Favorite Cinematic Adaptations of Noir?

I think I'd have to go with The Maltese Falcon, for which John Huston borrowed heavily, to say the least, from the book (a wise choice on his part), not just with regard to story and plot but whole chunks of dialogue. The only glaring omission is the Flitcraft tale that Spade tells Brigid. The direction and casting are superb. . . . . Sidney Greenstreet's first movie ever, if memory serves.

That is impossible for me. Those old B&W movies with the tough characters were mother's milk for me growing up. The Maltese Falcon is a classic. Bogart, Cagney; I could make a list here, so many flicks.

Maltese Falcon is pretty good, but as a movie I think I prefer "Out of the Past" (1947, Robert Mitchum, Kirk Douglas & Jane Greer). It *is* based on a book, but one I haven't read so I can't tell you how faithful an adaptation is.

I love it, love it! That is my kind of writing. Always puts a smile on my face. I think the movie is true to the book because the author of the book wrote the screenplay. It is chock full of great lines like:

Marny, diner owner: "Two things I can smell inside a hundred feet: a burnin' hamburger and a romance."

Jack Fisher: You know, a dame with a rod is like a guy with a knitting needle.

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Jeff Bailey: You know, maybe I was wrong and luck is like love. You have to go all the way to find it.
Ann Miller: You do to keep it.

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Jeff Bailey: I sell gasoline, I make a small profit. With that I buy groceries. The grocer makes a profit. We call it earning a living. You may have heard of it somewhere.

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Whit Sterling: My feelings? About ten years ago, I hid them somewhere and haven't been able to find them

Ahhhhh, that is a great way to start the day, thanks for reminding me.

I'm a fan of The Maltese Falcon and The Big Sleep.
In fact, I owe a lot to Bogart. If it weren't for his performance then I wouldn't have ever read Hammett or Chandler!

Interestingly, William Faulkner helped write the screenplay for The Big Sleep.

The Grifters is pretty darned good, with Angelica Huston and John Cusack.

ostrom, I saw "The Grifters" per your suggestion and was pleased to find how closely they followed the book. It was a good adaption and Huston was quite evil.

Aww, Juv3nal, Out of the Past is the best noir film ever, but since you've already mentioned it, I will say that I really liked L.A. Confidential.

"The Postman Always Rings Twice" both versions--love 'em. "L.A. Confidential" was fine, too.

Okay, I've just seen The Maltese Falcon for the first time-I know, I must be the last person on earth to see it-and I see why it's so famous. Wonderful acting, plot, atmosphere. Plus Peter Lorre, who I like very much. I was surprised at the amount of humor in it.

Yes, lot's of humor in the film version of The Maltese Falcon. The dialogue is basically lifted from the novel. I do wish they'd found a way to include the "Flitcraft" story-within-the-story.

I loved the Lana Turner/John Garfield version of "The Postman Always Rings Twice". Lana Turner was so good in that. I had always heard that it was 'steamy' but I was more impressed with the fact that so much of Cain's controversial plot made it into the picture rather than complete story changes, as I've seen in some adaptions.

#14 Love the oldies. There was a famous line:

Frank Chambers: With my brains and your looks, we could go places.

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And this one is funny:

Cora Smith: It's too bad Nick took the car.
Frank Chambers: Even if it was here we couldn't take it, unless we'd want to spend the night in jail. Stealing a man's wife, that's nothing, but stealing a man's car, that's larceny.

Double Indemnity. You have a classic Cain story adapted to the screen by Raymond Chandler, what a combination. A great story of a skirt-struck sucker, an insurance investigator (as is his boss, Edward G Robinson) which is a quasi-detective (see also Memento), falling for a rotten, morbid house wife. A scheme to kill her husband slowly unravels. Biting narration, suspenseful scenes, dark characters...all the great hallmarks. Great performances, directions and cinematography. Robinson was great and sarcastic as a father-like figure to MacMurray.

The Big Sleep is another great one.

Robinson was great amd so was MacMurray. I love the big sleep too!

Double Indemnity is my favorite of Cain's novels. I didn't know that Chandler had done the screenplay. I would love the movie except that Barabra Stanwyck is in it. To me she always looked so angry that I can't see her as a femme fatale.

I agree. It probably comes from all the tough western movie days.

Who's a girl? chandler?Robinson? me? :O

#20- what does it tell you?

bogart was too small to play marlowe so i can never get into the big sleep with him in it. prefer mitchum as marlowe

I've seen almost all the films mentioned, and they're all very good, but how can you beat John Huston directing the acting trifecta of Bogey, Greenstreet, and Lorre?

love Peter Lorre!

"I've seen almost all the films mentioned, and they're all very good, but how can you beat John Huston directing the acting trifecta of Bogey, Greenstreet, and Lorre?"

Out of the Past has this kind of mythic "bad things always happen to people who do bad things" Hays Code fatalism going for it that Maltese Falcon doesn't.

Mostly, I guess because Mitchum's character is into it up to his neck whereas Bogart gets away relatively unscathed.

Also, Jane Greer is a way, way better femme fatale than Mary Astor.

I would go with Double Indemnity. I will never forget the first time I saw Fred MacMurray in this. My jaw dropped as of course my only exposure to his acting at that point was on My Three Sons lol.

Barbara Stanwyck is one of my favorite actresses and I can't see anyone else in this part.

> 27 I remember the shock too upon realizing that in his career in movies like Double Indemnity and The Apartment that he was a real baddie. I understand Mr. MacMurray also had a hot hand with the stock market and at his death was one of the wealthiest men in Hollywood.

#28, That's right I forgot about the Apartment, he was a real sleazeball. I did not know he was into the stock market though. Good actor, one of those actors that just did his job well but was not hyped up a whole lot.

Try "Heaven's Prisoners," starring Alec Baldwin, Teri Hatcher and Eric Roberts, based on the book by James Lee Burke.

I've read a lot of noir fiction and seen a lot of film noir, but you'd have to go a very long way to catch up to The Friends Of Eddie Coyle by George V Higgins. Both the novel and the film, which starred Robert Mitchum in perhaps his greatest role ever, are among the most compelling examples of noir.

Higgins tells the story almost exclusively through dialogue. Probably 80% of the novel is dialogue, and it rings so true, you think you're sitting right there with the characters, eavesdropping on a real conversation. Wisely, the film followed the book closely and leaned heavily on Higgins' dialogue, lifting it almost word for word from the pages of the novel.

Unfortunately for Higgins, he tried (too hard, some say) to replicate his success in subsequent novels, but they never measured up to The Friends Of Eddie Coyle.

I wrote full reviews of both the novel http://mikedennisnoir.com/review-the-friends-of-eddie-coyle/1265/ and the Criterion DVD package of the film http://mikedennisnoir.com/review-the-friends-of-eddie-coyle-the-dvd-package/1448... Any fan of noir fiction or film noir should check them out. You'll like it.

Cutter's Way from Cutter and Bone is a good one.

The Third Man is the best noir movie and Harper, with Paul Newman, is criminally overlooked.

Last Man Standing with Bruce Willis, a re-make of Yojimbo by Kurosawa which was based on Red Harvest by Hammett.