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Ace in the hole. (111 min.). Chuck Tatum, an amoral newspaper reporter caught in dead-end Albuquerque, happens upon the story of a lifetime-and will do anything to ensure he gets the scoop. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2976 Act of violence / Mystery street. (175 min.). Act of violence: Ex-World War II pilot Frank Enley is a respected contractor and family man. Then his troubled, gimp-legged bombardier shows up with a gun and a score to settle. Perhaps neither man is what he seems to be. Mystery street: Vivian is being brushed off by her rich, married boyfriend. To confront him, she hijacks Henry Shanway and his car from Boston to Cape Cod. Once there, she strands Henry. Months later, a skeleton is found on a lonely Cape Cod beach. Using the macabre expertise of Harvard forensic specialist Dr. McAdoo, Lt. Pete Morales must work back from bones to find the victim's identity and killer. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5138 Akira Kurosawa's Stray dog. (122 min.). Set in Tokyo during the late 1940s, the film captures the chaos and humiliation that existed in Japan immediately after World War II. When detective Murakami loses his revolver, he must descend into Tokyo's underworld and face the killer who has taken it. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 816 Angel face. (92 min.). When Mrs. Tremayne is mysteriously poisoned with gas, ambulance driver Frank Jessup meets her refined but sensuous stepdaughter Diane, who quickly pursues and infatuates him. Under Diane's seductive influence, Frank is soon the Tremayne chauffeur, but he begins to suspect danger under her surface sweetness. When he shows signs of pulling away, Diane schemes to get him in so deep he'll never get out. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2402 The asphalt jungle. (112 min.). Considered the "star-making" vehicle for Marilyn Monroe. When criminal mastermind Doc Riedenschneider is released from prison, he approaches crooked (and broke) lawyer Alonzo Emmerich with a plan for the biggest jewel heist in history. Against a grimy urban background, Doc carefully selects and rehearses his team of semi-professional criminals even as Emmerich is planning to double-cross the thieves and flee the country with the loot and his "niece". Little accidents accumulate, fatal character flaws emerge, and what starts out as a clockwork operation becomes a disaster for all concerned. VHS 4586 Attack. (ca. 107 min.). Film looks at the Battle of Bulge, emphasizing a group of American soldiers in Fragile Fox Company led by the cowardly Captain Cooney. Cooney's previous mistakes have been covered up by Colonel Bartlett who hopes after the war to make use of Cooney's political connections. When Cooney fails to provide support for his men as they fight in Belgium, Lt. Joe Costa although badly wounded, seeks him out with the intention of killing him. VHS 5404 Beware my lovely. (ca. 77 min.). A rambling mansion becomes the setting for blood-curdling terror in this 1950s thriller. Ida Lupino is a wealthy widow looking for a hired hand to help clean up her huge, badly neglected estate. But when she employs drifter Robert Ryan, he turns out to be dangerously insane, and she suddenly finds herself a hunted prisoner in her own home. VHS 4861 The big clock. (ca. 95 min.). A hotshot crime magazine editor inadvertently becomes the subject of a murder investigation after spending an evening with his boss' mistress. VHS 4321 The big combo. (89 min.). Discouraged by his superior officers, a detective lieutenant doggedly continues his investigation to obtain evidence that would convict the head gangster of a crime syndicate. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5345, HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 3593 The big heat. (89 min.). A crime melodrama about an honest police sergeant who risks his life and his job when his investigations lead to the exposure of the crime syndicate that controls the city administration. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 758 The big knife. (114 min.). "Charles Castle is a successful Hollywood actor who has opted for screen success over art. He must make critical decisions regarding his career, his marriage, his art & morality. In this screen adaptation of a Clifford Odets play, Castle is pressured by his studio boss and manipulated into a potentially murderous cover-up to protect his career. An indictment of the amoral world of 50's Hollywood and its corrosive effect upon the artist." -- taken from imdb.com plot summary. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2407 The big sleep. (230 min.). Hard-boiled private eye Philip Marlowe is hired by millionaire Gen. Sternwood to learn who is using nude pictures to blackmail his wild, young daughter, Carmen. Solving the case involves Marlowe in a web of sex, blackmail and murder even as he and the older daughter in the family are falling in love. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1062 Black angel. (81 min.). When a beautiful blackmailer is murdered, Catherine, the wife of the convicted murderer, sets out to clear her husband's name. She enlists the aid of Martin Blair, the dead woman's ex-husband, an alcoholic musician who believes he might remember a stranger leaving his wife's apartment the night of the murder. Their prime suspect is Marko, a shady nightclub owner, and Catherine and Blair team up to perform in the club. VHS 5240 Blood simple. (96 min.). Thriller set in rural Texas combines chilling suspense with an offbeat humor to create an all-American version of the classic "film noir." A jealous husband hires a sleazy private eye to murder his adulterous wife and her lover. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 4740 Blue dahlia. (100 min.). Johnny, a returning Navy veteran, finds his wife Helen cheating on him. When she is killed with his gun, he tries to find the real killer. In the meantime Johnny meets Joyce, a woman discontented with her husband but interested in Johnny. Joyce helps Johnny look for the killer and sticks around for romance. VHS 3705 The blue gardenia. (90 min.). Norah Larkin (Baxter) is a working girl who wakes up a murderess after passing out in the apartment of brutish playboy Harry Prebble (Burr). Branded "The Blue Gardenia" by Casey Mayo, a sensation-seeking columnist (Conte), Norah dodges dragnets, informants and the cruel hand of fate as she struggles to conceal her involvement with Prebble, and to remember the details of her ill-fated night. As her hopes for justice fade, she decides to gamble her future on the journalist who transformed her into such a notorious public figure. VHS 5488 Bob le flambeur = Bob the gambler. (102 min.). Bob the gambler and his friends learn that the Deauville Casino expects to pull in 800 million francs. On the night of the heist Bob plays the casino tables until the appointed time. Before the dawn breaks, some of the men and women will win, some will lose, and some will die. DVD 425 Body and soul. (104 min.). Charley has become the middleweight champion of the world by winning a "fixed" fight. In his devious climb to the top, Charley has become hard and arrogant, and has estranged both his mother and the girl he loves. