60 Greatest Noirs of All Eras
I have trouble stopping at 60 on this list of the 60 Greatest Film Noirs of All Eras. This list contains the top 20 films as I have ranked them from Pre-Noir, Film-Noir, and Neo-Noir lists. I will continue to update the list as more movies are added. Your comments are appreciated.
I wanted to add a definition for Film-Noir, so I went to the great movie critic Roger Ebert. I have shortened his definitions but included the link below so you can read the complete original.
1. A French term meaning “black film,” or film of the night.
2. Doesn’t mislead you into thinking there will be a happy ending.
3. Locations that reek of the night, of shadows, of alleys, of the back doors of fancy places.
4. Cigarettes. Everybody in Film-Noir is always smoking. The best smoking movie of all time is Out of the Past, in which Robert Mitchum and Kirk Douglas smoke furiously at each other.
5. Women who would just as soon kill you as love you, and vice versa. This is priceless JEC.
6. For women: low necklines, floppy hats, mascara, lipstick, boudoirs, calling the doorman by his first name, high heels, red dresses, having gangsters as boyfriends, having soft spots for alcoholic private eyes, and sprawling dead on the floor with every limb meticulously arranged and every hair in place.
7. For men: fedoras, suits and ties, shabby residential hotels with a neon sign blinking through the window, buying yourself a drink out of the office bottle, cars with running boards, all-night diners, on first-name terms with homicide cops, knowing a lot of people whose descriptions end in “ies,” such as bookies, newsies, junkies, alkys, jockeys and cabbies.
8. Movies either shot in black and white, or feeling like they were.
9. Relationships in which love is only the final flop card in the poker game of death.
10. The most American film genre because no society could have created a world so filled with doom, fate, fear, and betrayal, unless it were essentially naive and optimistic.
| Title | Year | Comment | My Rate | Gen |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 The Maltese Falcon (1941) | 1941 | The best of ALL the Film Noir. Humphrey Bogart is amazing so is everyone else… | 1.00 | Film-Noir |
 Double Indemnity (1944) | 1944 | Foolish insurance man meets one of the best Femme Fatale in this must see drama... | 2.00 | Film-Noir |
 Sunset Blvd. (1950) | 1950 | A young man is murdered after he gets involved with a much older actress... | 3.00 | Film-Noir |
 Out of the Past (1947) | 1947 | The best Femme Fatale ever... | 4.00 | Film-Noir |
 The Asphalt Jungle (1950) | 1950 | Director John Huston pulls off another Film Noir masterpiece in this gritty heist drama where everything falls apart. Sterling Hayden and Sam Jaffe are amazing. They are supported by James Whitmore and Jean Hagen. Marilyn Monroe turns in her first major role… | 5.00 | Film-Noir |
| Touch of Evil (1958) | 1958 | Orson Welles directed this masterpieces that starred Charleton Heston as Mexican detective... | 6.00 | Film-Noir |
 The Killing (1956) | 1956 | Sterling Hayden is amazing in the tale of a robbery gone horribly wrong... | 7.00 | Film-Noir |
 The Big Sleep (1946) | 1946 | Detective Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) is hired by a wealthy client. By the end of the case, there is murder, blackmail, and maybe love… | 8.00 | Film-Noir |
 D.O.A. (1949) | 1950 | A "who done it" like you have never seen before… | 9.00 | Film-Noir |
 Murder, My Sweet (1944) | 1944 | (Aka Farewell, my Lovely). The most noir fun you will ever have. Raymond Chandler prose crackles with moody noir direction from Edward Dmytryk… | 10.00 | Film-Noir |
 Kiss Me Deadly (1955) | 1955 | One of the greatest and most stylistic Film Noirs ever made. Based on a Mickey Spillane novel, Kiss Me Deadly (1955) is a thrilling movie. | 11.00 | Film-Noir |
 Nightmare Alley (1947) | 1947 | One of the greatest, yet subdued, Femme Fatale, she uses greed instead of sex to drive a man to the lowest depths possible at the end of a Gin bottle… | 12.00 | Film-Noir |
 The Narrow Margin (1952) | 1952 | Set on a train, this is the classic Film Noir featuring Marie Windsor and Charles McGraw | 13.00 | Film-Noir |
 Ride the Pink Horse (1947) | 1947 | Disillusioned WW2 vet arrives in a New Mexico town to blackmail a war racketeer. Imbued with a rare humanity... | 14.00 | Film-Noir |
 Pickup on South Street (1953) | 1953 | A very good Film Noir with pickpockets, Feds, and Commies… | 15.00 | Film-Noir |
 Ace in the Hole (1951) | 1951 | A savage critique of corrupt mass media. Kirk Douglas is on fire… | 16.00 | Film-Noir |
 All the King's Men (1951) | 1949 | Southern politics the real way… | 17.00 | Film-Noir |
