Top 5 Film Noir

Mildred Pierce (1945)

Joan Crawford's greatest role, and the one she won Best Actress for. she plays a doting mother who's willing to do anything for her daughter, even murder. this film also sports one of the greatest villains in film history, i won't spoil it by telling you who it is. i first saw this movie in a film history class- it was used as the example for the whole genre of film noir, and it has all the classic elements. the story in narrative flashback, the dark shadows with all scenes set at night, the mystery. it's a great movie and i cannot WAIT to see the HBO miniseries remake next year, with Kate Winslet in the title role.

Double Indemnity (1944)

This is a close second for the best example of a film noir. the same history class showed clips from this one as well. Fred MacMurray is an insurance salesman who falls for classic femme fatale Barbara Stanwyck (from The Lady Eve). together, they conspire to murder her husband. the plotline is probably the template for every similar film that came after, and this shows why Barbara Stanwyck was one of my favorite golden age movie stars. she could do everything, from screwball comedy to melodrama to murder mystery, and all with ease. 

The Big Sleep (1946)

My personal favorite Bogie-Bacall pairing, this is the classic detective noir. Bogie is private eye Philip Marlowe, hired by a rich family to find a blackmailer, but drawn into an infinitely tangled mystery involving murder, drugs, money, and adultery. this movie famously has one of the most complicated plots of all time, and you really do have to pay attention to all the twists and turns, but it has a great climax and i'd say it's Humphrey Bogart's second best show of his classic "persona," after Casablanca of course.

The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946)

I love this movie and i'd say it was another perfect example of a noir, because it's structured in voiceover narrative again, this time from the guy's point of view. John Garfield is a drifter who has an affair with Lana Turner, the wife of a diner owner. this may have been the first film to take off of Double Indemnity, because again they're plotting to get rid of her husband, but the story takes it a bit further in this one. Garfield and Turner have great chemistry, which is probably why this was remade in 1981 with Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange, a version that included a ton of graphic sex scenes.

Sunset Boulevard (1950)

William Holden stars as a man who gets involved with Gloria Swanson, an aged movie star from the silent era, who lives in a creepy old mansion and draws him into her web. this is the one with the famous opening of him lying dead in the pool, while beginning to narrate the story from beyond the grave. Billy Wilder wrote and directed this one, one of many in his resume of great films (he also did Double Indemnity, Some Like it Hot, Sabrina, and The Apartment, to name some of my favorites).

*I have to put a disclaimer here that this entry might change, because i haven't quite seen every film noir i need to yet. i still have to see The Third Man, Laura, Out of the Past, and Pick-Up on South Street.