1940s films noir
by lila0489 | created - 26 Oct 2017 | updated - 8 months ago | Public- Instant Watch Options
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1. This Gun for Hire (1942)
Passed | 81 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
When assassin Philip Raven shoots a blackmailer and his beautiful female companion dead, he is paid off in marked bills by his treasonous employer who is working with foreign spies.
Director: Frank Tuttle | Stars: Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, Robert Preston, Laird Cregar
Votes: 10,502
2. The Dark Corner (1946)
Passed | 99 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
A secretary tries to help her boss who's been framed for murder.
Director: Henry Hathaway | Stars: Lucille Ball, Clifton Webb, William Bendix, Mark Stevens
Votes: 5,113
3. Too Late for Tears (1949)
Not Rated | 99 min | Crime, Film-Noir
Through a fluke circumstance, a ruthless woman stumbles across a suitcase filled with $60,000, and is determined to hold onto it even if it means murder.
Director: Byron Haskin | Stars: Lizabeth Scott, Don DeFore, Dan Duryea, Arthur Kennedy
Votes: 5,552
4. Dead Reckoning (1946)
Passed | 100 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
A soldier runs away rather than receive the Medal of Honor, so his buddy gets permission to investigate, and love and death soon follow.
Director: John Cromwell | Stars: Humphrey Bogart, Lizabeth Scott, Morris Carnovsky, Charles Cane
Votes: 8,601
5. Murder, My Sweet (1944)
Approved | 95 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
After being hired to find an ex-con's former girlfriend, Philip Marlowe is drawn into a deeply complex web of mystery and deceit.
Director: Edward Dmytryk | Stars: Dick Powell, Claire Trevor, Anne Shirley, Otto Kruger
Votes: 14,537
6. The Glass Key (1942)
Passed | 85 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
A crooked politician finds himself being accused of murder by a gangster from whom he refused help during a re-election campaign.
Director: Stuart Heisler | Stars: Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, Brian Donlevy, Bonita Granville
Votes: 7,330
7. The Blue Dahlia (1946)
Passed | 96 min | Crime, Film-Noir, Mystery
An ex-bomber pilot is suspected of murdering his unfaithful wife.
Director: George Marshall | Stars: Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, William Bendix, Howard Da Silva
Votes: 9,551 | Gross: $2.70M
8. Criss Cross (1949)
Not Rated | 84 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
An armored truck driver and his ex-wife conspire with a gang to have his own truck robbed on the route.
Director: Robert Siodmak | Stars: Burt Lancaster, Yvonne De Carlo, Dan Duryea, Stephen McNally
Votes: 9,494
9. Thieves' Highway (1949)
Passed | 94 min | Drama, Film-Noir, Thriller
A war veteran turned truck driver attempts to avenge the crippling and robbing of his father at the hands of an amoral produce scofflaw.
Director: Jules Dassin | Stars: Richard Conte, Valentina Cortese, Lee J. Cobb, Barbara Lawrence
Votes: 6,794
10. The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)
Unrated | 116 min | Drama, Film-Noir, Romance
A man is reunited with his childhood friend and her husband who believes he knows the truth about the death of her rich aunt years earlier.
Director: Lewis Milestone | Stars: Barbara Stanwyck, Van Heflin, Lizabeth Scott, Kirk Douglas
Votes: 10,872
11. Lady in the Lake (1946)
Passed | 105 min | Crime, Film-Noir, Mystery
The lady editor of a crime magazine hires Phillip Marlowe to find the wife of her boss. The private detective soon finds himself involved in murder.
Director: Robert Montgomery | Stars: Robert Montgomery, Audrey Totter, Lloyd Nolan, Tom Tully
Votes: 6,227
12. The Big Steal (1949)
Approved | 71 min | Crime, Film-Noir, Romance
An army lieutenant accused of robbery pursues the real thief on a frantic chase through Mexico aided by the thief's fiancee.
Director: Don Siegel | Stars: Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, William Bendix, Patric Knowles
Votes: 5,331
13. The Big Clock (1948)
Not Rated | 95 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
A magazine tycoon commits a murder and pins it on an innocent man, who then tries to solve the murder himself.
Director: John Farrow | Stars: Ray Milland, Maureen O'Sullivan, Charles Laughton, George Macready
Votes: 9,410
14. Detour (1945)
Passed | 66 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
The life of Al Roberts, a pianist in a New York nightclub, turns into a nightmare when he decides to hitchhike to Los Angeles to visit his girlfriend.
Director: Edgar G. Ulmer | Stars: Tom Neal, Ann Savage, Claudia Drake, Edmund MacDonald
Votes: 19,417 | Gross: $0.02M
15. Impact (1949)
Passed | 111 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
A unfaithful wife plots with her lover to kill her husband, but the lover is accidentally killed instead. The husband stays in hiding and lets his wife be charged with conspiracy.
