Film Noir and Neo Noir

James Stewart, in the darkest, most profound and sad performance of his career, falls in love with the alluring, distant, unattainable and mesmerizing Kim Novak.
Bernard Herrmann composes a heavenly, breathtaking wagnerian symphony.
and Alfred Hitchcock, in the absolute peak of his powers, materializes the most beautiful, haunting, compelling and heart breaking tale of love that transcended any cinematic or human barrier.
my all time favorite motion picture.

Fabulous brit noir with great prose by novelist Graham Greene, some other ad libbed by Orson Welles himself (cuckoo clock). Expresionistic state of the art photography. Immense duo Welles-Cotten. Baroque and poetry in black and white.

"Love and murder at first sight"
Fred MacMurray is sunk by his crave for money and for the enticing Barbara Stanwyck.
Amoral, snappy and tense exercise of suspense; and probably Miss Stanwyck's finest hour.
Rounded noir perfection.

Billy Wilder was unstoppable creating the sassiest and most acid masterpieces as this cruel noirish hollywood satire. William Holden and Erich Von Stroheim are always a privilege to watch, but the elderly and mentally unstable femme fatale Gloria Swanson always causes chills run down my spine. One of my unquestionable favorites.

Once again, at the orders of the great Howard Hawks, Bogie and Bacall throw off sparks whenever they share a scene in this brilliant adaptation of Raymond Chandler's classic novel.
A complex plot, very hard to unravel, even for the shrewd Philip Marlowe, who seems to find corpses anywhere he looks.
The story grabs you and never decays, contrary, it grows in tension with each minute, and almost every attitude seen by the players, and line of dialogue spoken has incommensurable vigor.

Mesmerizing build up of romance and tension by the snappy and captivating pen of Daniel Mainwaring (as Geoffrey Homes) and Jacques Tourneur's keen eye. They draw a vigorous and pulsating tale of a man with a tormented past that encloses emotional and business related attachments, murder and betrayal.
Robert Mitchum is the man who passively awaits for a dreadful fate, not without scrutinizing and sabotaging the people who damaged him first.

Bogey's launch to stardom. top notch thriller, the first film-noir ever conceived.

Glenn Ford plays the only cop with guts in a city filtered by corruption.
Concise direction, topnotch acting and a ceaseless, brutal and intense plot make an splendorous noir, full of drama and tension.

The perfect blueprint of the great heist films. a lyrical, fatalistic and bitter work, like a castle of cards. Superb from Huston expressionistic direction to Sterling Hayden's deeply felt portrayal. Marilyn Monroe never looked more beautiful.

Expatriate filmmaker Jules Dassin pulls off a paris style noir masterpiece. Starring a great world-weary french Bogey Jean Servais. full of all my beloved noir keys, darkness, gloomy atmospheres, losers without a dime but with everything at stake, a well planned but ultimately gone wrong heist and the unavoidable disastrous destiny knocking on everybody's door. suspenseful, deep and utterly compelling.

Stanley Kubrick plunges once again into noir, and reaches, with an almost millimetrical precision as co-writer and director, an essential heist film, led by the always brilliant Sterling Hayden and soaked in feelings of tragedy and powerlessness against fate.
Kubrick's best, behind the incommensurable 'Paths of Glory'

One of the wittiest and most exciting pictures done by the master.
Robert Walker's performance stands out, as the presumptuous and presumably homosexual psychopath Bruno Anthony.
A nail-biting concatenation of events with delightfully twisted sense of humour, impeccably written and staged.

Gene Tierney is Laura, an angel immortalized in a portrait, who enthralled the soul of three men, and my humble self as well. David Raksin's beautiful and haunting score and the utmost exactness of skill, both in screenplay and direction take this film up high as an enchanting love story and as a dark and complex mystery. Now I know why Otto Preminger, allegedly, destroyed all of the original director Rouben Mamoulian's footage. Another pinnacle of noir, and an obvious precursor, along with Luis Buñuel's Él, of my favorite film, Vertigo.

