The Spiral Staircase (1946)

The Spiral Staircase (1946) is a stalking terrorisation paranoia psychological historical film noir thriller with all the trimmings of the mystery style and elements of the apprehensive female domestic victim movie.

In the dimly lit streets of the city, a killer stalked the shadows, preying upon women with imperfections. His eyes, cold and calculating, sought out vulnerability—the slightest flaw that marked his victims. The town whispered of his deeds, and fear hung heavy in the air.

Helen, the mute caregiver for a wealthy old woman, was next on everyone’s list. Her silence made her an easy target, her inability to scream for help a cruel twist of fate. The old woman’s mansion loomed like a fortress, its walls hiding secrets and shadows.

The Killer Is Loose (1956)

The Killer Is Loose (1956) is a cat and mouse revenge killer on the run suburban family man cop film noir from the cul de sac end of the great mid century American noir cycle.

The Killer Is Loose (1956) is a film noir thriller with modern echoes, although the 1950s had already seen the death of modernism. We may well come back to that.

Yet the cinema has to be the ultimate of all modern artforms. The modern period, insofar as it relates to art, literature and most importantly of all, politics, can really be said to take place between 1880 and 1950.

It is curiously enough during this period also that cinema rises, develops, achieves its potential, and then enters the same decline as all else in post modern period.

Inferno (1953)

Inferno (1953) is a vivid Vista-Vision survival epic revenge desert color film noir from the baffling files of bright and gaudy three dimensional 50s.

Inferno however is saved from most of the widescreen peril of most color noir and despite employing a moderately beige and drab process, manages to follow its noir roots well, and wear its hard-boiled pants hitched right.

As a superior vehicle for noir's captain of the tough-side Robert Ryan, Inferno offers perils and deceits and desert sun and rolls out hard with its dangerous tycoon narrative, as Robert Ryan with a broken leg is ditched in the desert to di of exposure by his scheming missus and her lousy lover.

In the rugged expanse of the desert, a formidable and driven business magnate finds himself ensnared in a dire predicament. Live or die, your choice tough guy.

Spellbound (1945)

Spellbound (1945) is an Alfred Hitchcock romantic psychological amnesia thriller with a noir nuance that cannot be denied. 

In some senses an outlier in the body of Alfred Hitchcock's own work, and not entirely styled in the mode of a more traditional or acceptable example of film noir, Spellbound does carry with it key noir themes of amnesia and psychoanalysis, and is as much a thriller as it is a psychological mystery.

Most of Spellbound's power comes as a romance story — always a strength with Alfred Hitchcock, who was as much a master of amour as he was of suspense.

Spellbound follows a psychoanalyst who falls in love with the new head of the Vermont hospital in which she works, only to find that he is an imposter suffering dissociative amnesia, and potentially, a murderer.

Out of the Past (1947)

Out Of The Past (1947) is a classic fate-filled doomed-romance revenge mystery film noir, directed by Jacques Tourneur, and starring Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer and Kirk Douglas.  

From the shadows of the past stumble the memories of your misdeeds. They lug themselves towards you in heavy coats and hats — packing heat and chewing on cocktail sticks.  

Whatever you do, wherever you go, fate can catch you — fate WILL catch you.  

And that’s the message of Out of the Past (1947)

Out of the Past is one of the most heavy duty, hard-wearing, cigarette-smoking film noirs in the whole damn canon — hoods, hats, hold ups and past actions dredging up the most awful barrelfuls of darkness.