Sweet Smell of Success
Year: 1957
Country: USA
Director: Alexander Mackendrick
Starring: Burt Lancaster, Martin Milner, Emile Meyer, Tony Curtis, Sam Levene, Barbara Nichols, Jeff Donnell
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J.J. Hunsecker, the most powerful newspaper columnist in New York, is determined to prevent his sister from marrying Steve Dallas, a jazz musician. He therefore covertly employs Sidney Falco, a sleazy and unscrupulous press agent, to break up the affair by any means possible.
Kansas City Confidential
Year: 1952
Country: USA
Director: Phil Karlson
Starring: Neville Brand, Don Orlando, Jack Elam, Lee Van Cleef, John Payne, Howard Negley, Carleton Young
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A down-on-his-luck ex-GI finds himself framed for an armored car robbery. When he's finally released for lack of evidence--after having been beaten up and tortured by the police--he sets out to discover who set him up, and why. The trail leads him into Mexico and a web of hired killers and corrupt cops.
Johnny Eager
Year: 1941
Country: USA
Director: Mervyn LeRoy
Starring: Barry Nelson, Robert Taylor, Robert Sterling, Paul Stewart, Diana Lewis, Henry O'Neill, Edward Arnold
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Ruthless hood Johnny Eager is pretending to his parole officer that he has chucked the rackets and is now a full-time taxi driver. In fact he's as deep in as he ever was, and desperately needs official permission to open his new dog track. When he meets up with Lisbeth Bard he finds he not only has a stunning new girlfriend but a possible way to get his permit.
The Big Combo
Genres: Crime, Thriller, Drama
Year: 1955
Country: USA
Director: Joseph H. Lewis
Starring: Earl Holliman, Ted de Corsia, Whit Bissell, Robert Middleton, Roy Gordon, Richard Conte, Lee Van Cleef
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Police Lt. Diamond is told to close his surveillance of suspected mob boss Mr. Brown because it's costing the department too much money with no results. Diamond makes one last attempt to uncover evidence against Brown by going to Brown's girlfriend, Susan Lowell.
Laura
Genres: Crime, Thriller, Romance
Year: 1944
Country: USA
Director: Otto Preminger
Starring: Vincent Price, Judith Anderson, Gene Tierney, Clifton Webb, Dana Andrews
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Detective Mark McPherson investigates the killing of Laura, found dead on her apartment floor before the movie starts. McPherson builds a mental picture of the dead girl from the suspects whom he interviews. He is helped by the striking painting of the late lamented Laura hanging on her apartment wall. But who would have wanted to kill a girl with whom every man she met seemed to fall in love? To make matters worse, McPherson finds himself falling under her spell too. Then one night, halfway through his investigations, something seriously bizarre happens to make him re-think the whole case.
The Sleeping City
Genres: Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Year: 1950
Country: USA
Director: George Sherman
Starring: John Alexander, Richard Conte, Alex Nicol, Coleen Gray, Peggy Dow, Richard Taber
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At Bellvue Hospital, New York, an intern is shot in the head by an unknown killer. Inspector Gordon of the 9th Precinct finds no obvious leads but senses an undercurrent of mystery at the hospital; enter Detective Fred Rowan, whose medical background enables him to pose as an intern. Through wheels within wheels, Rowan finally penetrates to a secret, dirty racket...and nurse Ann Sebastian, whom he's been dating, may be mixed up in it.
The House on 92nd Street
Year: 1945
Country: USA
Director: Henry Hathaway
Starring: William Eythe, Harry Bellaver, Lloyd Nolan, Leo G. Carroll, Gene Lockhart, Signe Hasso, Charles Wagenheim
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Preface: a stentorian narrator tells us that the USA was flooded with Nazi spies in 1939-41. One such tries to recruit college grad Bill Dietrich, who becomes a double agent for the FBI. While Bill trains in Hamburg, a street-accident victim proves to have been spying on atom-bomb secrets; conveniently, Dietrich is assigned to the New York spy ring stealing these secrets. Can he track down the mysterious "Christopher" before his ruthless associates unmask and kill him?
