Stylish, Dark, Cynical! The Crimson Kimono (1959), The Lineup (1958), The Shadow in the Window (1956), The Long Haul (1957), Pickup Alley (1957), The Tijuana Story (1957), She Played with Fire (1957), The Case Against Brooklyn (1958), Man on a String (1960) –
Stalwart “noir” directors and casts highlight these hard to find features: Address Unknown (1944), Escape in the Fog (1945), The Guilt of Janet Ames (1947), The Black Book (The Reign of Terror) (1949), Johnny Allegro (1949), 711 Ocean Drive (1950), The Killer That Stalked New York (1950), Assignment Paris (1952), The Miami Story (1954)
It’s time once again for film noir fans rejoice with 9 additional major studio film noirs, this time from the period 1954-1956: “Bait” (1954), “The Crooked Web” (1955), “The Night Holds Terror” (1955), “Footsteps in the Fog” (1955), “Cell 2455, Death Row” (1955), “5 Against the House” (1955), “New Orleans Uncensored”(1955), “Spin a Dark Web” (1955), “Rumble on the Docks” (1956)
Crime & Thrillers
A fugitive enters England illegally following the disappearance of several noted atomic scientists and is drafted to work as a Military Intelligence operative.
Crime & Thrillers
The Slasher (Cosh Boy): A swift moving, no punches pulled exposé set in London’s tenement district, with a ruthless teenager (James Kenney, reprising his stage role) blackjacking an old woman to get her purse, and “graduating” to gang leader whose young cutthroats spread terror over the entire city.
Twilight Women (Women of Twilight, Another Chance): Originating on the London stage, this hard-hitting tale is set at a boarding house-haven for unmarried mothers, owned by a woman whose outward show of upstanding character hides her true personality: a fiend who abuses the women and farms out their babies!
Little Big Horn is the story of a Cavalry patrol that discovers a horde of Indians ready to ambush Custer’s 7th Cavalry. They set out to warn Gen. Custer that he is about to embark on a mission of virtual suicide. Gritty and extremely well-acted character studies set this version apart from the familiar telling of a tragedy from U.S. history.
Rimfire: The western setting is incidental in this unglamorous, well-written, tale of mystery and suspense. The story involves the death by hanging of The Abilene Kid, who is innocent of all charges. After death “the Kid” returns to kill off all of those who sentenced him to be hanged.
Crime & Thrillers
U.S. Air Force pilot Dan Duryea becomes a logical suspect after his English wife is shot and killed in her apartment. With only 36 hours to find the real murderer and clear himself before he must reporting for flight duty, Duryea doggedly sets out to learn the secret of Terror Street. From Hammer Films.
Crime & Thrillers
Plastic surgeon Paul Henreid molds the face of a woman (Lizabeth Scott) who rejected him onto the mug of a horribly scarred prison inmate (also played by Scott), and proceeds to wed the parolee despite her social-misfit status. Now, of course, the original gal reappears, and Henreid has one Scott too many–the “new” one dangerously psychotic!
Crime & Thrillers
A Senate investigating committee’s real-life (and widely publicized) probe into organized crime in Portland, Oregon, sparked this hard-hitting drama with Edward Binns as a tavern owner who finds himself–and his family–caught in the battle between rival gang lords. Frank Gorshin, “The Riddler” to TV’s Batman, has a you’ll-have-to-see-it-to-believe-it scene attempting to rape Binns’ teen daughter!
Crime & Thrillers
The kill-or-be-killed world of organized crime is the focus of this hard-hitting expose from the Oscar-nominated writing team of Russell Rouse and Clarence Greene. Broderick Crawford is the NYC mob boss dealing out death as the answer to every crisis–from a minor member of his own syndicate, to a Washington lobbyist, to his own hired killers! “Considerable brutality as well as sex… One’s attention [is] held tight from start to finish” (Harrison’s Reports).
Crime & Thrillers
From Hammer Films: Diana Dors, a stick of blonde dynamite working as a clerk in an English book store, catches a customer attempting to steal a rare volume–but instead of hollering “Cop!,” the two instead cook up a sinister scheme to blackmail the store manager (George Brent). One of Hammer Films' best noirs, helmed by their future horror specialist Terence Fisher.
Crime & Thrillers
1930s gangster great George Raft is an ex-convict now on the right side of the law in this tight-knit crime drama. When a loan-sharking mob preys on tire company workers, dishing out brutal beatings to the men who cannot repay their debts due to the huge interest payments, Raft goes undercover to find and expose Mister Big.
Film Noir
The story of a Cavalry patrol that discovers a horde of Indians ready to ambush Custer’s 7th Cavalry. They set out to warn Gen. Custer that he is about to embark on a mission of virtual suicide. Gritty and extremely well-acted character studies set this version apart from the familiar telling of a tragedy from U.S. history
Crime & Thrillers
8 movies/4 DVDs
- Terror Street
- Wings of Danger
- Paid To Kill
- The Glass Tomb
- The Black Glove
- The Deadly Game
- The Unholy Four
- A Race For Life
Crime & Thrillers
The Unholy Four: Someone knocked a man out and left him for dead during a fishing trip in Portugal. That someone is either his fetching wife, or two business partners all sporting guilty faces after his unexpected return. Two more murders and a frame-up befall the quartet before an inspector closes the case.
