They Made Me A Criminal (1939)

John Garfield stars as Johnnie, a boxer who goes on the run wrongly believing he killed a man while drunk. Presumed dead, Johnnie hides out at Grandma Rafferty's (May Robson) work farm for wayward boys (played by the Dead End Kids) where he steps back into the ring in order to help the kids raise money. But the crafty Detective Whelan (Claude Rains) is sure Johnnie is alive and is determined to bring him in. Gloria Dickson and Ann Sheridan co-star. 92 min. BW/Rtg: NR

Scarlet Street (1945)

Edward G. Robinson and Joan Bennett star in director Fritz Lang's compelling drama concerning a meek, unhappily married bank cashier who is befriended by a greedy, manipulative woman and her predatory lover and lured by them into embezzlement. With Dan Duryea, Margaret Lindsay. 102 min. BW/Rtg: NR

Shock (1946)

Riveting thriller stars Vincent Price as sinister psychologist Dr. Richard Cross, who murders his wife. After discovering that one of his female patients observed the crime, Cross convinces her spouse that she is going crazy and should be institutionalized at the facility where he works. But when the woman is put away, will the bad doc's secret stay locked up inside her head? With Lynn Bari, Anabel Shaw. 70 min. BW/Rtg: NR

The Stranger (1946)

Suspenseful cat-and-mouse thriller features director/star Orson Welles as an escaped Nazi war criminal living as a teacher in a small Connecticut college town, with Edward G. Robinson as a federal agent tracking him down. The final chase scene in an old clock tower is a classic. With Loretta Young, Richard Long, Philip Merivale. 95 min. BW/Rtg: NR

Impact (1949)

A wealthy industrialist (Brian Donlevy) becomes the target of a murder plot hatched by his two-timing wife (Helen Walker) and her lover (Tony Barrett). Presumed dead after the plan goes wrong and Barrett is killed instead, Donlevy adopts a new identity in a small Idaho town, falling in love with a beautiful woman (Ella Raines) before returning home where he finds himself accused of murder. Charles Coburn, Anna May Wong also star in this overlooked thriller. 111 min. BW/Rtg: NR

Port Of New York (1949)

Gritty, expertly realized noir from director Laslo Benedek ("The Wild One") featuring Yul Brynner, with a full head of hair, playing the dangerous leader of a ring of drug runners. Scott Brady and Richard Rober are the customs agents out to topple the syndicate. With K.T. Stevens and Neville Brand. 72 min. BW/Rtg: NR

Whirlpool (1949)

Director Otto Preminger's mix of psychological suspense and film noir atmosphere stars Gene Tierney as a compulsive kleptomaniac married to noted psychoanalyst Richard Conte. Caught stealing a brooch from a department store, Tierney is freed thanks to the efforts of hypnotist Jose Ferrer, who says he can cure her of her condition...but is actually scheming to use Tierney in a bizarre murder scheme. 97 min. BW/Rtg: NR

D.O.A. (1950)

A masterpiece of low-budget "noir" cinema, with Edmond O'Brien as a businessman vacationing in San Francisco who learns he has been poisoned with a "luminous toxin" and has mere days to live. A desperate search for his own killer follows. Luther Adler, Neville Brand, Pamela Britton also star in director Rudolph Mate's classic thriller; score by Dimitri Tiomkin. 83 min. BW/Rtg: NR

Quicksand (1950)

Mickey Rooney stars as a young man who commits a minor criminal act that slowly, inexorably draws him into a quagmire of crime and self-destruction. Grim human drama co-stars Peter Lorre, Jeanne Cagney. 79 min. BW/Rtg: NR

Beat The Devil (1953)

Offbeat is the only way to describe this John Huston/Truman Capote collaboration--the script's unusual qualities perhaps due partly to the fact it was being written even as the film was being shot--about a ragtag group of con men out to swindle each other while on a Mediterranean cruise. Humphrey Bogart (who helped finance the film) and Gina Lollobrigida play a married couple whose adulterous urges figure into the complex, loosey-goosey plot. Jennifer Jones, Robert Morley, and Peter Lorre co-star. 89 min. BW/Rtg: NR