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 210 Body heat. (113 min.). A lawyer has a love affair with a woman and gets involved in a plot to kill her husband. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 143 Boomerang. (88 min.). A prosecutor's fight to prove the innocence of a man accused of a notorious murder. Based on a true story. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5076 Border incident. (95 min.). The Mexico-California border is the power-keg setting for a tale of government agents versus greed and murder. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2408 Brute force. (95 min.). Joe Collins of Cell R-17 in Westgate Penitentiary is planning a mass breakout. The chief guard, Capt. Munsey, gets wind of this plan and seeks to further his career by crushing it. Violence erupts and Collins and Munsey come face to face with each other. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5316, VHS 5487 Call Northside 777. (111 min.). The powerful true story of a reporter who corrects a miscarriage of justice. VHS 3492 Caught. (88 min.). Leonora Eames fulfills her life's dream when she marries a millionaire but she soon discovers that her husband is mentally unstable. She resents being used as his business hostess and leaves him, finding a job with a struggling physician. A love affair develops, but when Leonara becomes pregnant, she returns to her husband so that her child can be born into wealth. Desperation and murder follow. VHS 4863 Chinatown. (131 min.). In the Los Angeles of the thirties, a private detective takes on a seemingly routine matrimonial inquiry. Jake Gittes is hired by a beautiful socialite to investigate her husband's extra-marital affairs and finds himself swept into a maelstrom of double dealings and deadly deceits, uncovering a web of personal and political scandals that come crashing together for one night -- in Chinatown. DVD 54 City that never sleeps. (90 min.). Chicago police officer Johnny Kelly falls for a dancer, leaves his wife, and begins a new life by making a deal with a corrupt criminal lawyer. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 6578 Cloak and dagger. (106 min.). Alvah Jesper, an American scientist, parachutes into war-torn Nazi Germany to obtain military secrets. But the deeper he probes, the deadlier his mission becomes - especially when his involvement with a mysterious woman, Gina, catapults him into an intense maelstrom of danger, betrayal, and murder. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 960 Crossfire. (ca. 85 min.). A police captain methodically unravels the truth behind the brutal murder of an innocent Jewish man by a World War II soldier with a rabid hatred of Jews. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1369 D.O.A. (83 min.). "On vacation from his clinging girlfriend, a complacent accountant unknowingly swallows a drink spiked with radioactive poison and then spends the last desperate hours of his life trying to find out who 'killed' him-- and why." --from container. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 930 The dark corner. (ca. 99 min.). Hard-boiled detective Bradford Galt is trying to start over in New York after having served a two year prison sentence in California for manslaughter after being framed by Jardine his ex-partner, a lawyer. Kathleen, his new secretary must help him when Jardine is killed and Galt, the prime suspect, must go on the lam from the police. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5430 The dark mirror. (85 min.). De Havilland plays twin sisters -- one good, one disturbed. The bad twin commits murder; the good twin is the chief suspect with no alibi. Ayres is a psychologist and Mitchell a police detective who must try to discover who the killer really is. VHS 4871 Dark passage. (107 min.). After successful plastic surgery on his face, a man wrongly convicted of murder hides out in an apartment in San Francisco. Tension builds in this tale of a fugitive hiding from the law as he feverishly works to prove his innocence. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5359, HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 4219 Dead reckoning. (ca. 100 min.). An ex-G.I. tries to find out who framed his pal for murder -- and then rubbed him out! While tracking his war buddy's shadowy past, the G.I. becomes involved with the mysterious night club singer who had once been his pal's sweetheart. VHS 6588 Deception. (112 min.). World War II has separated pianist Christine Radcliffe from her great love, cellist Karel Novak. Thinking Karel has been killed in action, she is unexpectedly reunited with him. Now, Christine desperately strives to hide her wartime dalliance as the mistress of a wealthy, sadistic composer. She'll lie to keep her shameful past a secret. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 4946 The desperate hours. (112 min.). Harrowing story about an escaped convict who breaks into a suburban home and takes a family hostage. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 4562 Detour. (68 min.). "Hitchhiking across the country to reunite with his fickle girlfriend, the film's 'hero' encounters two sinister characters -- one of them a venomous, blackmailing woman whom he 'accidentally' murders. Full of wildly surrealistic touches, this seminal feature is one of the blackest and best of the early noirs." --from container. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 931 Double indemnity. (108 min.). Walter Neff is a smooth talking insurance salesman who meets the very attractive Phyllis Dietrichson when he calls to renew her husband's automobile policy. The couple are immediately drawn to each other and have an affair. They scheme together to murder Phyllis' husband for life insurance money with a double indemnity clause. Unfortunately, all does not go as planned. Barton Keyes is the wily insurance investigator who must sort things out. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 51 Du rififi chez les hommes = Rififi. (118 min.). A story of a successful jewel robbery in which the four thieves betray each other. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1219 Ernest Hemingway's the killers. (102 min., 94 min.). Melodramatic thriller based on the Hemingway story about two hit men who become curious about the life and death of the man they were hired to kill. DVD 3064 The falcon takes over. (131 min.). "The Falcon takes over" when Moose Malloy starts asking about his lost love, and anyone with a wrong answer shuts up...permanently. A "Strange bargain" is revealed as a mild-mannered bookkeeper is caught in a web of complications when his boss stages a suicide to look like murder. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 6573 Fallen angel. (97 min.). "June Mills and her sister Clara live a quiet life in a small coastal town until Eric Stanton, a smooth-talking con man, comes into their lives. He seems to fall hard for June, but Clara believes he's interested only in the family fortune. Meanwhile, sultry waitress Stella catches Stanton's fancy and thinks he might be her ticket out of town. The local cop knows more than he's telling about his fellow citizens and their tangled relationships, which draw even tighter after a shocking murder"--Container. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2397 Farewell, my lovely. (97 min.). Private eye Philip Marlowe is hired by an ex-con to find the ex-con's missing sweetheart. In the course of Marlowe's search he is beaten unconscious and wakes up next to a corpse. So Marlowe's tasks are multiplying- find the girl, clear himself of the murder and discover the link between the two. VHS 4030 Film noir. (60 min.). This program explores how the film noir genre, which reached its peak in the 1950s, reflected the pessimism and paranoia that were signs of the times. Explores the peculiar look of film noir - from Double Indemnity and Kiss Me Deadly to Mean Streets and Body Heat - its roots in German Expressionism, and its disturbing sense of corruption and urban decay. VHS 2907 Film noir: Bringing darkness to light. (68 min.). "Clips from noir classics and little-known gems, plus interviews with modern noir aficionados like directors Christopher Nolan and Frank Miller, writers James Ellroy and Brian Helgeland and others shape this multifaceted exploration of the movie style that grew out of the hard realities of post-World War II life"--Container. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2413 Force of evil. (82 min.). A racketeer's lawyer finds that his boss has found a way to bankrupt New York's numbers banks but gets wedged between the numbers racket and a new prosecutor's anti-crime campaign. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1298 Gilda. (110 min.). "Johnny Farrell goes to work for Ballin Mundson, the proprietor of an illegal gambling casino in a South American city and quickly rises to become Mundson's 'main man.' All is well until Mundson returns from a trip with his new bride, Gilda-- a woman from Johnny's past. Mundson, unaware of their previous love affair, assigns Farrell the job of keeping Gilda a faithful wife. Fraught with hatred, Gilda does her best to antagonize, intimidate, and instill jealousy in Farrell-- until circumstances allow him to get even."--Container. DVD 1604 The glass key. (85 min.). Intricate mystery about a slightly corrupt politician, accused of murder, who solicits his right-hand man to hunt down the real killer. Ladd must take on a vicious gang led by Nick Varna, the police and the beguiling advances of his boss's fiancee, socialite Janet Henry. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 4555 The grifters. (114 min.). Three con artists walk on the razor's edge of life. Lilly has decided it's time to get out, and wants her son out, too. But Roy has fallen for sleek Myra, who wants him for her partner. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 207 Gun crazy. (87 min.). Although Bart is not a violent man at heart, he allows the no-good Laurie to lure him into a life of crime. They become the most wanted criminals in America as they blast their way through a series of deadly bank jobs. Eventually the police catch up with them for a final bloody showdown in the wilderness of Madera National Park. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5406, HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 3600 Hangmen also die. (134 min.). Pursued by the Germans after the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, Dr. Svoboda enlists the aid of a young woman who is oblivious to the lethal crosscurrents that surround her in Czechoslovakia. As she learns more about the mysterious doctor, she grows aware of the involvement of her father and fiance in the resistance, and soon finds herself entangled in the revolution's secret operations. DVD 106 He walked by night. (79 min.). An Los Angeles Police Department sergeant (Brady) follows the trail of a devious, clever and psychopathic burglar who has killed a cop. Film is done in semi-documentary style and marks the moment in cinema history when crimefighting became more a matter of forensic science than daring gunplay. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 80 Henri-Georges Clouzot's Diabolique. (116 min.). The story of a sadistic headmaster who brutalizes his fragile wife and his headstrong mistress. The two women murder him and dump his body in a swimming pool; when the pool is drained, no corpse is found. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 4673 High Sierra. (101 min.). Set against the captivating background of California's High Sierra Mountains, the story begins when convicted killer Roy Earle (Bogart in a performance that made him a a star) is sprung from jail by mobster "Big Mac" (MacBride), who wants Earle to assist in a California hotel hold-up. As a favor to his old friend, he agrees to pull one more job and then settle down to a normal life. When things go wrong Earle finds himself trapped 11,000 feet up in the High Sierras shouting defiance at an army of coppers below. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 4948 His kind of woman. (120 min.). Hard-luck gambler Dan Milner is in sudden luck. He'll get $50,000 to hang out at a posh Mexican resort. $5,000 now and the big payoff when the reason he's been sent there is revealed. Of course, the gangsters making the offer don't expect him to live long enough to collect. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2409 The hitch-hiker. (72 min.). Classic film noir that concerns two middle-class American family men (Edmond O'Brien and Frank Lovejoy) on vacation in Mexico on a long-awaited fishing trip. Suddenly their car and their very lives are commandeered by a psychopathic serial killer who would not hesitate to shoot them down in cold blood. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5544, VHS 4879 House by the river. (88 min.). A second-rate writer strangles his maid when she rejects him and frames his brother for the crime, after they dispose of the body. VHS 3658 House of games. (101 min.). A woman psychiatrist, trying to help a patient whose life has been threatened, is drawn into the dangerous but provocative underworld of a smooth-talking con man. DVD 1575 House of strangers. (ca. 100 min.). Max Monetti is consumed with vengeance for his brothers after their betrayal lands him in prison for seven years. When he learns that it was his father who created all the heartache within the family, he makes peace with his brothers. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2398 The house on 92nd street. (89 min.). When a young German American is solicited as a Nazi spy during WWII, he accepts the job after agreeing to go undercover for the FBI. Once he learns that his mission is to send atomic bomb secrets to the German government, the FBI chief works relentlessly to prevent this while not giving his agent's identity away. VHS 3827 I wake up screaming. (82 min.). Crime thriller of a cafe society celebrity who is murdered. Sports promoter Frankie Christopher is accused, while the dead woman's sister falls in love with him. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 6580 In a lonely place. (94 min.). A hotheaded, hard-drinking Hollywood screenwriter with a macabre sense of humor is questioned for the murder of a hat-check girl. He is drawn to his neighbor when she confirms his alibi but his volatile nature eventually threatens to destroy their one last chance for real love. VHS 4587 Johnny Guitar. (116 min.). When the railroad finally comes to a frontier boomtown, two power-hungry women fight to control the town and everyone in it. An enterprising business woman not only controls the nearby profitable gambling, she's also been buying up enough property to make her the most powerful person in town. Her arch rival sets out to stop her and force her out of town. The arrival of Johnny Guitar delays, but cannot prevent, a violent showdown between the women. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5268 Journey into fear. (69 min.). Howard Graham is an American naval engineer trying to return to the States with his wife. But the Nazi agents trailing him have a detour in mind -- murder! Stalked like a wild animal, Graham has only a passenger list of mysterious characters to turn to for help. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 6207 Kansas City confidential. (ca. 98 min.). John Payne gives a hard hitting performance as a man bent on finding the gang that unwittingly framed him for a robbery. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 6783 Key Largo. (101 min.). A disillusioned returning World War II veteran has lost the will to fight ... until he arrives at a rundown hotel in Key Largo. There a mobster holes up against a raging storm, holding the veteran, the hotel owner and the owner's widowed daughter-in-law at gunpoint. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 4679 Killer bait. (ca. 100 min.). "A couple interrupts their bickering to find a bag of money in the back seat of their car. The husband wants to turn the apparently illicit cash into the authorities, but his money-hungry wife has a different idea-- and she'll do anything to realize it." --from container. DVD 930-935 Killer's kiss. (67 min.). A boxer in New York protects a nightclub dancer, not knowing that her boss is a gangster. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 3275 The killers. (103 min.). Two professional killers invade a small town and kill a gas station attendant, who was expecting them. An insurance investigator pursues the case against the orders of his boss, who considers it trivial. Weaving together threads of the slain gas station attendant's life, the investigator uncovers a complex tale of treachery and crime, all linked with a gorgeous and mysterious woman. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5241 The killing. (89 min.). Using a darting camera style that creates the feeling that he is stalking his cast, Kubrick lays bare the inner workings of a bold racetrack robbery engineered by a group of small-time crooks. It's the almost perfect crime. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 4672 The killing of a Chinese bookie. (243 min.). A film noir about a gentleman's club owner finds himself on the bad side of a small time gangster, and then must save his beloved club and way of life. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1343 Kiss me deadly. (106 min.). A detective gives a ride to a half-naked girl, who is abruptly killed by thugs. Almost killed himself, the detective tries to solve the murder. Along the way, he is told to back off by the Feds, a bomb is placed in his car, a friend is killed, and he himself is beaten, drugged, and held hostage. DVD 1058 Kiss of death. (99 min.). A crime melodrama that set a new standard for realism in Hollywood. Nick Bianco, is a two-bit crook who is trying to go straight. He has a wife and two daughters but nobody hires ex-cons. Nick cooperates with the assistant D.A. Louie DeAngelo to save his family. DeAngelo wants Nick to squeal on up-and-coming hood Tommy Udo, but that could be very unhealthy -- for Nick and his two young daughters. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5343, HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 3814 Knock on any door. (ca. 100 min.). A young hoodlum from the slums is tried for murdering a cop. He is defended by a prominent attorney who has known him from childhood. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 6579 L.A. confidential. (138 min.). Three detectives in the corrupt and brutal L.A. police force of the 1950s use differing methods to uncover a conspiracy behind the shotgun slaying of the patrons at an all-night diner in this lush tribute to tough film noir crime films. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 3 The lady from Shanghai. (87 min.). A seaman becomes involved in the murderous intrigue of a crippled lawyer and his homicidal, frustrated wife. Culminates in a shoot-up in a hall of mirrors. DVD 1713 Lady in the lake. (103 min.). Experiment by director/actor Robert Montgomery (Philip Marlow) who uses a "subjective camera" in which the eye of the camera substitutes for Marlow's first person narrative - thereby allowing the viewer to experience the action directly. Philip Marlow is hired to search for a publisher's missing wife. When a different woman's corpse turns up in a mountain lake, the waters get deeper with plots and cross plots, troublesome cops and L.A. lowlifes. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2410 Laura. (85 min.). The detective assigned to the murder case of a beautiful young woman named Laura is stirred by her portrait and adoring descriptions by her admirers, and finds he, too, is strangely under her spell. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1239 Leave her to heaven. (ca. 110 min.). An extremely possessive woman will do whatever it takes to keep her husband all to herself, even murder. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2399 The letter. (ca. 95 min.). A rubber plantation owner's wife kills a man in what seems to have been self-defense but a letter from her proves it to have been a crime of passion, and becomes an instrument of blackmail. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1820 The long night. (97 min.). Joe Adams, a factory worker pinned inside his third-floor apartment after gunning down a mysterious gentleman, reconstructs the events leading up to the shooting through an intricate series of flashbacks. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 108 The lost weekend. (100 min.). An uncompromising film look at the devastating effects of alcoholism. Would-be writer Don's dissatisfaction with his life leads him on a three-day binge. To hide his bottles, he uses various strategies to evade the watchful eye of his brother, Wick, and his sweetheart, Helen. They must follow his debauch through a series of episodes which includes his importunities of a bartender, begging for drinks; a horribly humiliating encounter when he is caught stealing money from a woman's purse; a racking walk along New York's Third Avenue, trying to pawn a typewriter for some cash; and a staggeringly ugly experience in the Bellevue alcoholic ward where he goes through a bout of delirium tremens. VHS 3154 The Maltese falcon. (100 min.). After the death of his partner, private eye Sam Spade is dragged into a quest for a priceless statuette. DVD 130 Man of the west. (99 min.). When the train he is on gets robbed, Link Jones finds himself unwillingly reunited with his old gang. Dock Tobin, the gang's sadistic, half-crazed patriarch, was like a father to Link some twenty years past and welcomes him back. To survive, Link must take up his old ways--his killing ways. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 4584 The man who wasn't there. (116 min.). In a sleepy Northern California town in the 1940s, Ed Crane, a humble barber, suspects that his wife Doris is having an affair with her boss. When a stranger comes into town hinting that there is a fortune to be made in investing in the new invention of dry cleaning, Ed hatches a blackmail scheme he hopes will make him rich and get him some revenge at the same time. His plan goes horribly awry when he accidentally commits a murder for which Doris is blamed, landing her in jail, and Ed at the mercy of big-city lawyer Freddy Riedenschneider. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 365 The mask of Dimitrios. (ca. 96 min.). When the body of Dimitrios Makropoulos washes up ashore in Istanbul, there is cause for celebration all across Europe. The devious sociopath has left as his legacy an array of crimes including blackmail, thievery, murder and high treason. On vacation in Istanbul, a Dutch mystery writer (Lorre) becomes interested in chronicling Dimitrios' unscrupulous exploits and, aided by a mysterious man named Peters (Greenstreet), takes up a trail that leads them across Europe. Things perhaps are not what they seem. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 4770 Mildred Pierce. (ca. 111 min.). Mildred Pierce is a woman who will do anything to satisfy the demands of her spoiled daughter Veda, including divorce, opening her own business, and possibly murder. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2187 Ministry of fear. (87 min.). A man is released into World War II England after 2 years in an asylum where he was confined after the mercy killing of his wife, but the outside world does not seem so sane either. On his way back to London to rejoin civilization, he buys a cake at a charity bazaar and stumbles across a murderous Nazi spy ring who want the cake - and the British invasion plans in it. His life is threatened and so is his sanity, as a bizarre psychological chase follows. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5226 Mr. Arkadin. (100 min.). Set in Spain, film tells the story of Gregory Arkadin, a reclusive billionaire who, faking a case of amnesia, hires Guy Van Stratten, a young adventurer and con man, to research his life and compile a confidential report with special emphasis on how he achieved his power and wealth. As the inquiries begin unraveling Arkadin's sordid history, the young man realizes he's being used to keep the truth from Arkadin's daughter and (as those that he has talked to are killed) that his own life is in danger. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5451 Murder my sweet. (95 min.). The story of a private detective who gets drawn into a complex web of murder, blackmail, and double-dealing while searching for a missing jade necklace. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5352, HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 4031 The naked city. (96 min.). A squad of homicide detectives roam through the seamier parts of New York City as they solve a murder case. The movie gives viewers an unvarnished look at life in the city using the technique neorealism. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5285 The naked spur. (93 min.). Having lost both his ranch and his unfaithful fiancee, Howard King is determined to track down a vicious criminal in an attempt to start a new life with the bounty money he'll collect. When he finally catches up with his prey - and with the outlaw's female companion - he faces an even more perilous trip back with his prisoner. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5486 Niagara. (88 min.). Although the quaint motel overlooking the famed falls seems like the perfect honeymoon retreat, in fact, it's where the young and beautiful Rose Loomis plans to kill her husband George. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2400 Night and the city. (96 min.). Two-bit hustler Harry Fabian aches for a life of ease and plenty. Trailed by an inglorious history of go-nowhere schemes, he stumbles upon a chance of a lifetime in the form of legendary wrestler Gregorius the Great. But there is no easy money in this underworld of shifting alliances, bottomless graft, and pummeled flesh, and soon Fabian learns the horrible price of his ambition. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1222 Nightmare alley. (111 min.). Stanton Carlisle is an ambitious carnie who plays scams alongside phony mentalist Zeena and her alcoholic husband Pete, working the crowd as Zeena pretends to read their minds. But Stan has no intention of staying with the carnival; he has his heart set on an upscale night club act. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 3128 Notorious. (101 min.). Tale of espionage and romance set in Brazil during World War II. The daughter of a convicted Nazi traitor becomes an American undercover agent in Rio de Janeiro. The woman marries a Nazi renegade to help the U.S. government, but finds herself falling in love with her contact. DVD 338 Odd man out. (111 min.). An IRA gunman, wounded and on the run in Belfast, is helped and hindered by a variety of people. VHS 800 Odds against tomorrow. (ca. 96 min.). Tale of robbery gone awry. One hundred and fifty thousand dollars, ready for the taking. It's too much to resist for Earl Slater, a bigoted ex-con slumming through life with a patronizing girlfriend, an obliging neighbor and zero expectations. He agrees to be part of a bank job planned by former cop Burke. Until, that is, he finds out one of his partners will be Johnny Ingram, a black gambler. Earl's desperate need for cash, however, leads him to reconsider. For the job only, he'll put his racism aside - until moments away from the score, hatred erupts. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 4862 On dangerous ground. (82 min.). City cop goes to the countryside to help solve a brutal murder and falls in love with a blind woman whose brother is a suspect. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2411 Ossessione. (135 min.). The story of the ill-fated love between Gino, a virile young drifter, who arrives by chance at a roadside restaurant and filling station, and Giovanna, the beautiful young wife of the fat old man who owns the place. Gino leaves, only to return because he can't get her out of his blood. They kill her husband but his death haunts the guilt-ridden Gino. DVD 1243 Out of the past. (97 min.). Suspenseful tale of double-crosses, deceit and murder. Jeff, a former private detective, is hired by a gangster to find his former girlfriend, whom he still loves despite the fact that she took $40,000.00 from him and disappeared. Jeff not only finds the girl but falls in love with her as well. This makes the gangster very jealous and annoyed. During the investigation and the unexpected love affair, several murders occur that ultimately lead to the death of Jeff and the girl. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2403 The ox-bow incident. (75 min.). An angry mob kills a man after a popular rancher is murdered. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5194 Panic in the streets. (96 min.). One night in the New Orleans slums, vicious hoodlum Blackie and his friends kill an illegal immigrant who won too much in a card game. When Dr. Reed confirms the dead man had pneumonic plague he must find and inoculate the killers. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5075 Phantom lady. (87 min.). An unhappily married man spends the evening on a no-names basis with a woman he picks up at a bar. He later returns home to find his wife strangled and the police waiting. Every effort to establish his alibi fails; oddly, no one seems to remember seeing the phantom lady. In prison, the man gives up hope, but his secretary who is secretly in love with him doggedly follows clues. Will she be able to clear her employer in time as she deals with a bartender killed in a street fight, a jazz drummer strangled as he's revealing information, an insane woman and the psychopathic friend of her boss. VHS 5242 Pickup on South Street. (87 min.). Espionage thriller that captures the reality of life on Skid Row and combines suspense with a story of love and loyalty. A pickpocket steals the wallet of a street-smart woman who is carrying secret microfilm for a group of Communist spies. When he is identified by a police informer as the thief, he becomes the target of the Communists and the girl as well as the police. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5355 Possessed. (ca. 1 hr., 48 min.). A solitary, emotionally unstable private nurse obsessively attempts to regain the love of a callous bachelor, which ultimately drives her into madness--and murder. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 6785 The postman always rings twice. (113 min.). Steamy tale of a drifter offered a job at a roadside diner by the owner, an easy-going older man. When the drifter and the owner's voluptuous wife fall in love, they plot to kill her husband and run away together. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5388 Postmark for danger. (77 min.). When a journalist and his girlfriend get into a suspicious car accident, he is killed, but she returns to get the killers. VHS 6583 Pulp fiction. (154 min.). Clever, dark film that tells 4 separate stories that are gradually brought together. Involved are two low-rent hit men, their boss and his sexy wife, a prizefighter and a pair of desperate robbers. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1244 Pursued. (105 min.). A complex tale of family feuds, murder and vengeance in the Old West. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1373 Quai des orfèvres. (106 min.). Set within the vibrant dancehalls and historic crime corridors of 1940s Paris, a singer with "stars in her eyes" ignores the protest of her covetous husband and pursues a meeting with a lecherous movie financier. When her husband attempts to crash the rendezvous, murder ensues. Enter the detective, whose seasoned instincts lead him down a circuitous path of alibis. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 598 The racket. (89 min.). A straight-arrow cop and an old-school gangster find a common foe: big shots who run crime like a corporation. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2412 Railroaded. (74 min.). Mickey Ferguson, a detective, attempts to clear his girlfriend's brother of a murder rap and find the real killer Duke Martin who dips his bullets in perfume before using them. In the process Ferguson uncovers the hidden workings of the city's seedy underworld. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5243 Rancho notorious. (89 min.). An off-beat Western. Once an untroubled cowpoke content with his rugged, though peaceful existence, Vern Haskel becomes a ruthless manhunter when he discovers the body of his bride-to-be raped and murdered by a band of outlaws. He finally traces the leader of the band to the notorious "Chuck-a-Luck" - a combination horse ranch and criminal hideout overseen by saloon chanteuse Altar (Dietrich). But his revenge is complicated when he falls in love with Altar who is also loved by the man he seeks to kill. Meanwhile the bad guys are planning a big bank holdup. VHS 4413 Raw deal. (79 min.). Trapped within the walls of a state penitentiary, Joe Sullivan lives for the chance to avenge himself upon the man who helped put him there: Rick Coyle, a pyromaniac mob boss with a taste for party-girl flambé. Rick helps spring Joe from prison in hopes that the police will gun him down during the escape, but he grossly underestimates Joe's resourcefulness. With the assistance of a world-weary moll and an innocent girl, Joe dodges roadblocks, hitmen and dragnets and carves a bloody path back to his betrayer. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 80 Rebecca. (130 min.). A young bride is brought by her new husband to his manor house in England. There she finds that the memory of her husband's first wife haunts her, and she tries to discover the secret of that mysterious woman's death. DVD 345 The red house. (ca. 100 min.). A farmer tries to keep the curious away and protect the secret of the sinister decaying old house deep in the woods. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2405 Road house. (95 min.). Ida Lupino plays a sexy singer trying to make a quick buck as the star "attraction" at a roadside cocktail lounge and bowling alley. Richard Widmark plays a psychotic rich kid who wants to marry her. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 6581 Scarlet Street. (103 min.). "Homely, henpecked Chris Cross leads an honorable, if tedious, middle-class life until he falls madly in love with beautiful Kitty. Blind to the woman's selfishness and deceit, he steals money to finance her lazy lifestyle-- and soon begins plotting his hateful wife's demise." --from container. