Film-Noir Discussion/DVD Review Thread

[cigar joe]

Noir City comes to LA: http://www.americancinemathequecalendar.com/content/noir-city-hollywood-15th-annual-festival-of-film-noir

How odd that nothing like it comes to NYC.

Yea, we should push for one ;-), here are all the noirs based in part or wholly in and around NYC:

99 River Street
A Double Life
Blast of Silence
Broadway
C-man
City Across The River
Cop Hater
Cry Murder
Cry Of The City
Cry Terror
Deception
Detective Story
Deadline At Dawn
Deadline U.S.A.
Dr. Broadway
Edge of the City
Fallen Sparrow
Force Of Evil
Grand Central Murder
Guilty Bystander
He Ran All The Way
House of Strangers
I wake Up Screaming
Jigsaw
Johnny One Eye
Kiss Of Death
Killers Kiss
Lady On A Train
Laura
Mad Dog Coll
Murder Inc.
New York Confidential
Odds Against Tomorrow
Pickup on South Street
Port Of New York
Repeat Performance
Scandal Sheet
Scarlet Street
Side Street
Slaughter on 10th Avenue
Sleep My Love
Sorry, Wrong Number
Street Of Chance
Sweet Smell Of Success
The Big Clock
The Dark Corner
The Gangster
The Garment Jungle
The Glass Wall
The Harder They Fall
The House on 92nd Street
The Killer That Stalked New York
The Lost Weekend
The Naked City
The People Against O'Hara
The Phantom Lady
The Pusher
The Racket
The Seventh Victim
The Sleeping City
The Tattooed Stranger
The Thief
The Unsuspected
The Velvet Touch
The Wrong Man
The Young Savages
Tight Spot
Tomorrow Is Another Day
Vicky
The Window
Where The Sidewalk Ends
While the City Sleeps
Woman In The Window

[dave jenkins]

The Case Against Brooklyn? There must be others.

Notice how many titles at Noir City aren't available on DVD. That's why I want one of these to happen here: to see the rare films that can't otherwise be seen.

[dave jenkins]

LEAVE HER TO HEAVEN (1945) BLU-RAY - May 14th

Twilight Time is bringing this out, so the production run (by contract) is limited to 3,000 units. When they're gone, they're gone. I have seen the restored Technicolor version of this film, and the colors are electric. I'll be getting a copy for sure.

This is now up for pre-order. But yikes! It's 30 smackers plus shipping!!

[dave jenkins]

THE MASK OF DIMITRIOS (1944) is coming from Warner Archive on 5/7!!!

[drinkanddestroy]

THE MASK OF DIMITRIOS (1944) is coming from Warner Archive on 5/7!!!

good movie. I saw it on TCM a while ago 

[drinkanddestroy]

The Undercover Man (1949) http://www.fistful-of-leone.com/forums/index.php?topic=11345.msg158000#msg158000

Framed (1947) http://www.fistful-of-leone.com/forums/index.php?topic=11489.msg160668#msg160668

TCM will be showing both of these movies next week, on Wednesday, May 1:
http://www.tcm.com/schedule/index.html?tz=est&sdate=2013-04-30

The Undercover Man  at 12:00 AM EST

Framed at 2:45 AM EST

[dave jenkins]

Framed is worth watching.

[dave jenkins]

Columbia Pictures Film Noir Classics IV: http://shop.tcm.com/columbia-pictures-film-noir-classics-iv/detail.php?p=452616&v=tcm_vault-collection_sony

These don't look all that exciting--I've seen Johnny O'Clock, which is just OK--but maybe they've already released all the good stuff. I regret there are no mid-to-late 50s films--I love widescreen noir!

[cigar joe]

I haven't seen WALK A CROOKED MILE (1948) or WALK EAST ON BEACON (1952)

[dave jenkins]

Holy Jaw-drop, Batman, Warner Archive's got Loophole! http://www.dvdtalk.com/dvdsavant/s4181loop.html

[cigar joe]

Holy Jaw-drop, Batman, Warner Archive's got Loophole! http://www.dvdtalk.com/dvdsavant/s4181loop.html

Nice, just watched it recently http://www.fistful-of-leone.com/forums/index.php?topic=11582.msg162883#msg162883

[dave jenkins]

Wow, Joe, the source for your screen caps looks really poor. The Warner Archive images seems much, much better. I just ordered it, so I'll know for sure soon.

