The Dark Page

Taking its title from acclaimed book by Kevin Johnson, The Dark Page reviews the literary background of film noir and the influence of key writers such as Raymond Chandler but also the impact of black authors such as Walter Moseley and female writers, in a traditionally male domain, including Patricia Highsmith and Dorothy B. Hughes.

In this season

Film review: Hitchcocking the Train to Highsmith-ville

Ally Davies reviews Strangers on a Train screening as part of our The Dark Page film season.

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Film Review: The Long Goodbye: A Marlowe for the 70’s

Andy Willis, Professor of Film Studies, School of Arts and Media, University of Salford reviews The Long Goodbye. 

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Film Review: Devil in a Blue Dress

Moggie Hoffgen, freelance film educator and programmer reviews Devil in Blue Dress.

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Previously in this season

Jackie Brown

Elmore Leonard is undoubtedly one of the finest and most prolific of contemporary pulp writers and his novel Rum Punch is given a surprisingly mature…

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Strangers on a Train

In a world of shadows, Patricia Highsmith looms large in terms of crime writing and exploring the dark and twisted underbelly of the human psyche.…

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Rear Window

One of cinema’s finest observations of the act of looking, this is perhaps the best-known adaptation of a work by prolific, somewhat underrated New York…

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Shoot the Pianist

Based upon a novel by Noir fave David Goodis, it’s the shadowy tale of a lonely pianist with a dark past that he can’t manage…

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Devil in a Blue Dress

An atmospheric, neo-noir adaptationof Walter Mosley's seminal novel about black private eye Easy Rawlins' uneasy adventures in the (even more) segregated L.A. of the 1950s.

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The Long Goodbye

Robert Altman adapts Raymond Chandler's novel and updates it to a contemporary setting.

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The Killing

Kubrick’s account of an ambitious racetrack robbery is one of Hollywood’s tautest, twistiest noirs.

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Mildred Pierce

Michael Curtiz blends film noir and melodrama in this passionate story of a self-sacrificing mother who would do anything to provide a good life for…

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The Friends of Eddie Coyle

In one of the best performances of his career, Robert Mitchum plays small-time gunrunner Eddie “Fingers” Coyle in an adaptation by Peter Yates of George…

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