The Hardest Noir You've Ever Witnessed

[happyfilmluvguy]

What is the most hard boiled film noir you have ever seen? The one that had you hanging out of your seat from the suspense. The one that had you cringing at the gun shot blows. The one that intruiged you so much that your mind was unmatched. You couldn't try to guess what was going to happen next.

One of the hardest noir I ever saw was "Touch Of Evil" I believe. Every turn it made just lured me deeper into the story, and in the end, I wanted to see it again.

 

[Spitfire]

The third man.

 

[Decobelle]

Detour. Ann Savage is one mean femme fatale in this picture.

 

[Dinerman]

Would "Blood Simple" count?

 

[Fletch]

The Big Heat - thanks mostly to Lee Marvin.

 

[Feraud]

It is hard to name just one but here are a few favorites,
D.O.A., The Big Heat, The Ashphalt Jungle, The Killer, The Killing.

Right now I will say the hardest hitting I can think of is Out of the Past.
Jane Greer is the femme fatale, Robert Mitchum is the perfect noir protagonist, and Kirk Douglas gave a perfect performance of tightly coiled menace. When Kirk Douglas comments about Greer, "I just want her back" you know that is not all he wants.

 

[Fletch]

What a lot of these pictures have in common is a new (then) kind of second heavy – the guy who's not just in it for the cash, but is a pure man of violence, the kind of rabid thug you just didn't see on the screen before WW2. Marvin in Big Heat and Neville Brand in D.O.A. were great examples.

 

[jake_fink]

All great movies so far.

T-Men has a particularly vicious Charles McGraw, who always looked like he could drink more rocks on rocks than Nasty Canasata.

C. McGraw about to poach someone he doesn't like.

 

[Feraud]

T-Men has a particularly vicious Charles McGraw, who always looked like he could drink more rocks on rocks than Nasty Canasata.

That dude was all gravelly voice and chin!

I liked him in Narrow Margin.

 

[Senator Jack]

Hands down, Rififi. The final scene where he's driving the car has my head swirling.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

The Fountainhead (1949). It certainly looks very noir.

.

 

[BeBopBaby]

Kiss of Death - Just for the scene where Richard Widmark ties Victor Mature's mother to her wheel chair with an electrical cord and pushes her down the steps.

Brute Force - A gritty prison break movie with Burt Lancaster. This movie got a lot of flak in the 40s when it was released for being so violent. The scene where they're planning to break out of prison while in the tunnel and Lancaster realizes that 2 of his group members squealed on them is so intense! (I don't want to spoil the movie for anyone who hasn't seen it, so I won't say more about what happens.)

 

[Marc Chevalier]

The funniest Noir I've ever witnessed: Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982). lol

Great costuming, too!

.

 

[Feraud]

The funniest Noir I've ever witnessed: Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982). lol

Great costuming, too!

.

The combination of new and old footage is wonderful! :eusa_clap

 

[Mike1939]

The first one that came to mind was Border Incident (1949) with Ricardo Montalban and George Murphey as undercover agents investigating the smuggling of immigrants across the Texas-Mexico border. Horward da Sliva and Charles McGraw play the cold hearted greedy smugglers in this Anthony Mann film.

 

[MrNewportCustom]

The funniest Noir I've ever witnessed: Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982). lol

Great costuming, too!

.

I could watch this movie every day and not grow tired of it. And the sheer number of old films and classic stars in it: White Heat, The Glass Key, Suspicion, Notorious, Alan Ladd, Cary Grant, Veronica Lake, Bogart. Just to name a few of each.

Also, it was Eadith Head's final film.

From what I've read above, though, I haven't seen nearly enough noir. I need to get on the balL!


Lee

 

[Quigley Brown]

The Fountainhead (1949). It certainly looks very noir.

.

This is one of the few film noir titles where I have no sympathy for any of the characters. They're all nasty, stuck up and spoiled in some form or another. Most other film noirs have at least one honest character I can side with. It's still a great film, though.

 

[Senator Jack]

Oh boy, don't open up that Ayn Rand can of worms again, QB. I thought the same thing and got an earful.

 

[Jack Scorpion]

Hardest? Maybe that Mike Hammer flick when Mickey Spillane plays Hammer. Nothing like a cold-blooded gunshot in the face of a dame to make your movie outing a memorable one. The Lady Killers, was it called?

Detour is definitely on that list. Ann Savage just may be the meanest woman in movie history. And the lead male just might be the most morose protagonist in movie history.

The Big Combo, I believe, w/Richard Conte, was one of the most shadowy noirs ever. Some folks die in the movie that I really didn't want to die. (And not even at the end, either!)

Split Second! A hostage situation at ground zero of a nuclear test site? That really would have been HARD if I wasn't laughing at it the whole time. I think Dick Powell directed it.

 

[Senator Jack]

I never could get around the plot of Kiss Me Deadly. Crazy ending though. I know Tarantino stole the idea of the great whatzits for Pulp Fiction.