Director: Arthur Lubin | Stars: Brian Donlevy, Ella Raines, Charles Coburn, Helen Walker
Votes: 4,637
16. Angels Over Broadway (1940)
Passed | 79 min | Adventure, Comedy, Crime
A cuckolded embezzler on the verge of suicide is helped by a tout, an alcoholic playwright, and a pick-up girl to reimburse the money with a gambling sting.
Directors: Ben Hecht, Lee Garmes | Stars: Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Rita Hayworth, Thomas Mitchell, John Qualen
Votes: 1,313
17. I Wake Up Screaming (1941)
Passed | 82 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Why is Inspector Ed Cornell trying to railroad Frankie Christopher for the murder of model Vicky Lynn?
Director: H. Bruce Humberstone | Stars: Betty Grable, Victor Mature, Carole Landis, Laird Cregar
Votes: 5,304
18. Born to Kill (1947)
Approved | 92 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
A calculating divorcée risks her chances at wealth and security with a man she doesn't love by getting involved with the hotheaded murderer romancing her foster sister.
Director: Robert Wise | Stars: Claire Trevor, Lawrence Tierney, Walter Slezak, Phillip Terry
Votes: 5,865
19. Kiss of Death (1947)
Approved | 99 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Nick Bianco is caught during a botched jewelry heist. The district attorney offers him a more lenient sentence if he squeals on his accomplices but he refuses to make a deal. Three years into the sentence, an event changes his mind.
Director: Henry Hathaway | Stars: Victor Mature, Brian Donlevy, Coleen Gray, Richard Widmark
Votes: 9,420
20. East Side, West Side (1949)
Passed | 108 min | Drama, Romance
A vain businessman puts a strain on happy marriage to a rich, beautiful socialite by allowing himself to be seduced by a former girlfriend.
Director: Mervyn LeRoy | Stars: Barbara Stanwyck, James Mason, Van Heflin, Ava Gardner
Votes: 2,487
21. The Killers (1946)
Passed | 103 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Hit men kill an unresisting victim, and investigator Reardon uncovers his past involvement with beautiful, deadly Kitty Collins.
Director: Robert Siodmak | Stars: Burt Lancaster, Ava Gardner, Edmond O'Brien, Albert Dekker
Votes: 23,324
22. Lured (1947)
Approved | 102 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
British police are after a serial killer who lures his female victims through newspaper personal ads and sends cryptic poem clues to the cops.
Director: Douglas Sirk | Stars: George Sanders, Lucille Ball, Charles Coburn, Boris Karloff
Votes: 4,574
23. Out of the Past (1947)
Approved | 97 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
A private eye escapes his past to run a gas station in a small town, but his past catches up with him. Now he must return to the big city world of danger, corruption, double crosses, and duplicitous dames.
Director: Jacques Tourneur | Stars: Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, Kirk Douglas, Rhonda Fleming
Votes: 40,443
24. Johnny Eager (1941)
Passed | 107 min | Crime, Film-Noir, Mystery
The step-daughter of a district attorney falls in love with a gangster on parole who her father originally imprisoned.
Director: Mervyn LeRoy | Stars: Robert Taylor, Lana Turner, Edward Arnold, Van Heflin
Votes: 3,393
25. To Have and Have Not (1944)
Passed | 100 min | Adventure, Comedy, Film-Noir
During World War II, American expatriate Harry Morgan helps transport a French Resistance leader and his beautiful wife to Martinique while romancing a sensuous lounge singer.
Director: Howard Hawks | Stars: Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Walter Brennan, Dolores Moran
Votes: 37,652
26. Laura (1944)
Passed | 88 min | Drama, Film-Noir, Mystery
A police detective falls in love with the woman whose murder he is investigating.
Directors: Otto Preminger, Rouben Mamoulian | Stars: Gene Tierney, Dana Andrews, Clifton Webb, Vincent Price
Votes: 50,614 | Gross: $4.36M
27. Dark Passage (1947)
Passed | 106 min | Film-Noir, Thriller
A man convicted of murdering his wife escapes from prison and works with a woman to try to prove his innocence.
Director: Delmer Daves | Stars: Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Bruce Bennett, Agnes Moorehead
Votes: 21,687
28. Fallen Angel (1945)
Approved | 98 min | Crime, Film-Noir, Mystery
A slick con man arrives in a small town looking to make some money, but soon gets more than he bargained for.
Director: Otto Preminger | Stars: Alice Faye, Dana Andrews, Linda Darnell, Charles Bickford
Votes: 6,418
29. The Woman in the Window (1944)
Passed | 107 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
When a conservative middle aged professor engages in a relationship with a femme fatale, he's plunged into a nightmarish world of blackmail and murder.
Director: Fritz Lang | Stars: Edward G. Robinson, Joan Bennett, Raymond Massey, Edmund Breon
Votes: 17,543
30. Black Angel (1946)
Passed | 81 min | Adventure, Crime, Film-Noir
When Kirk Bennett is convicted of a singer's murder, his wife tries to prove him innocent...aided by the victim's ex-husband.
