Best Ever (Classic) Film Noir [POLL]

[Hayden]

[PurpleHazel]

[PurpleHazel]

Champion (Mark Robson, 1949)
Champion is the best -- and probably the best known -- of the 43 films I’ve watched so far for this poll. It was Kirk Douglas’ breakthrough film. His performance and the subsequent Oscar nomination for Best Actor made him a star. The character he plays in Champion established his on-screen persona as a “hard man.” Douglas himself said, “I made a career playing sons of bitches,” and his role in Champion became the template for the bastards he played in movies like Ace in the Hole and The Bad and the Beautiful: brash, vital, ruthless. Unlike most of the noir movies I’ve seen in the last 4 years, which have mainly been lesser-known B-movies, Champion is a well-constructed A production and the cast is excellent, particularly noir regular Paul Stewart and Arthur Kennedy. At first, Douglas is admirable, looking out for his disabled brother Kennedy and battling to survive. The film opens with a group of hobos attacking Douglas and Kennedy in a boxcar, establishing how poor Douglas is. But the more successful he is, the more ruthless he becomes. The film suggests he’s trying to fill the hole poverty left in him with money, status and adulation, but it will never quite be enough. The fight scenes were the most realistic and intense ones ever filmed until Raging Bull 31 years later. Director Mark Robson would go on to make another well-known boxing film often considered noir, The Harder They Fall....

The Harder They Fall (Mark Robson, 1956)
The Harder They Fall was adapted from a novel by Budd Schulberg, and it has a similar righteous tone and moral dilemma as On The Waterfront, which Schulberg adapted from his own story. Also like On the Waterfront, Rod Steiger plays the heavy. But in Waterfront, Marlon Brando was on the upswing of his career, while The Harder They Fall was Bogie’s last role. Unlike the other boxing films usually considered noir, there isn't just one fight in which the main character is pressured to take a dive; it depicts systemic corruption in the pro boxing world. It’s also the only noir boxing film in which the main character isn’t a boxer; Bogie plays a former sportswriter turned promoter. The film’s very good, but not on the level of Waterfront.

[glynspsa]

1. The Maltese Falcon
2. Sunset Boulevard
3. Asphalt Jungle
4. Postman Always Rings Twice
5. The Stranger
6. Strangers On A Train
7. D.O.A.
8. Blue Dahlia
9. High Sierra
10. Suspicion

[PurpleHazel]

Finalized my list (P. 4):

New additions:

Champion
Woman on the Run
The Breaking Point
Nobody Lives Forever
The Crooked Way (though not the best-made film, it's genuine amnesia noir and John Alton's cinematography's spectacular)
They Won't Believe Me
The Sniper