The Ox-Bow Incident (1943)

The Ox-Bow Incident (1943) is a psychological vigilante and posse film noir western starring Henry Fonda, Anthony Quinn, Mary Beth Hughes, Dana Andrews, Harry Morgan and Marc Lawrence.

If film noir is about anything it's got to be moral failings and immoral decisions, and if the western genre is about anything it is about the rough construction of United States by means of law and order.

Many of the film noir westerns we watch deal with the construction of a legal process and the layering of the base myths of Americana, and it was fitting therefore to see this quite par hazard in its ideal double billing with My Darling Clementine (1946).

The Ox-Bow Incident (1943) is a film noir for certain, largely because of the murderous mob and their moral dilemma, after we have witnessed the moral and murderous decision making of a new American community, an area of land and an area of being in which law and order are not as codified as they could be. 

Black Hand (1950)

Black Hand (1950) is a violent Italian-American historical mobster and protection racket revenge social issue thriller film noir, packed with cliché and atmosphere, and which partakes of the Italian American immigrant experience, with no-holds-barred villainous violence and later nineteenth century criminal moeurs.

Starring Gene Kelly as a hero for the good of the new country, and an immigrant who much in the style of the later Michael Corleone, vows a vengeance on the Black Hand gang that killed his father.

The historical aspect is accurate as it goes, and most notably there are scenes of pubic speaking during which the existence of the Black Hand is denied completely, something that was common to the phenomenon.

Dust Be My Destiny (1939)

Dust Be My Destiny (1939) is an innocent-man-jailed moral drifter narrative prison farm social state of the US couple on the run drama and romance proto noir which expresses noir moments and captures noir sentiment, as it bums across the states in various wagons and train carriages, always expressive of the idea that love will out.

Dust Be My Destiny (1939) is beautifully staged expression of what America sought most for itself, the idea of what it was set to become, its deepest anxieties about morality expressed in individual and romantic action from John Garfield, largely.

Dillinger (1945)

Dillinger (1945) is a cheapo-epic biopic crime heist, robbery, murder, prison and prison-break film noir which was the breakthrough role for tough guy villainous noir actor Lawrence Tierney, directed by Max Nosseck and co-starring Anne Jeffreys, Edmund Lowe, Marc Lawrence, Elisha Cooke Jnr and Eduardo Cianelli. 

Packed with fun, action and menace, and oddly replete with cinematic meta-mechanics, Dillinger (1945) cannot be flawed for anything other than historical accuracy. 

Historical accuracy might have gone against the grain, too. The minute makers of 1945, fresh off the tracks of the great crime film experiments of the 1930s, which incidentally probably amount to the greatest body of work of 1930s cinema, were imminently to collide with state forces and the Production Code was in fullest sway, and so accuracy might have been well sacrificed.

Jigsaw (1949)

Jigsaw (1949) is an unusual and at times outré mystery chase hate-group propaganda versus journalism, journalism and media film noir, starring Franchot Tone as a detecting assistant district attorney, on the scene and hunting for what might be called neo-fascists, or perhaps simply more likely, just fascists.

None of that was really truly departed for the future, after all, not even by 1949. And what is and was and what became and what now is fascism, and what the definitions of fascism are and might be, are all questions much relevant to film noir.

Jigsaw (1949) is an entertaining thriller that’s so over-the-top, you can’t help but overlook its far-fetched plot and be grateful for the fun it brings. It’s a film that’s as strange as they come.

Key Largo (1948)

Key Largo (1948) is a classic film noir home invasion criminal versus returning war veteran drama thriller directed by John Huston and starring Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall and Edward G. Robinson.

A full noir cast however awaits within the reels of Key Largo (1948), revealed with the standard credit sequence and a short aerial introduction and voiceover, explaining where we are, embedding the physical in what turns out to be high impact environment, both human and meteorological.

The Monster and the Girl (1941)

The Monster and the Girl (1941) is an outré monster death row revenge movie from the golden age of monster death row revenge movies. 

Unorthodox and strange, this crime science fiction courtroom horror thriller revenge monkey noir is a message to film lovers for all time, and stands as an immortal portal to more than just entertainment.

