Dial M for Murder

     It has all the dark touches Hitch used so well. Also remade very well in 1998 as A Perfect Murder .This Technicolour Noir, set mainly, as Hitchcock seemed to love, in one room, has much of the atmosphere and tension of his better known classics.

Playing Off the Rail

                  One of the patron saints of Hardboiled/Noir David Goodis himself liked to hang out in his local poolhall in Phillie and saw them as places to spend a quiet evening.

          It started with a broken rib. At least that's what Jack thought he had, with that soreness he had down his left side, sort of below his shoulder. It has been growing for months, that pain, gnawing at him, and so Red finally mentioned it to Duke. The two were drinking coffee down at Houston's Cue & Cushion.

Hustler Days

R.A Dyer

2003

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Nick DeWolf
Flagstaff 1950

Perfect Misalliance

        It's the long drop off the short pier and the wrong man and the wrong woman in perfect misalliance. It's the nightmare of flawed souls with big dreams and the precise how and why of the of the all-time sure thing that goes bad.

James Ellroy
introduction -
The Best American Noir
of the Century (Anthology)
2010

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Bunker Hill, Los Angeles

McDermott & McGough

all paintings by
McDermott & McGough

Hotel Noir

Featuring Robert Foster, Danny De Vito, Rufus Sewell and Carla Gugino this 2012 homage to Noir about a detective holed-up in a Downtown hotel has met with many good reviews.

Every Angel

             For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror, which we are barely able to endure. It amazes us so, because it serenely disdains to destroy us. Every angel is terrible.

Rainer Maria Rilke

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Romy Schneider
reblogged from imagesfilms

A Dark Fence

                 He was separated from her only by a sand yard and a dark fence, by a lighted window and by her protectors. He stood there until he was trembling with pity and rage. Then he fled, but his flight was slow as the flight in a dream, impeded by the deep sand and the blurring hands of the fog.

In a Lonely Place
Dorothy B. Hughes
1947

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In a Lonely Place
1950

Ripley's Game

One of the adaptatations of Patricia Highsmith's Ripley character often overlooked but Malkovich is excellent as the unemotional killer.

Everything Goes to Hell

                                 Why be sweet, why be careful, why be kind ?
                                 A man has only one thing on his mind
                                 Why ask politely, why go lightly, why say please ?
                                 They only want to get you on your knees
                                 There are a few things i never could believe

Everything Goes to Hell
(Waits/ Brennan)
Tom Waits

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Detour 1945

Nighthawks

The Set Up

         The Robert Wise stripped down ringside masterpiece from 1949 shot in real time by cinematographer Milton Krasner with the Noir legend Robert Ryan as the doomed protagonist.

Night of the Gun

         Then i remembered i had jumped my best friend outside a bar. And now that i thought about it that was before i tried to kick down his door and broke a window in his house. And then i recalled, just for a second, the look of horror and fear on his sister's face, a woman i adored. In fact i had been such a jerk that my best friend had to point a gun at me to make me go away. Then i remembered i'd lost my job.

Night of the Gun
David Carr
2008

Ruth Orkin

Standing in Another Man's Grave # 2

Godfather II

The Burglar

A Prophet

Killers Kiss

To Live and Die in L.A

Odds Against Tommorow

Bad Day at Black Rock

Paths of Glory

Consequences of Love

Pale Flower

Le Samourai

Underworld USA

The Conformist