Category: film noir
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British Invasion: Boorman Uncorks Psychedelic Noir
Angie Dickinson, Lee Marvin and Carroll O’Connor in ‘Point Blank’ (1967). Why is L.A. the location of choice for so many crime films and stories about the dark side of life? Maybe it’s just because the bulk of all film production is done in Hollywood and it’s cheaper to shoot in your own backyard. But…
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‘The Crimson Kimono’: Big Crime in Little Tokyo
Tawdry newspaper headlines bark out plot twists in ‘The Crimson Kimono’ (1959). Director, producer and writer Samuel Fuller photographs the streets of downtown L.A. stunningly in “The Crimson Kimono,“ a film that’s part mystery, part love triangle and part travelogue. We get to see the downtown exteriors, particularly Little Tokyo as it looked in 1959,…
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Crime Erupts Under the Streets of L.A.
Much of “He Walked by Night” is held together with the loose thread of documentary-style film-making. But those parts are no match or the last 20 minutes or so of the film that prowls the lower reaches of the city. Richard Basehart is the killer who terrorizes L.A. and can’t be stopped. Few have ever…
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Their Mileage May Vary: Thundering Down ‘Plunder Road’
I took James Ellroy’s advice — it didn’t come directly from him, you understand — and checked out “Plunder Road,” one of his all-time favorite crime films that was included in Monday’s post. It’s a great-looking, pared-down gritty drama made in 1957, obviously on a small budget. The cast includes the great Elisha Cook Jr.,…
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Scorsese’s Favorite Gangster Movies
James Cagney, “White Heat” (1949). Director Martin Scorsese revisits crime pictures that most influenced him Here are 15 gangster pictures that had a profound effect on me and the way I thought about crime and how to portray it on film. They excited me, provoked me, and in one way or another, they had the…