Barber Aims to Be a Dry Cleaner, Blackmail, Murder and Suicide Result

Frances McDormand, Billy Bob Thornton, "The Man Who Wasn't There" (2001).

 Why Did an Acclaimed

Coen Brothers Noir

Tank at the Box Office?

Contains Spoilers

By Paul Parcellin

‘The Man Who Wasn’t There’ (2001)

Ed Crane (Billy Bob Thornton) is the kind of guy who can enter or leave a roomful of people without a single soul taking notice. He’s got a knack for blending into the background, barely leaving an impression with anyone who cares to chat or even glance in his direction. Potted plants make a bigger splash at a party than Ed.

On-screen, he utters few words, but in the film’s voice-over narration, which Ed delivers with a laconic edge of existential dread, he’s a blabbermouth, relatively speaking. His patter fills in the story’s blank spots as he offers wisps of gossip and terse assessments of the people in his life. In Billy Bob Thornton’s wonderfully restrained performance, Ed smokes and listens while others do the talking. 

It’s an intriguing if odd setup for a noir, for sure. Still, “The Man Who Wasn’t There” had a lot going for it, yet, audiences didn’t warm up to the film and the reasons for that are buried in the details. (More about that later).  

Ed cuts hair in his brother-in-law, Frank Raffo’s (Michael Badalucco) barbershop and barely pays attention as Frank yammers on incessantly about Canadian fur trappers, Russian A-bombs and the like. That Ed is chained to a motormouth of Frank’s intensity is a textbook example of what hell on earth might be like. It’s the core of the film’s darkly humorous undercurrent, where the line between comedy and tragedy is as thin as a straight razor’s honed edge.

Ed’s wife, Doris (Frances McDormand), has a drinking problem and is having an affair with her blowhard boss, Big Dave Brewster (James Gandolfini), who runs a local department store where Doris keeps the books. 

Ed and Doris live in a modest suburban bungalow in Santa Rosa, Calif., and in the voice-over he sums up his domestic life without a trace of enthusiasm: “The place was OK, I guess; it had an electric ice box, gas hearth and a garbage grinder built into the sink. You might say I had it made.”

Ed Crane plies his trade.

Ed is in many ways a puzzle: he doesn’t seem to mind Doris’s cavorting about town with a married man, in fact the Cranes host Big Dave and his missus, Ann (Katherine Borowitz), for a dinner party where it’s painfully obvious that Ed and Dave’s wife are cramping the adulterous pair’s style. For her part, Ann is as disconnected from her spouse as are Ed and Doris.

Despite his lethargy, a spark of ambition still smolders within Ed. He wants to do something with his life, but thus far the dark cloud hovering over his head keeps him from making a move. 

Jon Polito
as Creighton Tolliver

Things change one day when Creighton Tolliver (Jon Polito), an out of town entrepreneur who’s sniffing around for startup money wanders in for a trim and pitches his scheme to open a dry cleaning shop. Ed takes an interest in Tolliver’s proposition, which at first seems like a ray of hope in Ed’s gloomy world. But the actions he takes will soon get him into hot water. 

He successfully blackmails Big Dave with anonymous threats to expose Dave’s affair with Doris, then hands the loot over to Tolliver, buying his way into the dry cleaning business. This is the stuff of a James M. Cain or Raymond Chandler novel, dripping with dramatic possibilities, including marital infidelity, icy indifference to murder and larger than life characters with a yen for quick cash. 

Overall, the critical reception was positive. Joel Coen won the Best Director award at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival. The BBC, the Guardian, the Austin Chronicle and the National Board of Review all named it one of the best films of the year. Roger Deakins was nominated for Best Cinematography at the Oscars. Yet upon its initial theatrical release, “The Man Who Wasn’t There” failed to catch on with the public. 

James Gandolfini, as Big Dave Brewster.

Despite its finely detailed channeling of 1940s noir, the film also includes some oddball elements. Joel and Ethan Coen, who wrote produced and directed the film, were inspired by a grab bag of pop culture material: 1940s-‘50s films noirs, ’50s science fiction films with flying saucers and body snatchers and oddities such as personal hygiene and driver’s education films — perhaps noir traditionalists were put off by the mixing of genres.

