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Classic Film Noir

Here be those darkly vexing offerings one should include in their diet periodically. Film Noir (literally 'black film or cinema') was coined by French film critics (first by Frank Nino in 1946) who noticed the trend of how 'dark' and black the looks and themes were of many American crime and detective films released in France following the war. It was a style of black and white American films that first evolved in the 1940s, became prominent in the post-war era, and lasted in a classic "Golden Age" period until about 1965. With the list below Alice has included many "Contempory Noirs", making browsing that much more "coloured"..... Right: Orson Wells stars and directs "A Touch Of Evil".

Gaslight (1944)

7.8/10
Director: George Cukor
Starring: Charles Boyer, Ingrid Bergman, Joseph Cotten

Ingrid Bergman won her first Oscar for her stunning portrayal of a susceptible young woman who marries the suave, romantic Charles Boyer, never suspec... Read more

The Lady from Shanghai / Miss Sadie Thompson (1948)

Director: Curtis Bernhardt, Orson Welles
Starring: Rita Hayworth, Orson Welles, Everett Sloane, Jose Ferrer, Aldo Ray

"The Lady from Shanghai" (1948) - Orson Welles, and wife Rita Hayworth, combine for a classic 'Film Noir' tale of a roguish sailor who signs on for a... Read more

Little Caesar (1930)

7.3/10
Director: Mervyn LeRoy
Starring: Edward G Robinson, Douglas Fairbanks Jr

Edward G. Robinson gives a powerful performance as Caesar Enrico Bandello, one of moviedom's most infamous and ruthless criminals. This landmark film... Read more

The Legendary Sherlock Holmes (1945)

Director: Roy William Neill
Starring: Basil Rathbone, Nigel Bruce

Three great Sherlock Holmes movies collected together on one dvd! Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce star in all three as the famous sleuth and his assist... Read more

Cover Girl / Gilda (1944)

Director: Charles Vidor
Starring: Rita Hayworth, Gene Kelly, Glenn Ford, George Macready

"Cover Girl" (1944) - This delightful Kern-Gershwin musical has Kelly's brilliant dancing, Silvers' burlesque routines, Arden's wisecracks and Haywort... Read more

Ministry of Fear (1944)

7.2/10
Director: Fritz Lang
Starring: Ray Milland, Marjorie Reynolds, Carl Esmond, Hillary Brooke

A dense, yet quirky espionage thriller with Ray Milland as a recently released patient from a mental asylum who unwittingly gets caught up in Nazi spy... Read more

Crossfire (1947)

7.4/10
Director: Edward Dmytryk
Starring: Robert Young, Robert Mitchum, Robert Ryan, Gloria Grahame, Sam Levene

Director Edward Dmytryk spun Richard Brooks' novel 'The Brick Foxhole', about the intense search for an anti-Semitic murderer, into a tense film noir... Read more

Shock Corridor (1963)

7.5/10
Director: Samuel Fuller
Starring: Peter Breck, Constance Towers, Gene Evans

Journalist Peter Breck gets admitted to a mental institution to unmask a murderer and we watch as he goes crazy himself. This complex masterpiece was... Read more

Sunset Boulevard ( Blu-ray ) (1950)

8.5/10
Director: Billy Wilder
Starring: Buster Keaton, Erich Von Stroheim, Fred Clark, Gloria Swanson, Jack Webb, Nancy...

Billy Wilder's classic drama stars Gloria Swanson as reclusive silent movie queen Norma Desmond. Sharing a mansion with her live-in butler/former husb... Read more

5 Fingers (1952)

7.8/10
Director: Joseph L Mankiewicz
Starring: James Mason, Michael Rennie, Danielle Darrieux

During World War II, the valet for the British ambassador in Turkey tires of his job and plans to photograph secret documents belonging to his employe... Read more