyfriend. Films are followed by a full-length bio-documentary (87 min.) about the legendary mystery writer Mickey Spillane. Includes interviews with mystery writers, film and TV directors, cartoonists, actors and actresses commenting on the development and influence of mystery writers on the film noir genre. Special features: Feature-length commentary with writer/director Max Allan Collins and co-producer, Phillip Dingeldein ; Blake Edwards "Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer" TV pilot (1954) ; Mickey Spillane's "I, the Jury," trailer ; "Behind principal," the making of "A matter of principal," featurette ; Mickey Spillane as Mike Hammer in "Tonight my love," a rare 1954 recording and more. 120 min. DVD 5045
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