Out of the Past (Jacques Tourneur, 1947)
The femme fatale isn’t obsessed with the destruction of men, that is a byproduct of her true aims: to find a sense of autonomy in a culture that wants to keep her powerless.
The Night of the Hunter is a fairy tale of the Great Depression—of violence, misogyny, drinking, sex, twisted faith, and a grand, drifting river under a heavy sky.
The specific movements of Southland Tales begin to resemble the curious logic of dreams: hurried, recursive, dissolving into themselves.
The Singing Detective depicts convalescence as a realm of mental reflection as well as physical suffering, but it's less about the actual experience of being ill in hospital than it is about being locked inside oneself.
Watching The Big Sleep, the question bouncing around in my head was not is this a good film, but rather, why is this a good film, and how?
In Brick, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, like a good young Bogart, presents a steely front.
When asked by critics to name the overarching theme for Shadow of a Doubt Hitchcock responded: "Love and good order is no defense against evil.”
Watching Joan Crawford's Myra Hudson fall in love, and then, shatteringly, out of love, is one of the deep pleasures of Sudden Fear.
The Third Man moves with a torque that seems both instinctual and skilled.
This month, we’re focusing our attention on the world of noir, and immersing ourselves in its dark waters.