A Race for Life: An idol of auto-racing fans attempts a comeback after serving in the Air Force. When his former rival lies dying in the hospital, he must decide whether to continue in the Grand Prix or make peace with his adversary.
Crime & Thrillers
The Black Glove (Face the Music) – An American trumpet star (Alex Nicol) appearing at the London Palladium meets and has dinner with a beautiful blues singer who is later found murdered. When Scotland Yard considers Nicol a “person of interest,” he realizes he’ll be facing the music unless he cracks the case himself.
The Deadly Game (Third Party Risk) – Lloyd Bridges is the imported American star in this murder-mystery from England’s Hammer Films, which was partly shot in Spain. Playing an author enjoying a Spanish vacation, Bridges quickly finds himself mixed up with a quartet of mysterious characters, a secret envelope, microfilmed chemical formulae and, of course, a corpse or two.
Crime & Thrillers
The Glass Tomb (The Glass Cage) – Honor Blackman, Goldfinger’s perfidious “Pussy Galore,” co-stars in this Hammer Films murder drama. Booking sensational acts for sleazy carnivals, John Ireland gets mixed up with a bookmaker, a blackmailer, a poisoner and, his newest sideshow attraction “The Fasting Man'” a chap who goes without food while publicly displayed in a glass cage.
PAID TO KILL – A man’s business deal fails and to provide for his “adoring” wife, he hires his best friend to kill him so his wife can collect on his insurance. The business deal comes through at the last minute, but he finds he can’t call off the murder. His treacherous double-crossing wife has different ideas! First time on video.
Crime & Thrillers
Terror Street (36 Hours) – U.S. Air Force pilot Dan Duryea becomes a logical suspect after his English wife is shot and killed in her apartment. With only 36 hours to find the real murderer and clear himself before he must reporting for flight duty, Duryea doggedly sets out to learn the secret of Terror Street.
Wings of Danger (Dead on Course) – Flyer Zachary Scott joins in the search for Robert Beatty, a airline operator suspected of smuggling millions of counterfeit dollars, and now suddenly gone missing. Complications include Scott’s romantic attraction to Scott’s sister (Naomi Chance)–and a blackmail scheme–as the counterfeit cargo and airborne adventure fly on “Wings of Danger.”
Crime & Thrillers
The Gambler and the Lady – In the days before Hammer Films became famous for their horrors, they produced this crime drama with Dane Clark as the American ex-con owner of an English nightclub, getting mixed up with gangsters, stock swindlers, a titled beauty (Naomi Chance)–and murder.
Heat Wave (House Across the Lake) – For Hammer Films, director Ken Hughes adapted his novel “High Wray” with Alex Nicol as an author ensnared by a socialite (Hillary Brooke) with murderous plans for her ailing husband. When hubby is accidentally knocked unconscious during a fishing trip, and sexy Brooke begs Nicol to drop him in the drink, the temptation proves too strong.
Crime & Thrillers
A STOLEN FACE – Plastic surgeon Paul Henreid molds the face of a woman (Lizabeth Scott) who rejected him onto the mug of a horribly scarred prison inmate (also played by Scott), and proceeds to wed the parolee despite her social-misfit status. Now, of course, the original gal reappears, and Henreid has one Scott too many–the “new” one dangerously psychotic! 1952|73 min.|B&W|1.33:1|NR
BLACKOUT (Murder By Proxy) – Down-and-out Canadian Dane Clark is soused in a London club the night he’s approached by a beautiful stranger (Belinda Lee) offering him £500 to marry her. The too-good-to-be-true offer turns sour when Lee goes missing and her wealthy father is found murdered.
Crime & Thrillers
BAD BLONDE (The Flanagan Boy) – Tony Wright is a prizefighter who goes from the ring to a fling with his promoter’s wife, played by the baddest of ’50s bad blondes, Barbara Payton. When Payton comes up pregnant, Wright realizes that only by eliminating one unneeded husband will Baby Make Three. Murder and mayhem ensue in this film noir takeoff on The Postman Always Rings Twice.
MAN BAIT (The Last Page) – Diana Dors, a stick of blonde dynamite working as a clerk in an English book store, catches a customer attempting to steal a rare volume–but instead of hollering “Cop!,” the two instead cook up a sinister scheme to blackmail the store manager (George Brent).
Crime & Thrillers
6 film noirs/3 DVDs
- Bad Blonde
- Man Bait
- A Stolen Face
- Blackout
- The Gambler and the Lady
- Heat Wave
Crime & Thrillers
Eye Witness (Your Witness) – Made in the Hitchcock style (and produced by longtime Hitchcock partner Joan Harrison), this witty English-made mystery/courtroom drama stars Robert Montgomery (who also directed) as a New York lawyer who comes to England to help a wartime pal (Michael Ripper) wrongly accused of murder.
Breakdown – There’s action and drama in AND out of the ring when an ex-convict (William Bishop) becomes a rising heavyweight fighter and a championship contender–and then, on the eve of the big fight, finds the man who can prove that he was framed for the crime for which he served time.
Hammer Film’s Scotland Yard Inspector – Cesar Romero stars in this Hammer Films mystery as a Yank newspaperman in London who sets out to solve a murder, American style.
Pier 23 – Two more “brushes with crime” for ace private detective Dennis O’Brien (Hugh Beaumont).
The Case of the Baby-Sitter – Jewel thieves, operating in the guise of a Duke and Duchess, hire the Ace Detective Agency to “baby sit” the infant they are using as a blind for their thefts.