Subgenre Sampler
Film Noir: 238 Films to Buy & Rent
- Enforcer, The (1976)
- Dir. James Fargo
Feat. Clint Eastwood, Tyne Daly, Bradford Dillman…
- For sheer hokey excitement, Clint's third outing as Dirty Harry is worth a revisit.
- Farewell, My Lovely (1975)
- Dir. Dick Richards
Feat. Robert Mitchum, Charlotte Rampling, John Ireland…
- With a nailbitten Robert Mitchum as a weathered Marlowe, this complex Raymond Chandler story is an impressive homage to '40s film noirs.
- Chinatown (1974)
- Dir. Roman Polanski
Feat. Jack Nicholson, Roman Polanski, John Huston…
- Classic detective thriller in the Hammett–Chandler tradition, with Jack Nicholson as P.I. Jake Gittes, whose simple case leads to murder and…
- Long Goodbye, The (1973)
- Dir. Robert Altman
Feat. Elliott Gould, Sterling Hayden, Nina Van Pallandt
- Elliot Gould portrays a '70s Philip Marlowe, a wildly unkempt version of Chandler's legendary detective. Altman's film noir pastiche is equally…
- Cercle Rouge, Le (The Red Circle) (1970)
- Dir. Jean-Pierre Melville
Feat. Alain Delon, Gian Maria Volonte, Yves Montand…
- A precisely–crafted colour 'noir' from the French master, dir. Melville, which rejigs the usual ingredients into an exemplary heist…
- Boucher, Le (The Butcher) (1969)
- Dir. Claude Chabrol
Feat. Stephane Audran, Jean Yanne
- Psychological thriller probes the perhaps dangerous liaison between a celibate school–teacher and a murder suspect, the local butcher. Rich in…
- Le Samourai (The Samurai) (1967)
- Dir. Jean-Pierre Melville
Feat. Alain Delon
- Alain Delon plays an ultra–cool assassin whose flawless disposition is impenetrable to the Gendarmerie but not to a sexy key witness. Steely…
- Alphaville (1965)
- Dir. Jean-Luc Godard
Feat. Eddie Constantine, Anna Karina, Akim Tamiroff…
- A private eye is sent to a futuristic city run by a computer to rescue a trapped scientist. Amalgam of film noir and science fiction illustrates the…
- Doulos, Le (The Finger Man) (1963)
- Dir. Jean-Pierre Melville
Feat. Jean-Paul Belmondo, Serge Reggiani
- Eschewing the French New Wave movement in favour of homage to the then ‘passe’ genre of film noir, dir. Jean–Pierre Melville adds shades of…
- High and Low (1963)
- Dir. Akira Kurosawa
Feat. Toshiro Mifune
- Adapted from a crime–novel by Ed McBain, this kidnapping–thriller is a central work in dir. Kurosawa’s series of film noirs, combining…