 Born to Kill (1947) | 1947 | A really dark Film Noir with a Femme Fatale and a Homme Fatale... | 18.00 | Film-Noir |
| Sweet Smell of Success (1957) | 1957 | Ambition and betrayal stripped of all pretense... | 19.00 | Film-Noir |
 Notorious (1946) | 1946 | Spies with Carey Grant, Ingrid Bergman, and Claude Rains… | 20.00 | Film-Noir |
 Blood on the Moon (1948) | 1948 | A rare Film Noir Western with the two leads being Robert Mitchum and Robert Preston. Blood on the Moon (1948) has a great support cast and a good storyline. | 21.00 | Film-Noir |
| Chinatown (1974) | 1974 | Probably the best Neo-Noir film, Chinatown (1974) is an intense and dark noir | 201.00 | Neo-Noir |
| Angel Heart (1987) | 1987 | Mickey Rourke, Lisa Bonet, and Robert De Niro are outstanding in the demonic and voodoo themed Neo-Noir Angel Heart (1987) | 202.00 | Neo-Noir |
| Farewell, My Lovely (1975) | 1975 | Robert Mitchum a veteran of many film noirs returns in this remake as detective Philip Marlowe. | 203.00 | Neo-Noir |
| Zero Dark Thirty | 2012 | 204.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| Body Heat (1981) | 1981 | 205.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| The Late Show (1977) | 1977 | 206.00 | Neo-Noir | |
The Friends of Eddie Coyle(1973) | 1973 | A gritty Boston based Neo-Noir with with one of the great Film Noir actor Robert Mitchum in The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973) | 207.00 | Neo-Noir |
| Blade Runner | 1982 | 208.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| L.A. Confidental | 1997 | 209.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| Sin City | 2005 | 210.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| Mulholland Drive | 2001 | 211.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| Get Carter | 1971 | Very dark film with Michael Caine | 211.00 | Neo-Noir |
| The Two Jakes | 1990 | 212.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| Basic Instinct | 1992 | 212.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| One False Move | 1992 | 213.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| The Grifters | 1990 | 214.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| Taxi Driver | 1976 | 215.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| 2 Days in the Valley (1996) | 1996 | 215.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| Theif | 1981 | 216.00 | Neo-Noir | |
| Mulholland Falls | 1996 | 218.00 | Neo-Noir | |
 The Shanghai Gesture (1941) | 1941 | Set in a Chinesse gambling den, Gene Tierney, Victor Mature, Ona Muson, and Walter Huston are amazing… | 45.00 | Pre-Noir |
 High Sierra (1941) | 1941 | A thief, after being released from prison, is hired by his old boss to lead an inept group in the robbery of a mountain resort... | 46.00 | Pre-Noir |
 Blood Money (1933) | 1933 | Frances Dee plays a kleptomaniac that get between a bail bondsman and his girlfriend. Norish but not a Film Noir. | 46.00 | Pre-Noir |
| Ladies in Retirement (1941) | 1941 | 248.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| Johnny Eager (1941) | 1941 | 249.00 | Pre-Noir | |
 The Maltese Faclon (1931) | 1931 | The original version of the classic movie that would come 10 years later. This version is very good and true to the story. Not a true Film Noir. | 302.00 | Pre-Noir |
 The Petrified Forest (1936) | 1936 | A wonderful pre-noir film with an oustanding performance by Humphrey Bogart as a deranged criminal. Cast includes Bette Davis and Leslie Howard… | 303.00 | Pre-Noir |
 Satan Met a Lady (1936) | 1936 | This is a terrible version of The Maltese Falcon. Bette Davis sleepwalks through the film… | 304.00 | Pre-Noir |
| M (1931) | 1931 | 305.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang (1932) | 1932 | 306.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| Angels with Dirty Faces (1938) | 1938 | 307.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| The Roaring Twenties (1939) | 1939 | 308.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| Fury (1936) | 1936 | 309.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| Scarface (1932) | 1932 | 310.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| The Letter (1940) | 1940 | 311.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| Underworld (1927) | 1927 | 312.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| The Docks of New York (1928) | 1928 | 313.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| Dead End (1937) | 1937 | 314.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| Marked Woman (1937) | 1937 | 315.00 | Pre-Noir | |
| You Only Live Once (1937) | 1937 | Fritz Lang and Hollywood kick-start poetic realism! Henry Fonda and Sylvia Sidney are the doomed lovers on the run. | 316.00 | Pre-Noir |