Tony Shalhoub
as Freddie Riedenschneider

The idea for the barbershop setting evolved, in the Coens’ typically idiosyncratic manner, from a piece of set dressing used in their film “The Hudsucker Proxy” (1994), a 1950s poster of men’s hairstyles, which is reflected in a witty montage of haircuts seen in the opening minutes.

But the film’s highest trump card is its authentically 1940s atmosphere, due in large part to Deakins’ classic noir lighting techniques, bathing the frame in inky black shadows while paying homage to iconic noir images, including: 

• “Phantom Lady” (1944): Ella Raines and Alan Curtis appear in near silhouette, a flood of sunlight to their backs visually isolates them in an otherworldly domain. Similarly, in “The Man Who Wasn’t There,” Atty. Freddie Riedenschneider (Tony Shalhoub) is bathed in a beam of light filtering down through a skylight as he confers with Doris and Ed.
• “Scarlet Street” (1945): Milquetoast Christopher Cross (Edward G. Robinson) gives Kitty March (Joan Bennett) a pedicure, much the way that Ed shaves Doris’s legs as she luxuriates in the bathtub. Both shots emphasize that the men are subservient to conniving women. 
•  “The Postman Always Rings Twice” (1946): Femme fatale Cora Smith (Lana Turner) and Frank Chambers (John Garfield), have a car wreck on a quiet country road, much like the crash that occurs near the end of “The Man Who Wasn’t There.”

Scarlett Johansson as Birdy, and Billy Bob Thornton as Ed Crane.

As is the case with  Frank Chambers in “The Postman Always Rings Twice,” Ed Crane’s life takes a significant turn when a female enters the picture. By chance, he meets Birdy Abundas (Scarlett Johansson), a high school student who plays Beethoven piano sonatas. On a whim, he decides to take her under his wing and help her establish a career as a concert pianist — whether she wants it or not. After much failure, he’s determined to have a success, but it’s a mentorship he’s uniquely unqualified to manage. Like a typically pushy stage dad pressuring a kid to step into the spotlight he means to do good. But down deep he wants the validation of public acclaim as well as the vicarious thrill of celebrity status. His delusional expectations, no doubt, include piles of money that his protege will rake in. 

They travel together to San Francisco where Birdy is to audition for a big shot piano instructor, which turns out to be a bust. As they return home, a confused Birdie, guilty over her failed audition, tries to give Ed some unwanted sexual gratification as he’s negotiating the turns of a country road, causing the car to wreck. The accident, almost a carbon copy of the one in “The Postman Always Rings Twice,” injures them both and dooms Ed.

Roger Deakins' classic noir lighting.

It isn’t until the film’s end, after two murders and a suicide, we begin to get the picture: Ed’s gloomy voice-over narration is a first-person article he’s writing for a men’s magazine as he marks time in a death row prison cell. He’s supposed to tell the readers how it feels to be awaiting execution. But it turns out they picked the wrong writer for the assignment. Ed delivers the bare facts only. He’d probably prefer to let someone else fuss over the tough stuff, like feelings. That’s not his strong suit. 

Audiences may have been put off by Ed's opaque motivations, many of which are open to speculation. We are left to wonder what dramatic turn in Ed’s life caused him to recede into the background and become a spectator, viewing the events of his life from a distance like a shy apparition, taking it all in and sending out little. The answer is likely buried so deeply that Ed himself doesn’t know, and that’s the way it will stay for eternity. 

Is "The Man Who Wasn't There" a film noir homage or is it satire? It's both, because you couldn't create such a smartly detailed satire without having an abiding love and admiration for the original material on which it is based. But you can take it either way. As Ed might say, it doesn't matter much to me.

‘Murder by Contract’: This Guy Kills Me

Vince Edwards, Caprice Toriel,
'Murder by Contract' (1958).

