Doc Riedenschneider (Sam Jaffe), recently released from prison, enters the city, where crime is rampant, though not successful, and the police are either on the take or suggest beating citizens because rights don’t matter. He has a perfect plan for a big heist, much bigger than the local low-life criminals are used to. It’s too
A middle aged professor (Edward G. Robinson) runs into a beautiful call girl (Joan Bennett) while admiring her portrait and they go back to her apartment. A jealous client bursts in and attacks the professor and they kill him in self defense. Fearful of their reputations, and that they won’t be believed, they decide to
Harry Fabian (Richard Widmark), a penny-ante crook who is forever going after the big score, gets in far over his head when he attempts to become a wrestling promoter. To do so he crosses mid-level crook Philip Nosseross (Francis L. Sullivan), Norreross’s scheming wife (Googie Withers), his foolishly faithful girlfriend Mary Bristol (Gene Tierney), wrestler
A sad, emasculated cashier, Christopher Cross (Edward G. Robinson), falls for Kitty March (Joan Bennett) a younger woman he believes he’s rescued from an attack, which was really just her sleazy, drunk boyfriend (Dan Duryea) slapping her around, as he often does. Thinking he is a rich painter, the two attempt to con him out
Dixon Steele (Humphrey Bogart), a short-fused screenwriter, takes a hat-check girl home, and she’s found dead the next morning. The police suspect him, especially due to his violent past. He gets a partial alibi from his neighbor, Laurel Gray (Gloria Grahame), and the two start a romantic relationship. This is a strange film for Bogart.
A serial killer is targeting young women and Walter Kyne (Vincent Price), the immature son of a just-deceased media mogul, decides whichever of his underlings can find the killer can become the new man in charge. The three candidates are Jon Day Griffith (Thomas Mitchell), the newpaper editor, Mark Loving (George Sanders), head of the
We spend a few hours in a police precinct as the officers go through their daily duties, bringing in a combination of hardened criminals and those who are mildly troubled. Standing out from the crowd is Det James McLeod (Kirk Douglas), a man driven by his hatred of his criminal father and an obsession to
Nick, a troubled policeman (Michael Douglas), becomes the mental and physical plaything of rich, educated, bisexual partier, Catherine Tramell (Sharon Stone), a suspect in an ice pick murder. His simple partner (George Dzundza) and ex-lover, psychologist Dr. Beth Garner (Jeanne Tripplehorn), try to help him, but he falls deeper and deeper into addiction and Catherine’s
In London, General Sternwood (James Stewart) hires American expatriate detective Philip Marlowe (Robert Mitchum) to deal with blackmail threats. However, what he really wants is for Marlowe to uncover what happened to his missing son-in-law. Marlowe finds that both the blackmail and the disappearance are tied up with Sternwood’s wild daughters, Charlotte (Sarah Miles) and Camilla (Candy
Stuffy, British couple Fiona and Nigel Dobson (Kristin Scott Thomas, Hugh Grant) take a cruise to India in an attempt to bring some magic to their overly comfortable marriage. On board they meet sexy, French, femme fatale, Mimi (Emmanuelle Seigner), and her obnoxious, crippled, American husband, Oscar (Peter Coyote), who pick Nigel to hear the
Insurance salesman Walter Neff (Richard Crenna) is seduced by housewife Phyllis Dietrickson (Samantha Eggar) into killing her husband. Walter falsifies an accident policy for the husband that has a double indemnity clause: it pays double if the insured dies in a train accident. Their one foreseeable problem is Barton Keyes (Lee J. Cobb), a crack insurance investigator