A Lawyer, a Mortician, and a Professor Walk Into a Morgue...

A unique take on the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle sleuth, Billy Wilder and longtime co-writer/producer I.A.L. Diamond, take the viewer inside the reclusive world of the enigmatic detective, or as the title suggests, The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes. Released in 1970, it was originally intended to be a three hour Road Show epic (with intermission in the middle), featuring three shorter vignettes and one larger narrative driving the story forward – sadly, the final product found only the main portion as well as one mini-segment (United Artists having a run of flops in 1969, they felt the best way to market the film was to cut it back to its present two hour, five minute runtime – Wilder’s thoughts upon seeing it, “when I came back [from Paris], it was an absolute disaster, the way it was cut. The whole prologue was cut, a half-sequence was cut. I had tears in my eyes as I looked at the thing. It was the most elegant picture I’ve ever shot.”).

You’ve gotta love a great film noir opening: “I’m Collier Bonnabel. I’m a cop. I’m a lieutenant detective in, uh, Homicide. That’s a fancy name for murder. We get plenty of tough cases. Solved most of them, sure. But how? I only know one way, one thing that breaks them wide open. Tension. I work on people, on suspects. Play up to them. Play up to their strengths, pour it on their weaknesses. Romance them or ignore them. Kiss them. Press them. But whatever way. . . keep stretching them. And when they get stretched so tight they can’t take it any longer: TENSION.” 1949's Tension, directed by John Berry, is narrated by Bonnabel (Barry Sullivan) – a hard-boiled, driven narrative that provides us with an intimate view into the detective’s mind. After this intriguing monologue (in which he speaks directly to the camera while playing with a rubber band), Tension opens with a prototypical film noir shot – a nighttime big city street, neon lights flashing, a pharmacy the main focal point.

Catch Me If You Can, octogenarian-style, 2018's The Old Man & The Gun, written and directed by David Lowery (A Ghost Story), is a fitting final tribute to the great Robert Redford (who will be retiring from acting after this role), a film that, despite its dramatic crime roots, has a certain sweetness, an old-fashioned, often poignant based-on-true-events tale about finding your inner child as well as your lifelong passion, and then living it. For those of you who have seen A Ghost Story, there is something immediately recognizable about The Old Man & The Gun – though they are completely different. Edited in a similar manner, Lowery’s mesmeric rhythm, unique pacing and efficiently simple style (with some nice cinematography from Joe Anderson) allows the charming characters to tell the story.

A film noir that would fit right into the fabric of twenty-first century television, Mystery Street, directed by John Sturges (The Magnificent Seven), is like an extended episode of CSI (or Criminal Minds), circa 1950 – a novel idea for the time. One of the first movies to be shot on location in Boston, in a way, it is a two pronged tale – demonstrating old-school investigative police work by State Police Lieutenant Peter Morales (Ricardo Montalban) and the avant-garde use of forensics by a Harvard doctor by the name of McAdoo (Bruce Bennett).

Taking noir genre tropes and flipping them on their heads, Nicholas Ray’s They Live by Night (1948) challenges the city setting, the cynical detective, the sultry femme fatale, and at every turn, finds a clever way to surprise and intrigue. An intimate look at the lives of outsiders (a Nicholas Ray speciality – think In a Lonely Place; Rebel Without a Cause), three individuals have escaped the confines of prison. . . guys who would easily be picked out of a lineup: one-eyed Chickamaw (Howard Da Silva) – a sinister man, quick to anger when his missing socket is mentioned; monstrous T-Dub (Jay C. Flippen) – though he seems sensible, there is a violent streak hidden just below the face only a mother could love; and baby-faced Bowie (Farley Granger) – the meek getaway driver of the gang.

One of the most divisive films of the year – a love it or hate it type (in which most fall into the latter) is Vaughn Stein’s 2018 flick Terminal. . . a feature steeped in film noir, dystopic future and gothic horror, a glossy B movie that pays tribute to the 1940s, Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner, the films of Brian De Palma, Quentin Tarantino, Guy Ritchie and tales the likes of Edgar Allan Poe and Lewis Carroll. As if dropped down the proverbial rabbit hole, Stein transports us into a dichotomous world, wet and sleek, decrepit and glossy, dangerously alluring, a Terminal (that seems to lead to nowhere) in which we find Annie (Margot Robbie) spinning her nasty web. Porting numerous garbs (one a striking red coat) and hair resembling Veronica Lake, the forking story has her working in the looming locale’s all-night diner. . . a waitress with a sharp tongue and cantankerously flirtatious attitude. Chatting up a sickly English professor, Bill (Simon Pegg), as he waits for the arrival of the next train to nowhere, his illness piques the fatale in the femme.