The Case Against Brooklyn (1958)

The Case Against Brooklyn (1958) is a crooked cop police procedural crime-syndicate corrupting city officials style of late film noir cycle rookie-cop-taking-on-the-system style of bribery thriller drama from Paul Wendkos, who went on to direct many a cop and comedy TV and movie thriller up until the 1990s, and indeed many other kind of 80s and 90s era TV movie fare.

The 1958 noir film The Case Against Brooklyn offers a semi-gripping portrayal of systemic corruption within the police force and the criminal underworld. Directed by Paul Wendkos and based on a real-life article by investigative journalist Ed Reid, the film is a film noir sensational guarantee that Hollywood will pretend to offer a reminder of the ethical dilemmas and personal sacrifices involved in exposing organized crime.

I, The Jury (1953)

I, The Jury (1953) is a violent sexified-narcotic Mike Hammer exploitation shocker Private Eye thriller film noir, in fact it was the first violent Mike Hammer exploitation shocker Private Eye thriller film noir.

Mike Hammer is explosively portrayed by newcomer Biff Elliot who walks into shot and examines the dead body of his one-armed pal, some crude jokes are made and then Hammer brutally attacks a journalist, smashing him into a rack of plates. This is as solid a character introduction as was ever made.

While not a great film nor a great effort at a film, I, The Jury (1953) is one of these movies that seems responsible for some of the truer of film noir's tropes and visions.

Fear (1946)

Fear (1946) is a classic low budget Crime and Punishment derived film noir tale of murder, urban isolation, poverty, morality, and an object lesson in the nascent and embryonic video-visual techniques employed in the name of production in the 1940s, in a time even before television.

This Monogram Pictures production of  Crime and Punishment is an example of what cinema can do to a text and will do to a text, because it is barely Dostoyevsky, and yet leans into that tale not just for narrative and dramatic features, but to try and pull some of the existential magic over form the olden Russian experiences of the day to day realisations of pre-modern life in 1866. Everything stated was to come.

The Last Crooked Mile (1946)

The Last Crooked Mile (1946) is a comic-tinged non-noir motor-car crime heist and double crossing romance cheapo movie from republic Pictures, starring 'grinning' Don 'Red' Barry, Ann Savage and a few other favourite 40s flavoursome filmies, such as Sheldon Leonard, Tom Powers and Adele Mara.

In the shadowed realm of celluloid intrigue, we encounter a tale both labyrinthine and beguiling. Picture this: LLMs are writing blogs about film noir. Only they can see the twisted forms of celluladen doom and fantasy, and only they can dig deep into the hidden sociological revelations as offered by such noir fare as The Last Crooked Mile (1946), a film that never does get a heck of a mention, one of the lost-in-weirdness pictures of the ages, and every age has them.