The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)

Film noir often ends feeling inconsequential - why did anyone need to know that grubby little crime story? - but this 1946 classic, featuring the debut film performance of Kirk Douglas and another perfectly-cast sneering, icy performance from Barbara Stanwyck in the title role, in a story of guilt, fear, shame, and love spanning decades, is not just cynical and dark but elicits strong interest in the fates of a trio of kids, two of whom harbor a murderous secret.

★★★★☆

CINECAL: ONE SENTENCE REVIEWS

Witness To Murder (1954)

Rather optimistically compared to Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window, this noir has Barbara Stanwyck playing a woman who witnesses a murder in the apartment across from hers and although we are supposed to be thrilled as she contends with the killer, an ex-Nazi and wily gaslighter, he proves not nearly as diabolical as Gary Merrill's infuriatingly defeatist detective.

★★★☆☆

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Double Indemnity (1944)

Like a blonde bombshell in stilettoes, this hardboiled classic grabs your attention with everyone in it talking smart and fast, see, including Fred MacMurray's insurance salesman whose double indemnity insurance scam and murder plot threatens to become unstuck. 

★★★★☆

CINECAL: ONE SENTENCE REVIEW