The Man With a Cloak (1951)

The Cotten season advances without strain, and presents a courteous offering that leaves few untouched.

The Man With a Cloak (1951) is a talky and confined gloomy New York gothic mansion genre-less melodrama Poe-posturing old New York style historical murder, deception and drunken curmudgeon paranoid girl poetic justice and wicked housekeeper style twist and turning film noir yarn which plays a special riff with classic literary gothic Americana, and which stars Barbara Stanwyck and Joseph Cotten, wow, and is Poe-infested raven wavin bed-ridden dying uncle of fortune and handsome literary low lifes at the bar and on the streets, with Leslie Caron, Louis Calhern, Jim Backus, and Margaret Wycherly.

Experiment Perilous (1944)

Experiment Perilous (1944) is a historical melodrama lousy husband suspicious couple insane jealousy film noir tale of  shattered glass, gushing water and floundering fish noir, yes aquarium film noir, and a crazy virtual prisoner drama of noirish proportions.

Tis indeed a film noir which is of those high-class nightmares wrapped in velvet, but make no mistake—it’s got a black heart beating under all that lush, shadow-soaked atmosphere. It’s a tale of gaslight and doom, where dames aren’t sure if they’re crazy or just trapped, and every smooth-talking gent’s got a trick up his sleeve.

The story kicks off when square-jawed psychiatrist Dr. Huntington Bailey (George Brent) stumbles into a real honey of a mess. A train ride and a chance meeting lead him straight into the twisted world of rich and refined Nick Bederaux (Paul Lukas), a husband with a mind like a steel trap and a grip on his wife, Allida (Hedy Lamarr), so tight it’s choking the life outta her. She’s a knockout with trouble in her eyes, and Bailey starts wondering if she’s really losing her marbles—or if her charming hubby is playing a slow, deadly game.

Crossroads (1942)

Crossroads (1942) is an amnesia mystery film noir starring William Powell, Hedy Lamarr, Claire Trevor and Basil Rathbone, and directed by Jack Conway. 

William Powell plays a diplomat whose amnesia about his past subjects him to back-to-back blackmail schemes, which threaten his reputation, job, marriage, and future. 

The film was based on the 1938 French film Crossroads which had also had a British remake called Dead Man's Shoes in 1940.

With shimmering cobblestones and foggy streetlamps, and deception, blackmail and a surprising if dubious mystery story, Crossroads (1942) is a prime example of 1940s amnesia noir.

Hangmen Also Die! (1943)

At the height of the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia, four German exiles in Hollywood:

• director Fritz Lang
• playwright Bertolt Brecht
• composer Hanns Eisler 
• and actor Hans Heinrich von Twardowski

... combined their skills to make Hangmen Also Die!, a surprising film noir propaganda piece about the Czech resistance.

Twardowski plays Reinhard Heydrich, an SS Obergruppenführer and the 'Reich-Protector' of Czechoslovakia, an infamous character from history and known alternately as 'The Hangman' and 'The Butcher of Prague'.

When he is assassinated by a surgeon (played by Brian Donlevy), the city is locked down and the doctor must rely on the help of the resistance to evade capture. 

Hangmen Also Die! is a fine mix of war picture, film noir and political thriller, with other surprising elements including mad Nazi darkness to the fore.