Film Noir- Similar Products- Film noir basic plots

1- Sweet Smell of Success
The film transforms New York City into a dystopia soaked with jazz, smoke, and criminals.  We follow Sidney Falco, a press agent without the burdens of morality.  He is hired by J.J. Hunsecker, New York’s premier newspaper columnist, to stop his sister from marrying Steve Dallas, a fresh, young jazz guitarist.  So, Sidney plants some reefer on him and spreads rumors that he is a Communist.  Things work at first and the relationship is destroyed.

But that isn’t the end for Sidney- he is summoned to Hunsecker’s penthouse only to find the sister attempting suicide. Hunsecker walks in on Sidney saving her and accuses him of rape.  From there, fates are decided and lives are destroyed as the truth comes out.  In this powerful film, nobody is innocent.

A shot of Sydney in Sweet Smell of Success

2- The Big Heat

The Big Heat is one of the most intense noir films ever made.  It all starts with the death of a police sergeant.  The detective assigned to the case, Dave Bannion, thinks that foul play may be involved.  Bannion has reason to believe that a powerful gang of criminals has infiltrated the police force and bumped the sergeant off.  But the department’s higher ups force the case closed and one of the only witnesses willing to provide information is murdered.  Enraged, he insults the suspected mob boss only to have his wife killed with a car bomb as a result.  This puts him on a war path of furious vengeance as he swears to take the culprits down.  Using every method at his disposal and the help of the gangster’s girlfriend Debbie, he cuts a path of violence and anger through all the obstacles in his way. It was daring for its time and still shocking for those who watch it now.

The Big Heat poster

3- Pickup on South Street

On a crowded subway in New York , a small time pickpocket named Skip McCoy steals a wallet.  To him, it’s no big deal.  After all, it’s just another job for him.  Unbeknownst to him is the fact that the woman he robbed was carrying a microfilm of stolen top-secret government information that was destined for a group of Communists.  With the incredibly vital information in the hands of a common thief, both the police and the Communists start to track him down.  Too bad Mr. McCoy doesn’t care about the welfare of his country or his civic duty.  To him, it is an opportunity to make a bundle from the highest bidder.  As he slips away from the police and the Communists, it is up to Candy, the woman he robbed, to find him and get the microfilm back.

4- The Killers

The Killers starts with one of the most famous opening scenes in film noir history where two hit men invade a small town and kill The Swede. The Swede used to be a member of a gang of thieves whom he was pushed into betraying by femme fatale Kitty Collins Colfax.  Like so many film noir characters, the Swede is fully aware of his transgressions and knows that he cannot escape his fate.  And so he greets his punishment like a man instead of trying to escape from it, as so many other film noir characters would.  We then follow an investigator and a police detective as they struggle to track down his killers and bring them to justice.  The Killers is a powerful story that fully deserves it reputation as a classic film noir.

The Swede and a female actress in The Killers

5- Detour

Detour features all the great noir clichés: a down and out protagonist running from his past, a foul-tempered femme fatale, stylized dialogue, and a moody, bleak voiceover.  It deals with a hitchhiker played by Tom Neal.  He hitches a ride with a businessman one night who complains about his previous passenger, a crazy woman who scratched him.  Much to the hitchhiker’s dismay, the businessman dies.  He panics and throws his body into the desert and drives off.  Too bad his next passenger is a fiery redhead who asks him where the real driver of the car is.  She threatens to blackmail him because she knows that he has stolen the car.  In that moment, their destinies become linked and they plunge towards a tragic outcome that they cannot escape.  A filthy, messy production, Detour's flaws become its greatest strength.  It achieves a kind of transcendent power by wallowing in the filth of its story and creation.

From finding the plots of the best film noir films ever made I noticed that quite a few are to do with tracking down communists or showing htem as the enemy, as in 1950 America they were extremely anti communist and this is shown alot in the plots.

Some other things I noticed is that there are alot of criminals involved in film noir, many being the main characters. Along with criminals there are the detectives tracking them or solving the cases they caused.

Many seem to have a depressing plot with many people dying and without happy endings, but this is a good convention of film noir that makes it more realistic.

Source : http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-film-noir-movies.php#ixzz1jKlSywb7