Dreams of a suburban home,

picket fence and a garden

can lead a man to homicide

By Paul Parcellin

"I want to be a contractor,” announces Claude (Vince Edwards), a determined, 30ish guy in the middle of an unusual kind of job interview at the start of “Murder by Contract” (1958). The shot cuts to an abrupt closeup as he utters those words, emphasizing that this is a turning point in his life, the first step on the way to becoming a professional hitman. 

It may have taken a lot of thought before making his decision, but we’re never sure because almost all of Claude’s past is cloaked in mystery. In the course of the meeting he reveals to his interviewer, a retired real estate man named Mr. Moon (Michael Granger), that he never writes anything down, meaning he doesn’t leave a paper trail. But that could also describe his shadowy presence as a man with no personal history, certainly none that he’s willing to share. What we do know are the meager facts he reveals and whatever else we can glean from his actions. 

He’s got a decent paying job with benefits, but wants to buy a house and needs more money to do so. As a potential hitman, his vocation puts him well outside the mainstream, but his basic middle class aspirations are rather, well, mundane. Underneath the bravado, Claude is just a square. He’s after that thing described in a trite couplet we love to parrot, the “American dream,” the only difference being that he’s willing to take a route that is untraversable for most of us. 

His interviewer asks him what makes him different from others. “I don’t make mistakes,” he says. We gather that from the methodical way he operates, the careful, almost ritualistic way he dresses prior to his interview. Those lacking a more conventional moral code cling tightly to a rigid order of their own, you see. 

Claude's exercise regimen echoed in 'Taxi Driver.'

Mr. Moon tests Claude’s mettle by making him wait for the phone call that will offer him an assignment, and Claude’s self-confidence and determination remain in place like a wall of granite.

He waits at home for the phone to ring, dressed in a jacket and J.C. Penny tie, then doing calisthenics in his shabby rooming-house quarters. By the way, the obsessive workout scenes in “Taxi Driver” (1976), in which Travis Bickle (Robert De Niro) exercises feverishly in his own scruffy room, were inspired by Claude’s workout regimen, according to director Martin Scorsese, who maintains that “Murder by Contract” had a greater impact on him as a filmmaker than any other feature film. 

Murder in a barber shop.

When Claude finally makes the grade as a hired killer, he dispatches a couple of targets in a businesslike manner, staying perfectly cool in each of apparently his first two professional killings. The film’s scenes echo Claude’s economy of style, just showing enough to give us the idea of what is about to happen, particularly when violence occurs. We never see much of the rougher stuff, but are chilled when Claude, posing as a barber, strops a straight razor as a target relaxes in the chair, languidly unaware of what is to come. He used the tools at hand and never carries a gun lest he be stopped and searched. 

So many blanks are left for us to fill in that “Murder by Contract” feels as edgy as French new wave cinema. It wouldn’t look out of place on a double bill with Jean Pierre Melville or Robert Bresson’s work of that same era. In fact, Claude’s zen-like focus on his new vocation seems echoed by Jef Costello (Alain Delon) in Melville’s “Le Samourai” (1967).

When Claude’s unseen employer is finally convinced of his reliability, Claude is sent to Los Angeles on a special contract, the details of which he doesn’t learn before accepting the job. In the City of Angels he meets up with two handlers, George (Herschel Bernardi) and Marc (Phillip Pine) who are meant to oversee Claude, but Claude turns the tables on them. Befuddled and nearly at the end of their rope, the two don’t seem so much like gangsters, more like student teachers trying to keep the class bad boy under control. 

Herschel Bernardi, Edwards, Phillip Pine, the killer and his handlers.

Their interactions bring a touch of wit that a story as grim as this needs. Fitting in perfectly with the film’s minimalist style, the musical soundtrack by Perry Botkin, which is often a single guitar, is as spare as it is effective — think of Anton Karas’s zither soundtrack in “The Third Man” (1949). 