Film noir is one the least issues with The Monster and the Girl (1941) as there is such a delightful heap of unpacking to be made of this short epic, which tells of a mad experiment with monkeydom, and a mad experiment in film making too, as Hollywood feels its way towards the horror genre out of the monster department, while still indulging in its deep passion for monkeys.

more mystery than monster for the main of its short running time, The Monster and the Girl is a courtroom framed thriller mystery told in flashback as the shocked participants of a murder trial piece together the most awful facts that had ever been imagined on screen.

Johnny Apollo (1940)

Johnny Apollo (1940) is an inter-generational double identity crime and prison break film noir from early in the cycle.

Directed by Henry Hathaway and starring Tyrone Power and Dorothy Lamour, Johnny Apollo tells the story of the son of a jailed financial and corporate embezzling broker who turns to crime to pay for his father's release.

Tyrone Power fits the title role of Johnny Apollo well. 

The name Johnny Apollo is a crazy, spontaneous, to-heck-with-it whassin-a-name spur of the moment decision for his character Robert Cain, Jr. whose father (played by Edward Arnold) has been jailed for some white collar securities violations, an event which brings his son's soft and privileged life to an end.

Blind Alley (1939)

Blind Alley (1939) is a psychoanalytic home invasion psychopath on the run crime film noir directed by Charles Vidor and stars Chester Morris, Ralph Bellamy and Ann Dvorak. The film was adapted from the Broadway play of the same name by James Warwick.

Blind Alley may well be a fairly unique prospect — it appears to be a fully-enough formed film noir production — produced at a time before the film noir style and approach was fully formed.

In terms of solid film noir elements we do have a few firm foundations in place which must classify Blind Alley as a film noir.

Firstly, Blind Alley features psychoanalysis as the tool which solves the crime, and gets to the bottom of the psychopathic criminal's dilemma.

Cloak and Dagger (1946)

Cloak and Dagger (1946) is a Nazi nuclear secrets behind enemy lines espionage thriller made partially in the film noir style by Fritz Lang, starring Gary Cooper and Lilli Palmer.

One of a handful of major Hollywood stars of the Golden Age who remained a virtual stranger to film noir, Gary Cooper plays a bachelor nuclear physicist named Alvah Jesper who is working in the United States on the Manhattan Project to build a nuclear bomb. 

Recruited into the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) his mission is to make contact with a Hungarian nuclear physicist, Katerin Lodor, who has been working on the German project to make a nuclear bomb and has escaped into neutral Switzerland. 

Nazi Agent (1942)

Nazi Agent (1942) is a propaganda espionage thriller directed by Jules Dassin in his first feature-length film for MGM. 

It stars Conrad Veidt playing identical twins, one loyal to the United States, the other a dedicated German Nazi.

There is an uncommonly interesting patch of movie-making in the 1940s which intersects both espionage themed thrillers and the spy genre with film noir.

Nazi Agent (1942) by dint of its subject matter is a film concerned with identity and that which is hidden —  a film of shadows and of betrayal —  and although its director Jules Dassin went on to make some of the finest film noir known to humanity including the mighty Brute Force (1947) and The Naked City (1948) Nazi Agent is not a film noir — despite certain qualities.

The Asphalt Jungle (1950)

The Asphalt Jungle (1950) is a cool, classy, rough and stylish classic film noir hit from John Huston starring Sterling Hayden, Louis Calhern, John McIntire and Marilyn Monroe.

This heist film noir classic has grungy backstreet scenery and is populated by dishonourable thieves and has a twisted backstabber feel about it, with everyone backstabbing left, right and centre, save for the two central crooks that we root for, Dix and Doc.

Both Dix and Doc have virtue, with Dix played by Sterling Hayden seeming to be the moral helm of the film. It is Dix's fantasy that gives The Asphalt Jungle the most angelic and super-normal film noir conclusion as this moral thief and thug almost ascends in a moment of equine and pastoral magic.

The Asphalt Jungle was based on the novel of the same name by W. R. Burnett. It was the first major example of the heist crime caper trope, while also being a deconstruction of it. It's  a classic of the Film Noir style with a large film noir ensemble cast including Jean Hagen, Sam Jaffe, James Whitmore, Barry Kelley, Anthony Caruso, Marc Lawrence and Brad Dexter; as well as Sterling Hayden, Louis Calhern, John McIntire and Marilyn Monroe.