Cosmo Vitelli owns the Crazy Horse West, a strip joint in California. He’s laconic, a Korean War vet, and a gambler. When we meet him, he’s making his last payment on a gambling debt. Then, he promptly loses $23,000 playing poker at an illegal local casino. The guys he owes this time aren’t so friendly, pressuring him for immediate payment. Then they suggest that he kill a Chinese bookie to wipe off the debt. Vitelli and the film move back and forth between the double-crossing, murderous insincerity of the gamblers and the friendships, sweetness, and even love among Vitelli, the dancers, a dancer’s mother, and the club’s singer, Mr. Sophistication.
Read More »
Crime
Underworld U.S.A. (1961) Samuel Fuller, Cliff Robertson, Dolores Dorn, Beatrice Kay, Crime, Drama, Thriller
Fourteen-year-old Tolly Devlin sees four hoods beat his father to death. Twenty years later, the killers have risen to the top of the crime syndicate and Tolly has a plan for revenge.
Read More »
American Me (1992) Edward James Olmos, William Forsythe, Sal Lopez, Biography, Crime, Drama
This epic depiction of thirty years of Chicano gang life in Los Angeles focuses on a teen named Santana who, with his friends Mundo and the Caucasian-but-acting-Hispanic J.D., form their own gang and are soon arrested for a break-in. Santana gets into trouble again and goes straight from reform school to prison, spending eighteen years there, and becoming leader of a powerful gang, both inside and outside the prison, while there. When he is finally released, he tries to make sense of the violence in his life, in a world much changed from when last he was in it.
Read More »
Shamus (1973) Buzz Kulik, Burt Reynolds, Dyan Cannon, John P. Ryan, Action, Comedy, Crime
New York private eye Shamus McCoy likes girls, drink and gambling, but by the look of his flat business can’t be too hot. So an offer of $10,000 to finds some diamonds stolen in a daring raid with a flame-thrower is too good to miss. His investigations soon get pretty complicated and rather too dangerous. At least along the way he does get to meet Alexis.
Read More »
The Dark Past (1948) Rudolph Maté, William Holden, Nina Foch, Lee J. Cobb
When a detective scoffs at his suggestion that an 18 year-old criminal be referred for psychiatric examination Read More »
Los olvidados / The Young and the Damned (1950) Luis Buñuel, Alfonso Mejía, Roberto Cobo, Estela Inda, Crime, Drama
A group of juvenile delinquents live a violent and crime-filled life in the festering slums of Mexico City, and the morals of young Pedro are gradually corrupted and destroyed by the others…
Read More »
Death on the Nile (1978) John Guillermin, Peter Ustinov, Mia Farrow, Simon MacCorkindale, Crime, Drama, Mystery
Almost everyone on the S.S.Karnak, cruising the Nile, has a reason to want heiress Linnet Ridgeway dead. Her jewels are coveted by elderly Mrs. van Schuyler, her maid is upset because Linnet won’t give her a promised dowry, writer Salome Otterbourne is facing a libel suit brought by Linnet, Salome’s daughter Rosalie wants to protect her mother, American Andrew Pennington has been embezzling from the Ridgeway family, and former friend Jacqueline de Bellefort is upset that Linnet stole her fiance, Simon, away from her. Belgian sleuth Hercule Poirot must unravel the mystery when Linnet (and some of the others) turn up dead.
Read More »
The Light Touch (1951) Richard Brooks, Stewart Granger, Pier Angeli, George Sanders, Crime, Drama
Sam and Felix are art thieves. Sam has just stolen a picture from a museum in Italy, but told Felix that it was lost in a boat accident. He wants copies made to sell while he will sell the original and get paid both ways. To find an artist, they pick the young, beautiful, naive Anna. When Anna has doubts, Sam strings her along and then marries her and go to Sicily on their honeymoon. Anna finds out that Sam is a thief and is very disappointed. Felix finds out that Sam has the original and is out to get it. The police are also waiting along with the buyer that Sam has for the painting.
Read More »
Le solitaire / The Loner (1987) Jacques Deray, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Jean-Pierre Malo, Michel Beaune, Action, Crime, Drama
Stan (Belmondo) and Simon, two linked to the world of crime individuals decide to emigrate to the Caribbean to start a new life. But their plans fall apart when, in the course of a fight, a dangerous criminal named Simon Schneider kills and flees. Stan takes over Christian, the son of his friend, and vows to avenge his death.
Read More »
Bin-jip / 3-Iron (2004) Ki-duk Kim, Seung-yeon Lee, Hyun-kyoon Lee, Hyuk-ho Kwon, Crime, Drama, Romance
The lonely and silent rider Tae-suk breaks in empty houses and lives a normal life while the owners are traveling. He does not steal anything and moves from house to house without any loss other than food, and he cleans the houses, provides small repairs or washes some clothes to pay for the hospitality. When he enters in the house of Sun-hwa, he does not see the woman that is wounded in her room after being beaten up on by her abusive husband Min-gyu Lee. Tae-suk helps the hurt woman and when Min-gyu returns, he hits the husband with golf balls and Sun-hwa leaves her husband with Tae-suk on his motorcycle. When they break in the house of an old man, they find that the man is dead and Tae-suk provides funeral service for him. However, his son returns and Tae-suk and Sun-hwa are arrested by two abusive police detectives. He is sent to prison and Sun-hwa is forced to return home. But she never forgets him.
Read More »