Director Irving Lerner hit a home run with this, one of his handful of gritty crime dramas. Before directing “Murder by Contract,” Lerner made documentaries, produced and edited films, then shifted gears with low-budget feature films including “Edge of Fury (1958) (sharing directing credits with Robert J, Gurney, Jr.), “City of Fear” (1959) as well as a number of dramas, war pictures,  westerns and TV shows. With “Murder by Contract,” he handles with assurance what must have seemed like edgy material in 1958. Lerner’s confidence is reflected in Claude, who is unconventional and sure of himself to the point of cockiness. 

Claude is a bit of a rock star compared with the two mob errand boys, and they both know it. George comes to admire Claude while Marc is fairly disgusted with him. His opinion doesn’t improve when Claude insists on relaxing instead of going to work. He swims at the beach, goes deep sea fishing and whacks golf balls at a driving range — Claude enjoys exasperating them both.

As cool and detached as he appears, Claude’s mood changes dramatically when he learns that the person he’s been hired to kill is a woman. She’s the wife of a deceased mobster who’s set to testify against the organization. He doesn’t like the idea of killing a woman, not that he believes it’s wrong, but unlike men, they’re unreliable, he says. You can predict when a man will move and where he will stand, but women move in unexpected ways. 

Claude breaks his own rule and uses firearms.

It’s telling that he refers to women as “unreliable,” perhaps alluding to his own relationships with women — perhaps even his mother. His rage comes to the surface when a room service waiter delivers a coffee cup with lipstick stains. He denigrates the waiter’s work ethic and remarks that the lipstick was left by “some pig” — he refers to women that way more than once, especially if he believes they have loose morals. Beyond his revulsion over a dirty cup, the lipstick traces convey the presence of a female and that upsets him and temporarily shakes his confidence. But, despite his moralistic judgment of women he’s not above ordering up a call girl when he sees fit. 

As his deadline approaches he finally gets down to the business of murder. His target is hiding out in a house nestled away in the Coldwater Canyon neighborhood of Los Angeles and is under police guard. That means he must keep his distance while doing the job, but his initial attempts at striking from the hillside above the house don’t go as planned. 

Billie Williams (Caprice Toriel) in leopard print, like big game.  

He’s forced to take another tack, this time getting close to the woman, and the stress on him is telling. He plans meticulously as usual but is unsteady on his feet. 

In what proves to be his downfall, he forges ahead, not only because he faces a dour fate if he fails — by this point his boss believes he’s botched the job and he’ll be lucky to get out of town alive. His obsessive work ethic compels him to complete the job, like any industrious citizen pursuing a comfortable suburban life on a leafy byway. In other words, the American dream. 

Headshrinker Noir: 10 Films With Mind Games, Crime

Ingrid Bergman, "Spellbound" (1945).

From Dedicated Healers 

to Evil Control Freaks,

Noir Psychiatrists 

Want to Pick Your Brain

By Paul Parcellin

Do all psychiatrists intentionally drive their patients insane and force them to commit awful crimes? In real life it’s unlikely … probably. But in film noir it’s a 50-50 bet. Not that all noir psychiatrists are the same, but they tend to fall into specific groups. One variety is the saintly crusader who tends to be hyper dedicated to healing the afflicted — he or she not only eases troubled minds, but fights crime, too.

Another type is the bumbling screwball, who may be well meaning but often does more damage than good.

Blonde Ice (1948).

Then there's the diabolical narcissist who uses his powers to tap into a patient’s subconscious for wicked purposes. He preys on the vulnerable, who are easy to influence and can be set up as patsies for murder or made to commit crimes. Hypnosis, psychoanalysis and drugs are the tools an evil psyche uses to pry open heads and sprinkle toxic dust inside.

Here is a handful of noirs with shrinks, good and bad. There are many other noirs that focus on psychiatry and mental anguish. Feel free to suggest titles in the comments:

The Good Doctors

Robert Paige, Leslie Brooks, “Blonde Ice.”
She’s full of surprises, none of them good.

“Blonde Ice” (1948)

The film’s icy blonde femme fatale, a shameless gold digger, mercilessly strings along a masochistic suitor. In a moment of clarity he describes her succinctly when he blurts out, “You’re not warm, you’re cold, like ice.” Ignore the hackneyed dialog because he’s got a point. But “cold” doesn’t begin to describe this fair-haired heart crusher. “Psychopath” is a better fit.