[cigar joe]

Wow, Joe, the source for your screen caps looks really poor. The Warner Archive images seems much, much better. I just ordered it, so I'll know for sure soon.

Yea it was a multi-generational copy 

[dave jenkins]

http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film4/blu-ray_reviews_59/the_file_on_thelma_jordan_blu-ray.htm

Just watched this myself. There are a couple really good scenes in this: the ADA helping Stanwyck rearrange the crime scene, not really knowing why he's doing it, by also working under pressure as he's in mounting danger of being discovered and implicated; and, of course, the trial scene, where Wendell Corey has to both prosecute the woman he loves while stage-managing her defense. The ending is a bit of a cop-out, but it doesn't ruin things.

[drinkanddestroy]

Friday nights in June, TCM will spotlight noir writers. First up, next week, June 7, will be Dashiell Hammett night, programmed by Eddie Muller. Schedule here http://www.tcm.com/schedule/index.html?tz=est&sdate=2013-06-07

Here is an essay by Muller about this Hammett program:


Eddie Muller on Dashiell Hammett
Anyone who has written a crime/mystery story since 1930, anywhere in the world, owes a debt to Dashiell Hammett. Raymond Chandler, certainly. But also bestselling contemporary writers such as James Ellroy, Michael Connelly, Laura Lippman, Elmore Leonard and Sara Paretsky. All of us, really. Hammett's influential stories and novels set the structural template for almost every derivation of modern crime story. He also set the tone and tempo: the tough, terse, as-it-happens pace, the jaundiced and cynical attitude--always peppering the pages with bitter humor.

He only finished five novels, but they echo throughout the history of crime fiction: gangland sagas (Red Harvest), family intrigues (The Dain Curse), hardboiled detection (The Maltese Falcon), political thrillers (The Glass Key), and blithe, murderous farce (The Thin Man)--all originated with Hammett.

What made his work special, why it remains vital more than eighty years after it was first published, is that Hammett brought the real world into mystery fiction. Or, as Chandler put it so well, "He gave crime back to the people who committed it for a reason"--distinct from the armchair detectives for whom the genre was merely a puzzle-solving amusement. Sure, Hammett knew how to goose a story along with melodramatics, and he ramped up the sex and violence to sate the cravings of the pulp readers who were his biggest fans, but behind this low-brow product was a high-minded intellectual: insatiably curious, extraordinarily well-read, socially conscious, a serious-minded craftsman. He played at being indifferent, but knew he was changing the game.

He also was an alcoholic, a womanizer, and inveterate gambler. And a good husband and father. He was a patriot and a Communist. He absorbed a world of contradictions and had the keenness of intellect and the storytelling intuition to transform it all into prose that is still emulated today, if rarely equaled.

Oh, and one last thing. If you watch me hosting the Hammett tribute on June 7 and think I'm mispronouncing his name: I'm not. It's Dash-EEL, not DASH-ill, as it's been mispronounced for decades. His full name is Samuel Dashiell Hammett, the middle name honoring his mother's family, whose lineage stretched back to the Huguenots of 17th century France. If you've named your son or daughter after him, don't worry--you can pronounce it anyway you want. But for the record, he pronounced it Dash-EEL.

I've chosen to show: The Maltese Falcon (1931, novel), City Streets (1931, original story), After the Thin Man (1936, original story), The Glass Key (1942, novel).

By Eddie Muller


To read the full month's Friday Night Spotlight: Noir Writers program, drag the entire text that is inside the red brackets into your browser:

[  http://www.tcm.com/this-month/article/614562|0/Friday-Night-Spotlight-in-June-Noir-Writers.html   ]

This will bring you to the homepage for the Friday Night Spotlight: Noir Writers program.

On the right side of that page is a full series of articles about each movie and each writer featured in this program.

Enjoy