A gutsy 30s gangster noir with two 'hood boys whose paths into adulthood are a complete contrast; Cagney becoming a violent gangster and O'Brien a priest. O'Brien has to fight the local kids' hero-worship of Cagney, and this leads to an emotional and ambiguous climax. Tense, dramatic, well-acted with sharp dialogue. Astounding. find out more...

A brilliant and highly rated thriller made in the Hitchcock mold. A hard-nosed businessman hires a low life private eye to murder his wife and the lover she's run off with, but the assassin has plans of his own. Ingenious, superbly original, satisfyingly convoluted and excruciatingly tense. A must-see. find out more...

Nothing more can be said about this classic melodrama from the peak of the Hollywood studio-film era. Hardened cynic Bogart softens when he meets old flame Bergman who is now a refugee in neutral wartime Casablanca. Together they outwit the Germans... and of course there's that famous song. Watch this classic or some day you'll regret it. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow... find out more...

Bogart confronted by a moral dilema in a Florida hotel. Money or integrity, safety or intervention. Classic film noir. find out more...

Ronet is the disgruntled war vet who plots to kill his boss and elope with his wife. Meanwhile, other events implicate him in a murder elsewhere, whilst he remains stuck in an immobile lift. Tense, clever plot with cool, minimalist direction by Malle and a great Miles Davis score. find out more...

Four men set in motion a heist of incredible audacity, a robbery where the level of risk is only matched by the protagonists' meticulous precision, but though the thieves are consummate professionals once the job is done their emotions and animosities begin to threaten the rewards of their hard work. Rififi is renowned for its tense half hour long heist scene in which not a word is ever uttered, and acknowledged as one of the classic examples of French film noir. find out more...

A remake of Jean Renoir's 1931 film 'La Chienne', this is Hollywood film noir at it's bleakest and most psychologically tortuous. Edward G Robinson plays a middle-class, middle-aged painter who becomes obsessed with an actress-cum-prostitute played by Joan Bennett. An incisive script, haunting score and claustrophobic visuals. find out more...

The original and best version of the detective thriller classic. Philip Marlowe is hired to investigate the gambling debts of a rich man's daughter, but is plunged into a twilight world of intrigue, blackmail and violence. Stylish and gripping. find out more...

When the desperate, obese Martha meets handsome Ray, who leeches off rich widows, she falls madly in love and teams up with him as he scours the lonely hearts clubs, but her jealousy is to lead to murder and betrayal. A bleak, unsentimental thriller loosely based on the real-life 'lonely hearts killers' Martha Beck and Ray Fernandez. find out more...

This is, along with Hawks' The Big Sleep, easily the most intelligent of all screen adaptations of Chandler's work. Altman in fact stays pretty close to the novel's basic narrative (though there are a couple of crucial changes), but where he comes up with something totally original is in his ironic updating of the story and characters: Gould's Marlowe is a laid-back, shambling slob who, despite his incessant claim that everything is 'OK with me,' actually harbours the same honourable ideals as C find out more...