Director: Roy William Neill | Stars: Dan Duryea, June Vincent, Peter Lorre, Broderick Crawford
Votes: 3,885
31. Million Dollar Weekend (1948)
Approved | 72 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
2 people - a middle-aged stockbroker and a young widow are passengers on the same flight from California to Hawaii. For different reasons, they've both fled the state with secrets. Neither ... See full summary »
Director: Gene Raymond | Stars: Gene Raymond, Osa Massen, Francis Lederer, Robert Warwick
Votes: 369
32. Moonrise (1948)
Passed | 90 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Danny is despised by his schoolmates because his father was accused of killing another man and sentenced to death.
Director: Frank Borzage | Stars: Dane Clark, Gail Russell, Ethel Barrymore, Allyn Joslyn
Votes: 2,932
33. Sorry, Wrong Number (1948)
Approved | 89 min | Drama, Film-Noir, Mystery
While on the telephone, an invalid woman overhears what she thinks is a murder plot and attempts to prevent it.
Director: Anatole Litvak | Stars: Barbara Stanwyck, Burt Lancaster, Ann Richards, Wendell Corey
Votes: 12,391
34. The Bribe (1949)
Approved | 98 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Federal agent Rigby, in Central America to trace stolen plane engines, falls for the gorgeous wife of the chief suspect.
Directors: Robert Z. Leonard, Vincente Minnelli | Stars: Robert Taylor, Ava Gardner, Charles Laughton, Vincent Price
Votes: 2,141
35. The Seventh Victim (1943)
Approved | 71 min | Drama, Horror, Mystery
A woman in search of her missing sister uncovers a Satanic cult in New York's Greenwich Village and finds that they could have something to do with her sibling's random disappearance.
Director: Mark Robson | Stars: Kim Hunter, Tom Conway, Jean Brooks, Isabel Jewell
Votes: 7,476
36. High Wall (1947)
Approved | 99 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
After a brain-damaged man confesses to murder and is committed, Dr. Ann Lorrison tries to prove his innocence.
Director: Curtis Bernhardt | Stars: Robert Taylor, Audrey Totter, Herbert Marshall, Dorothy Patrick
Votes: 1,918
37. I Walk Alone (1947)
Approved | 97 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Frankie Madison leaves prison expecting a share from his ex-partner. But Prohibition bootlegging didn't prepare Frankie for Big Business.
Director: Byron Haskin | Stars: Burt Lancaster, Lizabeth Scott, Kirk Douglas, Wendell Corey
Votes: 3,239
38. Deadline at Dawn (1946)
Passed | 83 min | Crime, Film-Noir, Mystery
After a woman he meets is murdered, a soon-to-ship-out sailor has until dawn to find the killer, aided by a weary dance hall girl.
Directors: Harold Clurman, William Cameron Menzies | Stars: Susan Hayward, Paul Lukas, Bill Williams, Joseph Calleia
Votes: 2,114
39. Christmas Holiday (1944)
Not Rated | 93 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
A young femme fatale-type woman realizes that the man she married is an incorrigible wastrel.
Director: Robert Siodmak | Stars: Deanna Durbin, Gene Kelly, Richard Whorf, Dean Harens
Votes: 1,632
40. Secret Beyond the Door... (1947)
Not Rated | 99 min | Drama, Film-Noir, Mystery
After a lovely woman and her new husband settle in an ancient mansion on the East coast, she discovers that he may want to kill her.
Director: Fritz Lang | Stars: Joan Bennett, Michael Redgrave, Anne Revere, Barbara O'Neil
Votes: 5,614
41. It Always Rains on Sunday (1947)
92 min | Crime, Drama, Romance
An escaped convict tries to hide out at his former lover's house, but she has since married and is reluctant to help him.
Director: Robert Hamer | Stars: Googie Withers, Jack Warner, John McCallum, Edward Chapman
Votes: 2,336 | Gross: $0.01M
42. They Won't Believe Me (1947)
Approved | 95 min | Drama, Film-Noir, Romance
On trial for murdering his girlfriend, philandering stockbroker Larry Ballentine takes the stand to claim his innocence and describe the actual, but improbable-sounding, sequence of events that led to her death.
Director: Irving Pichel | Stars: Robert Young, Susan Hayward, Jane Greer, Rita Johnson
Votes: 2,924
43. Framed (1947)
Approved | 82 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir
Mike Lambert, seeking a mining job, instead becomes the patsy for a femme-fatale's schemes.
Director: Richard Wallace | Stars: Glenn Ford, Janis Carter, Barry Sullivan, Edgar Buchanan
Votes: 2,227
44. Act of Violence (1948)
Passed | 82 min | Drama, Film-Noir, Thriller
An embittered, vengeful POW stalks his former commanding officer who betrayed his men's planned escape attempt from a Nazi prison camp.
Director: Fred Zinnemann | Stars: Van Heflin, Robert Ryan, Janet Leigh, Mary Astor
Votes: 5,655
45. Tension (1949)
Not Rated | 95 min | Crime, Drama, Film-Noir