She’s a classic femme fatale who uses her womanly charms to get what she wants. When she enters a room the guys’ tongues are hanging out. She’s a dish and she knows it 

But a former police psychiatrist is hip to the blonde’s true self. He’s seen oodles of charming cutthroats like her. She’s neurotically fixated on power and wealth, a kind of one-woman wrecking crew lacking a shred of moral fiber. She compulsively pursues men of stature and wealth and then disposes of them. Her ebony dresses remind us of a black widow spider. 

Did she have a rough childhood? You betcha, and it may have molded her into the ruthless she-wolf in a mink coat that she’s become. As for the good doctor, he unmasks her and that makes her mighty unhappy, and when she’s unhappy, bad things occur. 

Barbara Bel Geddes, Robert Ryan, “Caught.”

“ Caught” (1949)


A car hop gets a taste of the sweet life and it turns to ashes in her mouth. She dreams of a life of mink and diamonds, then meets an overbearing wealthy businessman who dates her but has no intention of making a commitment. That is, until his psychiatrist points out his tendency toward flirtations that never lead to anything permanent. The mogul’s contrarian attitude leads him to marry the girl simply to prove the psychiatrist wrong. Wedded life thereafter is miserable for both parties, and it gets worse when she lands a job as a receptionist for a pediatrician and gets involved with the doc. Here are two takeaways from all this: Don’t do anything rash just to prove your shrink wrong, and secondly, listen carefully to the good advice that you’re paying for. It could save you a lot of trouble.

William Holden, Lee J. Cobb, “The Dark Past.”

“The Dark Past” (1948)

A police psychiatrist recounts a harrowing experience he had when an escaped convict held the psychiatrist and others hostage in a country home. The documentary style film is told in flashback as the psychiatrists recalls why he decided to leave the teaching profession and work with the police. Over the course of one evening the psychiatrist analyzes the escapee’s childhood trauma and manages to cure his recurring emotional disorder. The film makes a case for early psychiatric intervention for youthful offenders, claiming that delinquency can be nipped in the bud when proper treatment is applied. It seems to work well in the movie, at least. 

The Quacks

Dana Andrews, Lee J. Cobb, “Boomerang!”. 

“Boomerang!” (1947)


A police psychiatrist plays a marginal role in a preliminary hearing for an accused murderer. The story begins when someone shoots a priest point blank in the head for no apparent reason, although the film offers a theory on the killer’s identity. Flashing back to a time before the murder took place, the clergyman tells a mentally troubled man that he intends to have him committed to an institution. He’s probably the trigger man, but that question is never fully answered. Presented documentary style, the film is based on a true story of a murder in a Connecticut town. An innocent man is arrested and brought to a preliminary hearing where the psychiatrist and others testify, and it looks like the defendant’s goose is cooked. A state’s attorney investigates and finds that there are troubling holes in the prosecutor’s case. Although he plays a minor role, the psychiatrist gets a demerit here for a flimsy evaluation of the accused man. He’s more than willing to rubber stamp the man as guilty without a thorough examination. The film is more about small town politics than psychological motivations behind crime. Suffice it to say that it’s best to steer clear of this quack.

Edward G. Robinson, “Night Has a Thousand Eyes.” 

“Night Has a Thousand Eyes” (1948)

A phony psychic suddenly gets true psychic premonitions and his newfound power brings him only misery. He can foresee the deaths of others and that makes him a suspect in the murder of his former vaudeville partner. After predicting the death of the former partner’s daughter, the psychic becomes the focus of a police investigation. A pair of university psychologists are brought in to evaluate the seer, but they can’t rule out the possibility that the psychic has genuine extrasensory powers. They remain skeptical, but they’re unable to explain the weird predictions that come to pass.

Bad Sanitariums

Lucille Bremer, Richard Carlson, Douglas Fowley, “Behind Locked Doors.”  

