Film noir
Film noir (; ) is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Cinema of the United States, Hollywood Crime film, crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and motivations. The 1940s and 1950s are generally regarde ...
is not a clearly defined
genre
Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other fo ...
(see
here
Here is an adverb that means "in, on, or at this place". It may also refer to:
Software
* Here Technologies, a mapping company
* Here WeGo (formerly Here Maps), a mobile app and map website by Here
Television
* Here TV (formerly "here!"), a ...
for details on the characteristics). Therefore, the composition of this list may be controversial. To minimize dispute the films included here should preferably feature a footnote linking to a reliable, published source which states that the mentioned film is considered to be a film noir by an expert in this field, e.g.
The terms which are used below to subsume various periods and variations of film noir are not definitive and are meant as a navigational aid rather than as critical argument. Because the 1940s and 1950s are universally regarded as the "classic period" of American film noir, films released prior to 1940 are listed under the caption "Precursors / early noir-like films". Films released after 1959 should generally only be listed in the list of neo-noir titles.
Precursors / early noir-like films
Under Cover Man
1927
* ''
Underworld
The underworld, also known as the netherworld or hell, is the supernatural world of the dead in various religious traditions and myths, located below the world of the living. Chthonic is the technical adjective for things of the underworld. ...
Thunderbolt
A thunderbolt or lightning bolt is a symbolic representation of lightning when accompanied by a loud thunderclap. In Indo-European mythology, the thunderbolt was identified with the 'Sky Father'; this association is also found in later Hell ...
''
1931
* '' The Big Gamble''Vernet, Marc "''Film Noir'' on the Edge of Doom", in Copjec, Joan, ed. (1993). ''Shades of Noir''. London and New York: Verso.
* '' City Streets''
* '' Little Caesar''
* '' The Maltese Falcon'' (a.k.a. ''Dangerous Female'')
* ''
The Public Enemy
''The Public Enemy'' (''Enemies of the Public'' in the UK) is a 1931 American all-talking pre-Code gangster film produced and distributed by Warner Bros. The film was directed by William A. Wellman and stars James Cagney, Jean Harlow, Edwar ...
The Secret Six
''The Secret Six'' is a 1931 American pre-Code crime film starring Wallace Beery as "Slaughterhouse Scorpio", a character very loosely based on Al Capone, and featuring Lewis Stone, John Mack Brown, Jean Harlow, Clark Gable, Marjorie Ramb ...
''
1932
* ''
20,000 Years in Sing Sing
''20,000 Years in Sing Sing'' is a 1932 American Pre-Code drama film set in Sing Sing Penitentiary, the maximum security prison in Ossining, New York, starring Spencer Tracy as an inmate and Bette Davis as his girlfriend. It was directed by M ...
I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang
''I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang'' is a 1932 American pre-Code crime-drama film directed by Mervyn LeRoy and starring Paul Muni as a wrongfully convicted man on a chain gang who escapes to Chicago. It was released on November 10, 1932. The ...
Private Detective 62
''Private Detective 62'' is a 1933 American pre-Code detective film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring William Powell as a private detective who falls for a woman whom he has been hired to frame in a scandal.
Plot
In France, United States ...
Journal of a Crime
''Journal of a Crime'' is a 1934 American pre-Code crime drama film produced by First National Pictures. It was directed by William Keighley and stars Ruth Chatterton, Adolphe Menjou and Claire Dodd. The film is a remake of the 1933 French film ...
''
* ''
Midnight
Midnight is the transition time from one day to the next – the moment when the date changes, on the local official clock time for any particular jurisdiction. By clock time, midnight is the opposite of noon, differing from it by 12 hour ...
''
* ''
The Thin Man
''The Thin Man'' (1934) is a detective novel by Dashiell Hammett, originally published in a condensed version in the December 1933 issue of ''Redbook''. It appeared in book form the following month. A film series followed, featuring the main cha ...
Crime and Punishment
''Crime and Punishment'' ( pre-reform Russian: ; post-reform rus, Преступление и наказание, Prestupléniye i nakazániye, prʲɪstʊˈplʲenʲɪje ɪ nəkɐˈzanʲɪje) is a novel by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoevsky ...
''
* ''
G Men
''G Men'' is a 1935 Warner Bros. crime film starring James Cagney, Ann Dvorak, Margaret Lindsay and Lloyd Nolan in his film debut. According to ''Variety,'' the movie was one of the top-grossing films of 1935. The supporting cast features Rob ...
The Petrified Forest
''The Petrified Forest'' is a 1936 American film directed by Archie Mayo and based on Robert E. Sherwood's 1935 Broadway drama of the same name. The motion picture stars Leslie Howard, Bette Davis and Humphrey Bogart. The screenplay was written ...
''
* ''
Satan Met a Lady
''Satan Met a Lady'' is a 1936 American detective film directed by William Dieterle and starring Bette Davis and Warren William.
The screenplay by Brown Holmes is a loose adaptation of the 1929 novel '' The Maltese Falcon'' by Dashiell Hammett, ...