According to some scholars, the last work of the film-noir golden age. Orson Welles takes Whit Masterson's simple story of murder and corruption on the mexican-american border and improves it, making it a feast for the eyes, starting with a lenghty travelling shot. Russel Metty's striking photography and Henry Mancini's snappy score are major points, as well as the acting department, led by none other than Welles, as the crooked cop, funny appearences by Dennis Weaver and Akim Tamiroff and Charlton Heston as a mexican, which might be odd, but he did a very good job. A cinematic tour de force.

Hitch's personal favorite of his own, and one of mine too. the adorable Teresa Wright and the always cool Joseph Cotten as well as the master's talent for pace, character development and sophisticated but dark sense of humour makes this film a great experience.

There are more worries in the life of a gangster besides money. There's love, loyalty, friendship, and the most implacable killer of all: time itself, the way it undermines and vanishes every human being no matter how strong or resolute he/she used to be.
Jean Gabin plays the elegant and charismatic Max, an aging criminal mentor who finds his way to retirement full of bumps.
After pulling out the heist that Max thought would end up his occupation for good, Max's best friend Riton tells his girlfriend (a very young Jeanne Moreau) about their last job. Unfortunately, this leak of information given by the incompetent Riton leads to his kidnapping by Max's competitor Angelo (Lino Ventura) who will demand their last job's loot for ransom. It will all be decided in a tense and masterfully shot gun battle.
An engrossing masterpiece with phenomenal direction, acting and cinematography.

Vibrant and brilliant film, engaging plot, and electrifying performance by James Cagney as the totally amoral and psychotic momma's boy Cody Jarret.
Cody's farewell line is unforgettable.

The gorgeous Rita, for her famous flirtation while dancing singing and marrying rich criminals, gets a slap full of anger by the cool Glenn Ford. a noir jewel, an imperishable delight.

Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum are face to face, pound to pound in this thrilling and terrifying noir with a great score by Bernard Herrmann

I've always considered a train as an ideal geography for suspense. A claustrophobic spot where a cat-and-mouse game seems edgier than usual, and this was no exception.
An intense, enormously effective thrill ride, full of great twists and occasional touches of humour.

with this low budget noir gem Welles shows his guts once more, by giving it his essential expresionistic style, and also because he cut and dyed the hair or the gorgeous Rita Hayworth. marvelous.

Exciting story of lovers with a twisted passion for the trigger ala Bonnie and Clyde, with frenetic but solid direction by Joseph H. Lewis.

Ralph Meeker, in the role of his life, plays the violent and fireproof Mike Hammer in a supremely enjoyable McCarthy-era/nuclear holocaust paranoid Noir. full of great moments like the opening scene and an epilogue that makes it feel like a genuine horror film.

Alluring fox Ava Gardner tempts a weary Burt Lancaster in this rambling faena of betrayal, theft, jealousy and murder.

Nightmarish, gritty and substantial post war noir. an A class B picture.

A hired killer takes us for a stroll through Manhattan's wet pavement, along with his misanthropic thoughts, and especially directed feelings of utter disgust and hatred for his new target; like he was some kind of a grown up Holden Caulfield.

The film, like everybody points out, lacks storytelling expertise. The voice over narration is unnecesary and takes away the emotional impact the images for themselves could have had. Perhaps this only inconvenience is what keeps it away from being a real contender when compared to others.

But having stark realism and nihilism all over it, makes Allen Baron's obscure opera prima what film noir is all about, the complex character study of a man trapped on a hellish existence.

Brilliant, pessimistic, enchanting and fascinating tone, noir at its best. as always, Bogart rocks in his antiheroism.

Kubrick's noirish second film. great story and performers. a short, fun and bold little gem.

State of the art direction by Polanski. A homage that surpases a lot of Film-noirs and hard-boiled detective thrillers. one of the best and most bitter endings ever captured.