“Behind Locked Doors” (1948)

Evil psychiatrists employed in mental institutions are a subset of headshrinkers. Like their office and couch brethren, they possess a frightening amount of power over those in their care. In “Behind Locked Doors,” a newspaperwoman hires a private detective to be committed to a sanitarium. Inside the locked ward, a corrupt judge on the lam from justice is holed up, and the newswoman means to flush him out. As the private dick soon learns, in this institution psychiatry is a tool of the corrupt, where a patient can be kept on ice after stepping on the wrong sets of toes. The sanitarium director, terrified that his aiding and abetting of a criminal could end his career, is nevertheless beholden to the judge, whose political pull got him his job. 

The very real danger for a mole inside an institution is that the psychiatrist is also his jailer. It’s easy and tempting to keep a patient under observation for the financial benefit of it. Sane or not, you may have a long wait for release.

Peter Breck, “Shock Corridor.”

“Shock Corridor” (1963)

Journalist Johnny Barrett aims to expose poor conditions in an institution for the mentally ill, and he also intends to identify a killer at large in that sanitarium. But he’s not entirely motivated by altruism. He wants a Pulitzer, and he’s willing to have himself committed to a sanitarium to earn it. He uses a psychiatrist friend to help him prep for an undercover operation, walking him through drills that will help him convince doctors that he’s mentally ill.  

Like the sanitarium director in “Behind Locked Doors,” this one uses his power as a doctor to keep a lid on a big secret. Driven by the fear of tarnishing the institution’s reputation and losing any of the joint’s lucrative patient population, the sanitarium director covers up the murder of a patient named Sloan. 

Johnny’s exotic dancer girlfriend is dead against the undercover scheme, but reluctantly aids him. She poses as his sister and both pretend that he harbors an unnatural sexual attraction to her. She swears out a complaint against him and sees to it that he’s committed to the institution where the murder took place.

She worries that the punishing tests he’s subjected to will drive him insane, and she’s not wrong. Here, we have a facility overseen by a corrupt director and managed by an immoral staff where the treatments are as damaging as the trauma that brings patients to the facility in the first place.  

Leo G. Carroll, Gregory Peck, Ingrid Bergman, “Spellbound.”  

“Spellbound” (1945)

In making “Spellbound,” Alfred Hitchcock employed a psychiatric advisor and hired Salvador Dali to create a dream sequence, making it a richly detailed film about mental illness, psychiatry and sanitariums.  

The setting is a sanitarium, and we meet a sadistic and seductive female patient who tries to sweet talk an attendant before gouging his hand with her sharp nails. Other patients include a suicidal man with delusions that he killed his father. Both cases, a charming predator and a man paralyzed with guilt are two personality types upon which the story is built.  

The outgoing director of the sanitarium has been dismissed after showing signs of senility, and he’s to be replaced by Dr. Anthony Edwardes. The new director gets off to a rocky start with his inappropriately angry outburst. Dr. Constance Petersen, an attractive, buttoned-down staff psychiatrist, uses the tines of a fork to draw a diagram on a snowy white table linen. Edwardes inexplicably loses his cool and makes a bit of a fool of himself. 

Petersen is a reserved rationalist. She deflects another colleague’s advances and he refers to her as the human glacier. She keeps her emotions in check and puts the brakes on when Edwardes nearly immediate attempts to woo her. But it doesn’t take long for him to break through her wall of resistance. 

The trouble is, Edwardes’s emotional outbursts are signs of deeply repressed memories and amnesia, and before long both he and Petersen will be questioning his true identity. To make matters worse, there’s been a murder committed and Edwardes is the likely culprit. 

Kleptomaniac Patients

Robert Mitchum, Laraine Day, “The Locket” (1946).  

“The Locket” (1946)

Kleptomania is just one of the psychological afflictions taking center stage in “The Locket,” a story about a woman with sticky fingers for shiny objects who just can’t be trusted. On her wedding day her psychiatrist ex-husband steps forward to unmask her as a sociopath before she can exchange wedding vows. Her fiancé listens incredulously as the shrink fills him in on the lady’s history. It turns out that swiping rich ladies’ jewelry isn’t the half of her misdeeds. Charming and manipulative, she commits a heinous act and leaves a falsely accused domestic servant holding the bag. The upshot is that she’s such a highly polished liar she fools her psychiatrist husband. 