Angels with Dirty Faces
''Angels with Dirty Faces'' is a 1938 American crime drama film directed by Michael Curtiz for Warner Brothers. It stars James Cagney, Pat O'Brien, The Dead End Kids, Humphrey Bogart, Ann Sheridan, and George Bancroft. The screenplay was wri ...
The Roaring Twenties
''The Roaring Twenties'' is a 1939 American crime thriller film directed by Raoul Walsh and starring James Cagney, Priscilla Lane, Humphrey Bogart, and Gladys George. The film, spanning the periods between 1919 and 1933, was written by Jerry Wa ...
City for Conquest
''City for Conquest'' is a 1940 American epic drama film directed by Anatole Litvak and starring James Cagney, Ann Sheridan and Arthur Kennedy. The picture is based on the 1936 novel of the same name by Aben Kandel. The supporting cast feature ...
Le Dernier tournant
''The Last Turning'' (French: ''Le Dernier tournant'') is a 1939 French drama film directed by Pierre Chenal, written by Charles Spaak and Henri Torrès, based on the 1934 novel '' The Postman Always Rings Twice'' by James M. Cain.
Cast
*Fernan ...
'' (''The Last Turning'') (1939, France)
* '' Le Jour se lève'' (''Daybreak'') (1939, France)
* ''
On the Night of the Fire
''On the Night of the Fire'', released in the United States as ''The Fugitive'', is a 1939 British thriller film, directed by Brian Desmond Hurst and starring Ralph Richardson and Diana Wynyard. The film is based on the novel of the same name b ...
Dead of Night
''Dead of Night'' is a 1945 black and white British anthology horror film, made by Ealing Studios. The individual segments were directed by Alberto Cavalcanti, Charles Crichton, Basil Dearden and Robert Hamer. It stars Mervyn Johns, Googie ...
Pink String and Sealing Wax
''Pink String and Sealing Wax'' is a 1945 British drama film directed by Robert Hamer and starring Mervyn Johns. It is based on a play with the same name by Roland Pertwee. It was the first feature film Robert Hamer directed on his own.
The t ...
Dancing with Crime
''Dancing with Crime'' is a 1947 British film noir film directed by John Paddy Carstairs, starring Richard Attenborough, Barry K. Barnes and Sheila Sim. It was shot at Southall Studios with sets designed by the art director Andrew Mazzei. ...
''
* ''
Dear Murderer
''Dear Murderer'' is a 1947 British film noir crime, drama, thriller, directed by Arthur Crabtree for Gainsborough Pictures, and starring Eric Portman and Greta Gynt.
The film has come to be regarded as one of the best movies made under the ...
It Always Rains on Sunday
''It Always Rains on Sunday'' is a 1947 British film adaptation of Arthur La Bern's novel by the same name, directed by Robert Hamer. The film has been compared with the poetic realism movement in the French cinema of a few years earlier by the ...
''
* ''
Mine Own Executioner
''Mine Own Executioner'' is a 1947 British psychological thriller drama film starring Burgess Meredith and directed by Anthony Kimmins, and based on the novel of the same name by Nigel Balchin. It was entered into the 1947 Cannes Film Festiva ...
Odd Man Out
''Odd Man Out'' is a 1947 British film noir directed by Carol Reed, and starring James Mason, Robert Newton, Cyril Cusack, and Kathleen Ryan. Set in Belfast, Northern Ireland, it follows a wounded Nationalist leader who attempts to evade po ...
Temptation Harbour
''Temptation Harbour'' is a British black and white crime/drama film directed by Lance Comfort, released in 1947 based on the novel ''Newhaven-Dieppe'' (''L'Homme de Londres'') by Georges Simenon. The film was made at Welwyn Studios with sets ...
''
* ''
They Made Me a Fugitive
''They Made Me a Fugitive'' (released in the United States as ''I Became a Criminal'') is a 1947 British film noir set in postwar England.'' Variety'' film review; 2 July 1947, page 13.''Harrison's Reports'' film review (14 February 1948), page 2 ...
'' (a.k.a. ''I Became a Criminal'')
* ''
The Upturned Glass
''The Upturned Glass'' is a 1947 British film noir psychological thriller directed by Lawrence Huntington and starring James Mason, Rosamund John and Pamela Kellino. The screenplay concerns a leading brain surgeon who murders a woman he believe ...
''
1948
* ''
Blanche Fury
''Blanche Fury'' is a 1948 British Technicolor drama film directed by Marc Allégret and starring Valerie Hobson, Stewart Granger and Michael Gough. It was adapted from a 1939 novel of the same title by Joseph Shearing. In Victorian era Englan ...
Good-Time Girl
''Good-Time Girl'' is a 1948 British film noir-crime drama film directed by David MacDonald. A homeless girl is asked to explain her bad behaviour in the juvenile court, and says she’s run away from home because she’s unhappy there. They exp ...
Noose
A noose is a loop at the end of a rope in which the knot tightens under load and can be loosened without untying the knot.
The knot can be used to secure a rope to a post, pole, or animal but only where the end is in a position that the loop can ...