A seminal neo-noir, one of the most powerful and violent psychologic dramas. Scorsese's master direction and Herrman's jazzy score bring a new meaning to god's lonely man...

San francisco, California. where some of the greatest thrillers in film history have taken place, is the location of one of the most haunting and painstaking character studies in the genre. Gene Hackman is simply brilliant in his personification of a surveillance expert sunk by guilt, who gradually succumbs to the insidious and intricate scheme he is struggling to find out. Profoundly insightful and conspicuous.

Just when everyone thought good old noir was under the ground, John Boorman resurrected it in style, mixing it with a little psychedelia and avant-garde techniques, adding sex appeal of blond babes Angie Dickinson and Sharon Acker, and last but not least, placing the tough guy Lee Marvin in the deadly assignment of getting the money he was double-crossed for. Topnotch example of innovative, hypnotic and thrilling filmmaking.

Rough, exciting and suspenseful thriller starring Clint Eastwood, in the role that made him a star, as police inspector Harry Callahan, one of the coolest and most iconic anti heroes in motion picture history. Superb narrating pulse by Don Siegel, vibrant editing and jazzy score by Lalo Schifrin, which is also Eastwood's favorite music genre. Andy Robinson is also very good as the psychopathic Scorpio killer, loosely based on the notorious Zodiac case.

Gripping, frantic and viscerally realistic thriller with a formidable Gene Hackman as the hard-boiled law enforcer Popeye Doyle.
Gritty ambiance, impressive performances, and one of the most staggering and tense car chases ever shot.

Sordid and mean spirited pulp with a classic score, and probably the british gangster film par excellence. Michael Caine, in a brutal but cool performance, plays the avenger Jack Carter, a London racketeer who goes to the foggy Newcastle trying to get the people who killed his brother. Seriously nihilistic, bleak and vividly detailed.

DePalma's last masterpiece. Pacino accomplished one of his most memorable, touching and heart warming characters.
A film that goes relentlessly to the top of crime/neo-noir films of all time.

masterful debut film for Tarantino. great homage to old school heist films. memorable in every sense.

A human ear is the passage to the violent, dark, provoking and neurotic forces hidden on the confines of a small american town.

Darius Khondji's moody cinematography is the most outstanding factor of one of the best thrillers of the 90s. Andrew Kevin Walker's screenplay is superb, just as the two leads Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt. Suspense goes uphill with every passing minute, and ends up in a powerful and mind-blowing moment. David Fincher's masterwork.

Classic noir was re born from the ashes with this superb adaptation of James Ellroy novel. A complex detective story inside the crooked L.A police.

Interesting hybrid between film-noir and southern gothic horror. Mickey Rourke does a great job as the private eye, and De Niro delivers a memorable and shivering performance.

Alain Delon plays a cool, well dressed hitman who travels through the colourful sixties paris underworld following a code of silence. superb art design and overall feeling of a lonely, austere way of living.

Unjustifiably forgotten new classic. A striking and quirky neo noir with a superb triad of criminals blinded by greed. Terrific score by Elmer Bernstein.

Milano, and its same old trades and issues, awaits Ugo Piazza after serving three years in prison. on top of that, his acquaintances believe he stole them 300,000 dollars in the last job he did before his capture.
Gastone Moschin is the cool, tough guy of few words, with no will of rehab and no other alternative than get mixed in obscure dealings with sinister and psychotic racketeers, like the one Mario Adorf brilliantly performs.
First part of Fernando Di Leo's trilogia del milieu, with the trademarks of colourful violence, and hard-hitting socio-political dialectic about the grudges between the industrial north and the agricultural south.
Italian poliziottesco (neo-noir) at its best.

Another intricated cinephile masturbation by DePalma, though his virtuous and stylish mise-en-scene is always present. fun and sexy, especially for the soundtrack and Rebecca Romijn's presence.