The Set-Up
Year: 1949
Country: USA
Director: Robert Wise
Starring: Robert Ryan, Darryl Hickman, Alan Baxter, Hal Baylor, Wallace Ford, Percy Helton, David Clarke
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Over-the-hill boxer Bill 'Stoker' Thompson insists he can still win, though his sexy wife Julie pleads with him to quit. But his manager Tiny is so confident he will lose, he takes money for a "dive" from tough gambler Little Boy...without bothering to tell Stoker. Tension builds as Stoker hopes to "take" Tiger Nelson, unaware of what will happen to him if he does.
Dark Passage
Year: 1947
Country: USA
Director: Delmer Daves
Starring: Lauren Bacall, Humphrey Bogart, Agnes Moorehead, Douglas Kennedy, Bruce Bennett, Clifton Young, Rory Mallinson
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Bogart plays a man convicted of murdering his wife who escapes from prison in order to prove his innocence. Bogart finds that his features are too well known, and is forced to seek some illicit backroom plastic surgery. The entire pre-knife part of the film is shot from a Bogart's-eye-view, with us seeing the fugitive for the first time as he starts to recuperate from the operation in the apartment of a sympathetic young artist (played by Bacall) for whom he soon finds affection. But what he's really after is revenge.
Inner Sanctum
Genres: Thriller, Mystery, Film-Noir
Year: 1948
Country: USA
Director: Lew Landers
Starring: Dale Belding, Lee Patrick, Roscoe Ates, Nana Bryant, Billy House, Fritz Leiber, Charles Russell
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A man fleeing the police after having committed a murder hides out in a boarding house in a small town.
The Amazing Mr. X
Genres: Thriller, Horror, Film-Noir
Year: 1948
Country: USA
Director: Bernard Vorhaus
Starring: Cathy O'Donnell, Richard Carlson, Virginia Gregg, Turhan Bey, Donald Curtis, Lynn Bari
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On the beach one night, Christine Faber, two years a widow, thinks she hears her late husband Paul calling out of the surf...then meets a tall dark man, Alexis, who seems to know all about such things. After more ghostly manifestations, Christine and younger sister Janet become enmeshed in the eerie artifices of Alexis; but he in turn finds himself manipulated into deeper deviltry than he had in mind...
The Woman in the Window
Genres: Crime, Thriller, Mystery
Year: 1944
Country: USA
Director: Fritz Lang
Starring: Raymond Massey, Edward G. Robinson, Joan Bennett, Dan Duryea, Dorothy Peterson, Arthur Loft, Edmund Breon
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Gotham College professor Wanley and his friends become obsessed with the portrait of a woman in the window next to the men's club. Wanley happens to meet the woman while admiring her portrait, and ends up in her apartment for talk and a bit of champagne. Her boyfriend bursts in and misinterprets Wanley's presence, whereupon a scuffle ensues and the boyfriend gets killed. In order to protect his reputation, the professor agrees to dump the body and help cover up the killing, but becomes increasingly suspect as the police uncover more and more clues and a blackmailer begins leaning on the woman.
The Reckless Moment
Year: 1949
Country: USA
Director: Max Ophüls
Starring: James Mason, Henry O'Neill, Roy Roberts, Joan Bennett, Shepperd Strudwick, David Bair, Geraldine Brooks
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After discovering the dead body of Bea Harper's lover, Bea's mother Lucia hides the body under the assumption that it was her daughter who killed the man. Martin Donnelly comes to blackmail Lucia on behalf of his partner Nagel and falls in love with Lucia instead. Nagel wants the money and Donnelly kills Nagel to protect Lucia, and then kills himself to end the impossible relationship with the married Lucia.
The Asphalt Jungle
Genres: Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Year: 1950
Country: USA
Director: John Huston
Starring: Sterling Hayden, Marilyn Monroe, James Whitmore, Marc Lawrence, John McIntire, Sam Jaffe, William 'Wee Willie' Davis
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'Doc' Riedenschneider, legendary crime 'brain' just out of prison, has a brilliant plan for a million-dollar burglary. To pull it off, he recruits safecracker Louis, driver Gus, financial backer Emmerich, and strong-arm man Dix Handley. At first the plan goes like clockwork, but little accidents accumulate and each partner proves to have his own fatal weakness. In the background is a pervasive, grimy urban malaise.