'' (a.k.a. ''The Silk Noose'')
* ''
The Small Voice
''The Small Voice'' (released in the United States as ''The Hideout'') is a 1948 British thriller film directed by Fergus McDonell and starring Valerie Hobson, James Donald and Howard Keel (who was credited as Harold Keel). The film is part of ...
The Third Man
''The Third Man'' is a 1949 British film noir directed by Carol Reed, written by Graham Greene and starring Joseph Cotten, Alida Valli, Orson Welles, and Trevor Howard. Set in postwar Vienna, the film centres on American Holly Martins (Cotte ...
''
1950
* ''
The Blue Lamp
''The Blue Lamp'' is a 1950 British police procedural film directed by Basil Dearden and starring Jack Warner as PC Dixon, Jimmy Hanley as newcomer PC Mitchell, and Dirk Bogarde as criminal Tom Riley. The title refers to the blue lamps that t ...
''
* ''
The Clouded Yellow
''The Clouded Yellow'' is a 1950 British mystery film directed by Ralph Thomas and produced by Betty E. Box for Carillon Films. A dismissed secret service agent falls in love with a disturbed young woman who is wrongly accused of murder and t ...
''
* ''
So Long at the Fair
''So Long at the Fair'' (US re-release title ''The Black Curse'') is a 1950 British thriller film directed by Terence Fisher and Antony Darnborough, and starring Jean Simmons and Dirk Bogarde. It was adapted from the 1947 novel of the same name ...
'' (a.k.a. ''The Black Curse'')
* '' The Woman in Question'' (a.k.a. ''Five Angles on Murder'')
Pool of London
The Pool of London is a stretch of the River Thames from London Bridge to below Limehouse.
Part of the Tideway of the Thames, the Pool was navigable by tall-masted vessels bringing coastal and later overseas goods—the wharves there were ...
The Last Page
''The Last Page'', released in the United States as ''Man Bait'', is a 1952 British film noir produced by Hammer Film Productions starring George Brent, Marguerite Chapman and Diana Dors.
The film is notable for being the first Hammer film dir ...
Cosh Boy
''Cosh Boy'' (released in the United States as ''The Slasher'') is a 1953 British film noir directed by Lewis Gilbert and starring James Kenney and Joan Collins. It was made at Riverside Studios in Hammersmith.
Plot
Based on an original play b ...
The Long Memory
''The Long Memory'' is a black-and-white 1953 British crime film directed by Robert Hamer and based on the 1951 novel of the same title by Howard Clewes.
Filmed at locations such as London Waterloo railway station, the North Kent Marshes on ...
Three Steps to the Gallows
''Three Steps to the Gallows'', released in the United States as ''White Fire'', is a 1953 British crime film directed by John Gilling and starring Scott Brady, Mary Castle and Gabrielle Brune. The film, essentially a British second feature, ...
Murder by Proxy
''Murder by Proxy'' is a 1954 British film noir crime drama film directed by Terence Fisher and starring Dane Clark, Belinda Lee and Betty Ann Davies. The screenplay concerns a man who is offered money to marry a woman. It was produced by ...
A Stranger Came Home
''A Stranger Came Home'' is a 1954 British film noir directed by Terence Fisher and starring Paulette Goddard, William Sylvester and Patrick Holt. The film was produced by Hammer Films at Bray Studios with sets designed by the art director J ...
'' (a.k.a. ''The Unholy Four'')
* '' Third Party Risk'' (a.k.a. ''Deadly Game'')
* ''
The Weak and the Wicked
''The Weak and the Wicked'' (called ''Young and Willing'' in the United States) is a 1954 British drama film directed by J. Lee Thompson based on the autobiographical novel '' Who Lie in Gaol'' by his wife, Joan Henry, starring Glynis Johns a ...
Confession
A confession is a statement – made by a person or by a group of persons – acknowledging some personal fact that the person (or the group) would ostensibly prefer to keep hidden. The term presumes that the speaker is providing information th ...
'' (a.k.a. ''The Deadliest Sin'')
* '' Dial 999'' (a.k.a. ''The Way Out'')
* '' Joe MacBeth''
* '' Little Red Monkey'' (a.k.a. ''Case of the Red Monkey'')
* ''
The Ship That Died of Shame
''The Ship That Died of Shame'', released in the United States as ''PT Raiders'', is a black-and-white 1955 Ealing Studios crime film directed by Basil Dearden and starring George Baker, Richard Attenborough, Roland Culver and Bill Owen.
...
Time Without Pity
''Time Without Pity'' is a 1957 British film noir thriller film about a father trying to save his son from execution for murder.
The film was directed by expatriate American Joseph Losey after he was blacklisted in the U.S. during the ( McCarth ...
Blind Date
A blind date is a social engagement between two people who have not met, usually arranged by a mutual acquaintance.
Structure
A blind date is arranged for by a mutual acquaintance of both participants. The two people who take part in the blind ...
Films noir
Film noir (; ) is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Cinema of the United States, Hollywood Crime film, crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and motivations. The 1940s and 1950s are generally regarde ...
Films noir
Film noir (; ) is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Cinema of the United States, Hollywood Crime film, crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and motivations. The 1940s and 1950s are generally regarde ...