Category: vintage film
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Crime tourists, Part I: Yanks behaving badly in foreign lands
Orson Welles, ‘The Third Man’ (1949). By Paul Parcellin Film noir loves morally sketchy locales — the kind of places where law and order is on life support and police can be manipulated like a vending machine. Like America’s Wild West, post-war Europe and Asia’s rubble strewn roadways were a magnet for drifters, bootleggers, grifters…
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Live it up! 11 essential nightclubs of noir
Karen Morley, ‘Scarface’ (1932) By Paul Parcellin In noir, nightclubs are smokey hideaways where criminality thrives under moody lighting. Ritzier than typical barrooms, they are havens for hedonists and the racketeer elite. Crucial to these nightspots are floorshows. A chanteuse may whisper a torch song designed to torment an ex-lover sitting ringside. Her words spell…
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Mark Stevens: his quartet of searing films noir still light up screens today
Lucille Ball, Mark Stevens, ‘The Dark Corner’ (1946). By Paul Parcellin Mark Stevens made a string of taut crime dramas in the 1940s and ’50s that still resonate today. He acted in dozens of films, from westerns, war pictures to musicals and comedies, and directed two of his self-produced noirs as well as some hardboiled…
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‘Out of the Past’: 13 Signs that Jane Greer is About to Destroy You
Jane Greer, ‘Out of the Past’ (1947). Dressed in mink and deadly. Warnings abound, but the only thing Mitchum can sputter is ‘Baby, I don’t care’ Contains spoilers By Paul Parcellin ‘Out of the Past’ (1947) You can’t say that Jeff Bailey (Robert Mitchum) had no way of knowing what he was in for. A…
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The Big Knockoff: 14 Films With Armored Car Heists
Burt Lancaster struggles for the gun. “Criss Cross” (1949). By Paul Parcellin If the movies are any indication, the 1940s and ’50s, especially the ’50s, must have been the golden age of armored car robberies — they were getting knocked over like clay pigeons in a shooting gallery. A common armored car robbery movie plot:…
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‘The Long Good Friday’: A Gangster Noir That Saw the Future
Bob Hoskins, Helen Mirren, “The Long Good Friday” (1980). Mobster’s World Blown to Bits in an Easter Wave of Terror Contains spoilers By Paul Parcellin ‘The Long Good Friday’ (1980) As Good Friday approaches it’s fitting that we look at one of the slender number of crime films set on the holiest of Christian holy…
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Headshrinker Noir: 10 Films With Mind Games, Crime
Ingrid Bergman, “Spellbound” (1945). From Dedicated Healers to Evil Control Freaks, Noir Psychiatrists Want to Pick Your Brain By Paul Parcellin Do all psychiatrists intentionally drive their patients insane and force them to commit awful crimes? In real life it’s unlikely … probably. But in film noir it’s a 50-50 bet. Not that all noir…
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Could You Repeat That? — 36 Noirs That Unfold In Flashbacks
Barbara Stanwyck, Fred MacMurray, “Double Indemnity” (1944). They pop up in all kinds of movies and TV shows, but flashbacks are the stuff that films noir are made of By Paul Parcellin Is that film you’re watching a noir? Here’s one semi-reliable way to tell: Look for flashbacks. In noir, flashbacks show us the stuff…
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D.O.A.: Small Town Man Visits Big City, Murder Follows
Frank Gerstle, Edmond O’Brien, “D.O.A.” (1949). The doctor delivers some astonishingly bad news. Frank Bigelow needs to find the truth,but he’s driven by a deeper motivation By Paul Parcellin When you think of noir, it’s probably not 18th century British author Samuel Johnson who first springs to mind. But his most famous quote really nails the…
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Busted But Not Broken: Greylisted Actor Made Indy Noirs
Virginia Christine, Edward G. Robinson, “Nightmare” (1956). Edward G. Robinson’s testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) resulted in his being shunned by the major studios. Instead, he appeared in independently produced Poverty Row films Film Noir: The Dark Side of Cinema XVII [Vice Squad / Black Tuesday / Nightmare] [Blu-ray] By Paul Parcellin…