Act of Violence
Genres: Thriller, Drama, Film-Noir
Year: 1948
Country: USA
Director: Fred Zinnemann
Starring: Will Wright, Robert Ryan, Taylor Holmes, Janet Leigh, Connie Gilchrist, Berry Kroeger, Mary Astor
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War veteran Frank Enley seems to be a happily married small-town citizen until he realises Joe Parkson is in town. It seems Parkson is out for revenge because of something that happened in a German POW camp, and when a frightened Enley suddenly leaves for a convention in L.A., Parkson is close behind.
Night and the City
Genres: Crime, Thriller, Sport
Year: 1950
Country: UK
Director: Jules Dassin
Starring: Hugh Marlowe, Richard Widmark, Herbert Lom, Mike Mazurki, Gene Tierney, Francis L. Sullivan, Charles Farrell
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Harry Fabian (Richard Widmark) is a London hustler with ambitious plans that never work out. One day, when he encounters the most famous Greco-Roman wrestler in the world, Gregorius, at a London wrestling arena run by his son Kristo, he dreams up a scheme that he thinks will finally be his ticket to financial independence. As Fabian attempts to con everyone around him to get his scheme to work, he of course only ends up conning himself. This is an interesting tale of blind ambition, self-deception, broken dreams, and how a man who always thinks he's ahead of the game ends up tripping himself very badly.
The Glass Key
Year: 1942
Country: USA
Director: Stuart Heisler
Starring: Donald MacBride, William Bendix, Moroni Olsen, Veronica Lake, Margaret Hayes, Alan Ladd, Richard Denning
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During the campaign for reelection, the crooked politician Paul Madvig decides to clean up his past, refusing the support of the gangster Nick Varna and associating to the respectable reformist politician Ralph Henry. When Ralph's son, Taylor Henry, a gambler and the lover of Paul's sister Opal, is murdered, Paul's right arm, Ed Beaumont, finds his body on the street. Nick uses the financial situation of The Observer to force the publisher Clyde Matthews to use the newspaper to raise the suspicion that Paul Madvig might have killed Taylor.
The Killing
Genres: Crime, Thriller, Drama
Year: 1956
Country: USA
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Starring: Jay C. Flippen, Sterling Hayden, Ted de Corsia, Tito Vuolo, Joe Sawyer, Elisha Cook Jr., Jay Adler
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After getting out of prison, Johnny Clay masterminds a complex race-track heist, but his scheme is complicated by the intervention of the wife of a teller (George Peatty) in on the scheme, the boyfriend of the wife, airport regulations, and a small dog.
The Thief
Genres: Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Year: 1952
Country: USA
Director: Russell Rouse
Starring: Ray Milland, Rita Gam, Martin Gabel, Harry Bronson, Rita Vale, Rex O'Malley, John McKutcheon
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Interesting, but sometimes slow film about a nuclear physicist working in Washington DC who also spies for some unnamed foreign country. It does have a rather funny, patriotic/propagandist ending. It's most interesting aspect is that it is filmed entirely without dialogue.
The Night of the Hunter
Genres: Thriller, Drama, Film-Noir
Year: 1955
Country: USA
Director: Charles Laughton
Starring: Robert Mitchum, Peter Graves, James Gleason, Shelley Winters, Don Beddoe, Lillian Gish, Gloria Castillo
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Harry Powell marries and murders widows for their money, believing he is helping God do away with women who arouse men's carnal instincts. Arrested for auto theft, he shares a cell with condemned killer Ben Harper and tries to get him to reveal the whereabouts of the $10,000 he stole. Only Ben's nine-year-old son, John and four-year-old daughter, Pearl know the money is in Pearl's doll and they have sworn to their father to keep this secret. After Ben is executed, Preacher goes to Cresap's Landing to court Ben's widow, Willa. He overwhelms her with his Scripture quoting, sermons and hymns, and she agrees to marry him. On their wedding night h...