The Killers (1946)

The Killers (1946) is a classic film noir potboiler western-style revenge movie re-styled in the gangster mold post war study in masculinity flashback within flashback but no voiceover prison boxing crazed love and fatal existential doom laden hitman themed compote de criminalitie and lustful love forlorn longing and rejection, directed by Robert Siodmak, and starring  Ava Gardner, Edmond O'Brien and Sam Levene, with extra noir plus ultra provided by William Conrad, Charles McGraw, Albert Dekker and Jack Lambert.

The Secret of Convict Lake (1951)

The Secret of Convict Lake (1951) is a pressure cooker ensemble cast prison break snow-bound gang on the run innocent-man-accused Western movie with film noir tendencies aplenty and a few side comments too on the social roles of men and women, as such relate to heroism, homesteading and justice.

The 1951 Western The Secret of Convict Lake emerges as a unique entry in the genre, distinguished by its noir-inflected atmosphere and an unusually strong female presence. 

Directed by Michael Gordon, the film tells the story of a group of escaped convicts who, after enduring a harrowing journey through the snow-covered Sierra Nevadas, stumble upon a remote settlement populated solely by women. 

Party Girl (1958)

Party Girl (1958) is a brassy blast of 50s technicolor dance and jealous showgirl murder misogyny film noir.

Directed by Nicholas Ray and starring Robert Taylor, Cyd Charisse and Lee J. Cobb, and filmed in CinemaScope, Party Girl celebrates like few other mediocre classics, the gazing male and the prancing half naked female, along with such blasts of wowed brass instruments the sound of those fat horns lingers painfully after the fact.

The movie we are talking about describes a perspective often portrayed in media and art that tends to objectify and depict women from a particular viewpoint. 

This perspective often emphasizes certain physical attributes or characteristics of women, positioning them as objects of desire rather than fully realized individuals. 

The Unsuspected (1947)

The Unsuspected (1947) is a multiply textured mystery and suspense film noir starring Claude Rains as a handsome patriarchal radio show presenter, who specialises in true crime. For film noir — it's a way of life.

Technology and murder combine in The Unsuspected in the form of Claude Rains' own master studio where he engineers as much evil as he does family entertainment, with his hi-tech equipment.

Victor Grandison (Claude Rains) plays a character more embedded in crime than most, and hosts a murder mystery radio show. 

99 River Street (1953)

Down at 99 River Street (1953) meet furious and and pent-up ex-boxer Ernie Driscoll; his devious but gorgeous wife Pauline; Ernie's wife's lover, a sleazy diamond thief whose got a new line in murder; and Ernie's old pal Linda James, an aspiring actress who, almost in the style of Team America ― uses her acting powers to solve the crime.

There, down at 99 River Street is where these all converge, with of course the cops and the diamond fencing gang, who are an especially brutal coterie of evil, with big spade hands for chopping necks and revolvers for the killing slug.

In for the worst weekend of his life, angry former boxer and now full time cabbie Ernie Driscoll lives life on  ropes, when he's not reliving the fatal moment in the ring where he was defeated, felled and retired, all in one series of sucker punches to the eye and gut.

It's likely one of the most definitive film noir set-ups going —  the ex-boxer, living in the shadows of society, struggling with women, struggling with the past, and struggling with crime which seems to be all around him.

We are all in to witness the fantastic escapades that ensue, when Ernie Driscoll takes yet another sucker punch to the guts.

It is supreme film noir fayre.

Border Incident (1949)

Border Incident (1949), starring Ricardo Montalban, George Murphy and Howard Da Silva is a film noir set in the wild border lands between Mexico and California.

Director Anthony Mann is maybe better known for the gritty westerns he made with James Stewart in the 1950s.

However he also directed some memorable film noir favourites such as T-Men (1947), He Walked By Night (1948) and Raw Deal (1948).

Curiously, Border Incident lacks any femme fatale, or indeed any female character at all, and is an unusally violent film for its day.

Border Incident winds its way on to film noir lists, therefore, primarily because of the photography, which teems with interesting closeups, wide-angle lenses, low-angle shots, tons of shadows and light, and a lot of darkness, from which scared and tense faces emerge.

We'll dig deeper into whether this is an actual film noir or not, later. 

But first it's the politics.