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".
They Drive By Night (1940)
7.3/10
Director: Raoul Walsh
Starring: George Raft, Ann Sheridan, Humphrey Bogart
This gritty and compelling road drama stars George Raft and Humphrey Bogart as truck-driving brothers who take on corrupt businessmen when they try to... Read more
Foreign Correspondent (1940)
7.6/10
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Starring: Joel McCrea, Laraine Day, Herbert Marshall
In 1939, the editor of the New York Daily Globe sends Haverstock, a crime reporter, into Europe in the hope of getting a fresh angle. Naive and wholly... Read more
Sherlock Holmes: The Hound of the Baskervilles (Rathbone) / Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror (1939)
7.6/10
Director: John Rawlins, Sidney Lanfield
Starring: Basil Rathbone, Lionel Atwill, Nigel Bruce, Richard Greene, Reginald Denny
Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce are widely celebrated as cinema's perfect Homes and Watson, filming more than a dozen adaptations of Sir Arthur Conan D... Read more
Sherlock Holmes: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes / Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon (1939)
7.6/10
Director: Alfred L Werker, Roy William Neill
Starring: Basil Rathbone, Ida Lupino, Nigel Bruce, Dennis Hoey, George Zucco
'The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes' (1939) - Evil mastermind Professor Moriarty (George Zucco) escapes a murder conviction when Holmes (Basil Rathbone... Read more
Mr Moto's Last Warning (1939)
6.6/10
Director: Norman Foster
Starring: George Sanders, John Carradine, Peter Lorre
Japanese detective Mr. Moto (Peter Lorre) finds himself hip-deep in international espionage in this adventure tale... It's a warning the folks running... Read more
The Mystery of Mr Wong (1939)
6.4/10
Director: William Nigh
Starring: Boris Karloff, Grant Withers, Dorothy Tree
In the second instalment of the Mr Wong series Boris Karloff stars as the inscrutable detective, enlisted to solve another mystery. The largest star s... Read more
(Under Quicksand) Mickey Rooney Triple: Quicksand (1950) / My Outlaw Brother (1951) / Mickey The Great (1939)
Director: Irving Pichel
Starring: Robert Preston, Mickey Rooney, Robert Stack, Jeanne Cagney, Peter Lorre, Barbara...
'Quicksand' - Mickey Rooney is cast once again as the everyman, only this noir crime drama sees him in real jeopardy as Dan, a young man who can't aff... Read more
Jamaica Inn (1939)
6.3/10
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Starring: Charles Laughton, Maureen O'Hara, Leslie Banks
Hitchcock's last film in England before moving to Hollywood. With Charles Laughton in a story set in the eighteenth century about a young Irish girl w... Read more
The Roaring Twenties (1939)
7.9/10
Director: Raoul Walsh
Starring: Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, Priscilla Lane
James Cagney stars as a good man turned crook in this recreation of the world of bootleggers, speakeasies and violence; Humphrey Bogart is the gangste... Read more
Hitchcock Collection: Secret Agent / The Farmer's Wife / Rich and Strange / Juno and the Paycock / The Lady Vanishes (1938)
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Starring: John Gielgud, Peter Lorre, Henry Kendall, Joan Barry, Barry Fitzgerald, Margaret...
A collection of 5 classic Hitchcock films. 'Secret Agent' (1935) - Hitchcock's realistic, darkly funny thriller stars John Gielgud as the British agen... Read more