Force of Evil (1948)

"According to Martin Scorsese nobody portrayed guilt on the American screen better than John Garfield in Abraham Polonsky's hard-hitting Force of Evil (1948). As Joe Morse, 'a crooked little lawyer,' Garfield has reason to feel guilty. He's in league with Ben Tucker, a former beer-runner, who's planning to takeover the numbers racket by fixing the old liberty number, 776, to fall on July 4th. After 776 hits, the big Tucker corporation will move in and consolidate the small numbers banks that can't pay off their debts and form a monopoly."
Images Journal, Wikipedia, YouTube, Twenty Four Frames, amazon, Noir of the Week

Union Station (1950)

"Union City (1951) directed by Rudolph Mate is a period crime action movie set in Chicago that marks the transition from the classic period of film noir to the 50′s police procedural. While the picture is weakened by a conventional plot and a fairly laconic performance from William Holden as the railway cop, the location shooting (actually on the streets of LA) has a 'naked city' feel and the action played out in Union Station is made interesting by certain noirish episodes.
films noir, Wikipedia, amazon, YouTube

The Big Clock (1948)

"If there is one thing I learned from Ray Milland’s most famous performance, it’s that a booze bender makes for a great narrative. Milland’s Oscar winning role in The Lost Weekend was as one of film history’s most memorable and voracious alcoholics. Battling his personal bacchant demons, as well as the people trying to sober him up, made for a great movie (especially when flying bats are hallucinated). In director John Farrow’s The Big Clock we know that Milland may find himself in trouble again because of lady liquor after he is fired from his job and confides that the first thing he is going to do is “have a good stiff couple of drinks.” In this film he ties one on with the wrong woman, in the wrong place and as the title may allude, at the wrong time. The fatal result is a murder committed in the heat of passion."
Noir of the Week, Wikipedia, , YouTube, amazon

The Stranger (1946)

"The dark nature of this movie of course is what consigns it to the noir category, that plus the moody but still dazzling black-and-white photography, complete with unusual camera angles, especially during the many trips up and down the inside of the bell tower facing the green in a small one-horse town in Connecticut right after the war. But is it really a noir film? Not really by subject matter, that of a post-World War II manhunt."
Mystery File, Twenty Four Frames, Wikipedia, YouTube

Crime Wave (1954)

"A late night gas station knock-over goes South for a trio of escaped thugs when one is killed and an intervening cop is killed. The L.A.P.D. suspect the culprits will converge on - and hole up at - the home of Steve Lacey (Gene Nelson), an ex-con anxious to leave the life and that ilk far behind."
Noir of the Week, Goodfella Movies, amazon, YouTube, The City is Dark