Film-Noir

Pickup on South Street (1953) Samuel Fuller, Richard Widmark, Jean Peters, Thelma Ritter, Crime, Film-Noir, Thriller

Pickup on South Street (1953)
On a crowded subway, Skip McCoy picks the purse of Candy. Among his take, although he does not know it at the time, is a piece of top-secret microfilm that was being passed by Candy’s consort, a Communist agent. Candy discovers the whereabouts of the film through Moe Williams, a police informer. She attempts to seduce McCoy to recover the film. She fails to get back the film and falls in love with him. The desperate agent exterminates Moe and savagely beats Candy. McCoy, now goaded into action, confronts the agent in a particularly brutal fight in a subway.
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The Whistler (1944) William Castle, Richard Dix, Gloria Stuart, J. Carrol Naish, Film-Noir, Mystery, Thriller

The Whistler (1944)
A man, despondent over the death of his wife, wants to commit suicide but can’t bring himself to do it. He hires a man to hire a professional killer to do the job. However, he soon finds out that his wife isn’t really dead – but the man he paid to hire the hitman is, and he has no idea who the man hired or how to get him to call off the hit.
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The Devil Thumbs a Ride (1947) Felix E. Feist, Lawrence Tierney, Ted North, Nan Leslie, Crime, Drama, Film-Noir, Thriller

The Devil Thumbs a Ride (1947)
Not by any means a great film, The Devil Thumbs a Ride nonetheless has an indefinable audience allure that sucks the viewer into its labyrinthine storyline and doesn’t let go until the fade-out. Lawrence Tierney plays Steve Morgan, a charming but utterly sociopathic criminal who has just robbed and killed a movie theater cashier. Morgan hitches a ride with inebriated conventioneer Jimmy Furguson (Ted North). Later on, Furguson picks up two more hitchhikers: virginal Beulah Zorn (Nan Leslie) and good-time girl Agnes Smith (Betty Lawford). When circumstances lead Jimmy to believe that Steve is the fugitive whom the cops are looking for, Morgan sweet-talks his way into everyone’s confidence. Before he knows what’s happening, Jimmy is holed up in a beach house while Steve parties with Beulah and Agnes. Not even the most fervent of film noir fans will be able to predict the outcome of this one. Long ignored by movie buffs, The Devil Thumbs a Ride gained a large following through repeated TV showings in the 1960s and ’70s. It is now considered so representative of its genre that one film historian used the film’s title for a collection of his essays on B-melodramas.
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The Secret of the Whistler (1946) George Sherman, Richard Dix, Leslie Brooks, Michael Duane, Crime, Drama, Film-Noir

The Secret of the Whistler (1946)
An artist married to a wealthy but ill woman begins an affair with one of his models, who is after him solely for his money. His wife discovers the affair and threatens to cut him out of her will. In order to be able to keep both the wife’s money and his girlfriend, he begins to secretly poison his wife – but events take a surprising turn after she eventually dies.
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Voice of the Whistler (1945) William Castle, Richard Dix, Lynn Merrick, Rhys Williams, Drama, Film-Noir

Voice of the Whistler (1945)
The 4th film of the Columbia series based on the CBS radio program, “The Whistler”, finds wealthy John Sinclair, with no health or friends, being advised by his doctor to take a long vacation. Heading for the Great Lakes, he becomes ill in the cab operated by Ernie Sparrow an is taken to a clinic where he meets nurse Joan Martin, who is engaged to intern Fred Graham. Doctors now tell him he has only a few months to live and advise him to go to Maine (where, evidently, it will seem longer.) He asks Joan to marry him, promising to leave her his fortune.
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