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 933 Secret beyond the door. (ca. 99 min.). Celia, a wealthy heiress married to a man she met on vacation, travels to his New England mansion where she meets his domineering older sister and his son from a previous marriage. Celia learns that Mark collects rooms where murders have been committed and adds them to his mansion. As more bizarre facts are revealed, Celia is determined to stay and find the cause of her husband's strange fascination with murder, even though she must risk her own life to do so. VHS 3895 The set-up. (72 min.). An over-the-hill boxer thinks he can still win a bout, despite doubts from his wife and his manager. He goes into his next fight determined to beat his opponent, not realizing his manager has taken money for a 'dive' from a tough gambler. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2406 Shadow of a doubt. (108 min.). Understated thriller about Uncle Charlie a beguiling murderer who travels from Philadelphia to California just one step ahead of the law. Once there he charms his unsuspecting family until Charlie (his niece and namesake) begins to suspect her uncle is hiding some terrible secret. DVD 1783 The Shanghai gesture. (97 min.). A melodrama of decadence and sexual guilt that uses Oriental motifs as a cypher for all that is unknown and unknowable. English businessman Sir Guy Charteris tries to shut down a gambling establishment owned by Mother Gin Sling. Unfortunately, Charteris' daughter is one of Mother's most frequent (and indebted) customers. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 4875 Shock corridor. (101 min.). Fuller depicts schizophrenics and nymphomaniacs, stripteases and shock treatments with an eye for harsh realism and bizarre surrealism in this story of Johnny Barratt, a reporter obsessed with winning the Pulitzer Prize, who goes undercover in an insane asylum to solve a grisly murder mystery. He may lose his stripper girlfriend - not to mention his sanity - but Barratt is determined to get the story. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5484 The snake pit. (108 min.). A woman finds herself in a state mental institution and must spend several months under the care of her compassionate doctor before she can face the troubling secrets of her past and be cured. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 6039 Alfred Hitchcock's spellbound. (111 min.). When John Ballantine, the new director of an elite mental institution, turns out to be an imposter, an amnesiac and - just possibly - the murderer of the real director, a psychiatrist who has fallen in love with him sets out to discover his identity. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5198 The steel helmet. (84 min.). Despite its relatively low budget, this portrait of Korean War soldiers grappling with moral and racial issues while trying to stay alive remains one of the director's most gripping, realistic, reflections of Fuller's social conscience. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 3457 The strange affair of Uncle Harry. (ca. 80 min.). Suspense film about Harry Quincey, a young man who lives with his two sisters, Lettie and Hester. When Lettie interferes with his romance with a co-worker, he tries to poison Lettie but kills Hester by mistake. Lettie is blamed for Hester's death and Harry decides he has committed the perfect crime. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 4878 Strange illusion. (ca. 80 min.). B-movie update of Hamlet. A son is haunted by dreams of the mysterious death of his father and his widowed mother being wooed by a fast-talking schemer - dreams which he fears foreshadow future events. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5411 Strange impersonation. (68 min.). Nora Goodrich is a scientist working on an anesthesiology project. Her lab partner sabotages an experiment leaving Nora's face badly scarred. After her face is surgically altered, she plots revenge on her enemies. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 107 The strange love of Martha Ivers. (116 min.). Streetwise gambler Sam Materson returns to his hometown. His old girlfriend Martha believes he is planning to blackmail her over the suspicious death of her aunt, which he witnessed years earlier. Martha is now married to the local district attorney and tries to threaten, connive and seduce Sam in an effort to discover just what he does know. Meanwhile Sam tries to intervene to help Toni Marachek, a young woman who was unjustly imprisoned and is now on parole. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5244 The Stranger. (94 min.). "Directing his first noir, the brilliant Orson Welles creates a tense, highly atmospheric thriller about a monstrous Nazi official hiding out as an American professor at a New England college. A mysterious war crimes detective comes to town determined to expose him-- even if it means sacrificing the life of the Nazi's innocent wife." --from container. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 932 Strangers on a train. (204 min.). A tennis star, Guy Haines, who hates his wife is approached on a train by a stranger, Bruno Anthony, who hates his father. Anthony offers a plan: each could kill the other's victim. No motive, no clue would link the two murders save the casual meeting of strangers on a train. Haines doesn't take the plan seriously, however, until his wife is suddenly murdered, and Anthony appears to demand that Haines keep his part of the bargain. The British version amplifies Bruno's flamboyance, his homoerotic attraction to Guy, and his psychotic personality. DVD 339 Sudden fear. (110 min.). A wealthy lady playwright marries a worthless actor who plans to kill her. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2404 Suspicion. (99 min.). Alfred Hitchcock weaves a terrifying web of suspicion around a fragile young English bride and captures a classic suspense thriller. Joan Fontaine is the bride, a gently-reared heiress who fears she has married a murderer. Cary Grant is the husband, a dashing ne'er-do-well with a penchant for the high life--and a bank account that's strictly low-life. DVD 3524 Sweet smell of success. (96 min.). "A powerful film about a ruthless journalist and an unscrupulous press agent who'll do anthing to achieve success"--Container. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1296 Swoon. (95 min.). A film noir "thriller" that presents the true case of Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, brilliant young men from good Jewish families, who were convicted for murdering a 13-year-old boy. VHS 3438 T-men. (92 min.). Two treasury agents infiltrate the ranks of a notorious counterfeiting ring known as the Vantucci Gang. Delving into a labyrinth of betrayal, sacrifice and the occasional pummeling, the agents watch as their civilian happiness ebbs away and they fall victim to the elaborate disguises they have constructed for their own protection. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 80 They drive by night. (94 min.). Paul Fabrini and his brother Joe are wildcat drivers--men who buy their trucks on installment plans and then worry that loan sharks will repossess their trucks. As they drive their truck over rough California roads, night after night, their rough life gets even tougher when they get involved with murder and the mob. VHS 3837 They live by night. (95 min.). In the 1930s Bowie, a young fugitive from the law, sinks deeper into a life of crime thanks to his association with two hardened criminals. He and two companions have fled a Mississippi prison. He marries a farm girl and tries to change his lifestyle but his former partners draw him back in and toward a tragic ending. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5381, HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 3003 Thieves' highway. (94 min.). Ex-G.I. Nick Garcos is a tyro trucker bent on satisfaction from the man responsible for crippling his father, a ruthless market operator by the name of Mike Figlia. Along the way, he is seduced by the siren Rica and drawn into the San Francisco produce racket, landing him in a web of treachery and heartbreak. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1110 The third man. (104 min.). Pulp novelist Holly Martins travels to shadowy, postwar Vienna, only to find himself investigating the mysterious death of an old friend, black-market opportunist Harry Lime-- and thus begins this legendary tale of love, deception, and murder. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 48 This gun for hire. (ca. 80 min.). The hard-edged story of love, power, and betrayal set in the seamy underworld of the 1940's. Ladd portrays a cold-blooded professional killer who's been double-crossed by his client. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5344 Tight spot. (97 min.). Wise-cracking Sherry Conley is moved by U.S. Attorney Hallet and Detective Lieutenant Striker from prison to a swanky hotel suite. They try to persuade her to testify against mobster Benny Costain. Sherry first refuses to testify but changes her mind when a bullet intended for her kills a prison matron. Striker is shot when the mobster makes his last desperate effort to silence the girl. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5407 To have and have not. (100 min.). An American charter boat captain in Martinique gets involved with a young female drifter and some French freedom fighters who are trying to elude local Nazi collaborators. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 1440 Touch of evil. (111 min.). An elaborate mystery involving a corrupt police official in a squalid town on the Mexican border and a murder that ensnares a narcotics agent and his wife. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 163 Try and get me! (91 min.). Based on a true event, the 1933 lynching of two accused kidnappers in San Diego, California. Two men kidnap the son of wealthy parents in hopes of a huge ransom but are arrested after they kill him. A local journalist stirs up the town with his stories - and then watches in horror as the citizens take the law into their own hands. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5063 Vertigo. (128 min.). Scottie Ferguson, a San Francisco police detective, is forced to retire when a freak accident leaves him with a severe fear of heights. He becomes a private detective and is hired by a rich shipbuilder to follow his wife Madeleine who is behaving suspiciously and might be planning suicide. Ferguson falls in love with her but she plunges to her death from a tall bell tower with Ferguson unable to take any action. Then he spots another woman who looks like Madeleine and he becomes obsessed in his desire to re-create her in another woman. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 14 Where the sidewalk ends. (ca. 94 min.). Cop Mark Dixon is in hot water with his bosses because of his rough style and tactics. He accidentally kills a murder suspect and tries to frame a known racketeer that he despises for the crime. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2396 Whirlpool. (97 min.). "A young wife is caught in a spiral of deceit, blackmail and murder. Terrified that her psychiatrist husband will learn of her frailty, Ann Sutton attempts to cure herself with the help of hypnotist David Korvo. However, Ann finds herself plunging deeper and deeper into a psychological abyss as Korvo, with a diabolical plan of his own, manipulates her subconscious mind."--Container. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 2395 White heat. (115 min.). Cody Jarrett is a psychopathic gangster and a ruthless killer who is anything but rational with his fierce headaches and strong mother-fixation. A train robber, he is jailed on a lesser charge. An undercover treasury agent is put in his cell to gain his confidence. A daring escape is planned and the world of Cody Jarrett begins to explode. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5340, HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 3289 The window. (64 min.). If you are ten-years-old and noted for your vivid imagination, you might not be able to convince your parents that you actually witnessed a murder. VHS 3778 The woman in the window. (ca. 99 min.). Edward G. Robinson is the pawn in a shocking crime thriller with a surprising twist in the tale. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 5356, HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 3877 The wrong man. (105 min.). An innocent man is arrested, jailed, and brought to trial for serious crimes committed by someone else who looks very much like him. As he struggles to prove his innocence, his life collapses around him. VHS 3170 The wrong man. (104 min.). The first Hitchcock film based on a true story. A nightclub musician is falsely accused of a robbery, an accusation that ruins his life. DVD 3530 Yoidore tenshi = Drunken angel. (98 min.). This film is regarded as Kurosawa's first significant work and is a about a Yakuza who visits the clinic of a grog-sodden doctor one evening to have a gunshot wound attended to. While removing the slug, the surgeon diagnoses TB in his patient. Only a change of lifestyle will improve his prognosis, he tells the gangster. A yakuza mobster suffering from tuberculosis enters into an unusual relationship with an alcoholic doctor. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 4524 You and me. (94 min.). A romantic crime story, laced with comedy and social commentary, that projects the message that "crime doesn't pay." A group of ex-cons are working in a department store whose owner believes in rehabilitation. Two of them, Helen and Joe fall in love and marry. However, Helen's failure to tell Joe she too has served time causes him to leave her when he finds out. He rejoins the mob and pressures a group of the store's parolees to rob it. Helen must set him straight. HOME USE COLLECTION VHS 5494 You only live once. (86 min.). An ill-fated young couple are separated when he is put in prison for a crime he didn't commit. HOME USE COLLECTION DVD 746
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