Events over the course of one traumatic night in Paris unfold in reverse-chronological order as the beautiful Alex is brutally raped and beaten by a stranger in the underpass.
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Mystery
Love Letters (1945) William Dieterle, Jennifer Jones, Joseph Cotten, Ann Richards, Drama, Mystery, Romance
When a man asks another man more facile with words to do his wooing for him, there are always complications. The man with no talent for writing marries the girl, confesses one night he didn’t write the letters and ends up with a knife in his back. The writer of the letters fell in love with the woman he wrote to and wants to become her second husband even if she did murder husband number one. Singleton doesn’t remember the murder or anything about the first 22 years of her life as Victoria Remington. Then at her second wedding she wonders why she said “I take you, Roger,” instead of “I take you, Alan.”
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Innocence (2004) Lucile Hadzihalilovic, Zoé Auclair, Lea Bridarolli, Bérangère Haubruge, Drama, Mystery
Prepare yourself to be either infuriated or fascinated by this French film. There’s no in-between reaction available here.When people talk about seeing a really weird film where nothing happened and the end didn’t make any sense, this is the film they’re probably talking about. I’d call it fascinating, but I’m well aware that I’m probably in the minority.
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Track 29 (1988) Nicolas Roeg, Theresa Russell, Gary Oldman, Christopher Lloyd, Drama, Mystery
A doctor’s wife tires of his obsession with model trains, and spends her days wondering about the son she gave up for adoption at birth. While eating at a roadside cafe, she encounters a British hitchhiker, who turns out to be her son. They spend time together trying to find a bond. The son begins to hate the husband, and the wife begins worrying about the safety of her husband and his train set.
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The Return of the Whistler (1948) D. Ross Lederman, Michael Duane, Lenore Aubert, Richard Lane, Film-Noir, Mystery
On the eve of his marriage, a young man’s fiance disappears. He hires a private detective to help him track her down, but soon finds himself entangled in a web of lies, intrigue and murder revolving around his fiance’s dead ex-husband and his wealthy, corrupt family.
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Deadline at Dawn (1946) Harold Clurman, Susan Hayward, Bill Williams, Paul Lukas, Film-Noir, Mystery, Romance
Alex, a sailor on leave, recovers from a drink-induced blackout with a large sum of money belonging to Edna Bartelli, a b-girl who invited him home to “fix her radio.” He tries to return it with the reluctant aid of June Goth, a sweet but oh-so-tired dance hall girl; they find Edna murdered. Not quite sure he didn’t do it himself, Alex and June have four hours in the dead of night to find the real killer before his leave ends. Their quest brings them into contact with a sleazy kaleidoscope of minor characters; clues get more and more tangled…
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Midnight Killer / Morirai a mezzanotte (1986) Lamberto Bava, Valeria D’Obici, Leonardo Treviglio, Paolo Malco, Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Nicola confronts his beautiful wife about the affair she’s been having. But someone brutally murders her in the shower, right after he leaves the house. Naturally Nicola is made prime suspect. But his colleague, Anna, sees signs that the murder may have been committed by the so-called “Midnight Ripper”. The only problem is that the Midnight Ripper has been dead for several years…
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The Thin Man Goes Home (1945) Richard Thorpe, William Powell, Myrna Loy, Lucile Watson, Comedy, Crime, Mystery
Nick and Nora head to Nick’s hometown of Sycamore Springs to spend some time with his parents. His father, a prominent local physician, was always a bit disappointed with Nick’s choice of profession in particular and his lifestyle in general. With Nick’s arrival however the towns folk, including several of the local criminal element, are convinced that he must be there on a case despite his protestations that he’s just there for rest and relaxation. When someone is shot dead on his doorstep however, Nick finds himself working on a case whether he wants to or not.
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Bodas de sangre / Blood Wedding (1981) Carlos Saura, Antonio Gades, Cristina Hoyos, Juan Antonio Jiménez, Mystery, Musical
In a sense, Carlos Saura’s first foray into filming classical dance, Blood Wedding, may be seen, not as a stark departure from the immediacy of his narrative films, but rather, as an oblique return to form towards the social interrogations implicit in his earlier work on the fundamental question of Spanish identity – a particularly timely and relevant re-assessment in the aftermath of a contemporary history marked by institutional repression, creative censorship, and historical revisionism. It is within this framework that the selected adaptation of the seminal “rural trilogy” play by Spanish playwright, Federico García Lorca – a writer who was executed by Falangists in the early days of the Civil War and whose work was generally banned throughout Franco’s regime – seems particularly suited to this post Franco-era cultural introspection in its dark and tragic tale of passion, betrayal, and revenge.
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Full Circle / The Haunting of Julia (1977) Richard Loncraine, Mia Farrow, Keir Dullea, Tom Conti, Drama, Horror, Mystery
After the sudden accidental death of her small daughter, Julia Lofting, a wealthy American woman living in London, bolts her unhappy marriage and buys a house in Kensington which is haunted by the ghost of a quite obscenely nasty little girl who died in the 1950s and plans to use Julia as her pawn in a terrible revenge.
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