The film is a marvel of complex flashbacks, nested within flashbacks. The psychiatrist tells the groom a tale that we see in a flashback. In it, a visitor tells him of his association with the bride to be, and in that flashback she tells of her traumatic childhood, and we see that in yet another flashback. According to her version of the story, wealthy, abusive high society types (one of whom is the source of her childhood trauma) are the villains. 

Each flashback offers a new layer to ponder, but we don’t witness a story taking place in the present, we hear others’ recollections of the facts which may or may not be reliable. Still, the story we see is enough to give you pause on your wedding day.   


 José Ferrer, Gene Tierney, “Whirlpool” (1950).  

“Whirlpool” (1950)

Psychiatrist Dr. William Sutton is in a battle with smooth-talking hypnotist David Korvo over the well being of the doctor’s wife, Ann. She has the embarrassing habit of shoplifting goods from local stores, and one day she gets caught. Korvo happens to be on the scene and he fast-talks her out of the jam and persuades her to let him treat her neurosis. 

The quack therapist hypnotizes Ann, allegedly to treat her insomnia, and he promises to address her kleptomania, as well. Although her husband is a highly respected psychiatrist, she’s embarrassed to tell him about her problems, and Korvo offers her a way to keep it all on the down low. 

Both she and Korvo are alike, in a way. They both share a disdain for the people who tend to their needs, the waiters and housekeepers whom they order around with little tact. Ann lives a comfortable life, and her rough treatment of the domestic help seems more a byproduct of her inner turmoil than a mark of entitlement. Korvo, on the other hand, is mean and manipulative when none of his wealthy clients are watching. He can turn on the charm at will when there’s a fat pocketbook to be picked, and all the while he plots sinister ways to take advantage of Ann’s weaknesses.

“Whirlpool” is a cautionary tale about the pitfalls of seeking help from a charlatan, and reassures us that genuine psychiatry offers legitimate treatment. 

After enduring a life threatening ordeal, Ann and her husband get to the bottom of her psychological conflicts, although it happens too quickly and easily to be believed. But after escaping Korvo’s clutches she’s earned the right to a happy ending. 

Could You Repeat That? — 36 Noirs That Unfold In Flashbacks

Barbara Stanwyck, Fred MacMurray, “Double Indemnity” (1944). 

They pop up in all kinds of movies and TV shows,

but flashbacks are the stuff that films noir are made of

By Paul Parcellin

Is that film you’re watching a noir? Here’s one semi-reliable way to tell: Look for flashbacks. In noir, flashbacks show us the stuff that gets characters into the mess that they are in, and are no doubt trying to wriggle out of. 

Did that someone betray a spouse, steal from an employer or send another to an untimely grave? Or, maybe it’s a poor sap with rotten luck who landed in hot water. Flashbacks give us background information — the essential dirty details in a neat package.

Of course, even a film chock-full of flashbacks isn’t necessarily a noir. Flashbacks pop up in all kinds of movies and TV shows. But, if you’re watching a black and white film in which crime happens, and there’s at least one flashback (extra points if Robert Mitchum is doing voice-over narration), you’re probably looking at a noir. 

Flashbacks let stories unfold in fragments rather than in a single straight line. Their unpredictability jacks up our emotions and expectations, reshapes a story’s contours and, if done right, provides us with plot twists we never saw coming. 

At first we may feel sympathy for the one in a tight spot. But moods can shift once the facts come out in a flashback. Of course, the opposite is also be true. Villains sometimes morph into angels when we see what they’ve endured. 

Having said all that, here are 36 noirs with flashbacks that manipulate the flow of the story as well as our perceptions and attitudes toward it. This is but a fraction of the flashback-heavy noirs available for viewing. Bet you can name a number of others: 

Rory Mallinson, Jay C. Flippen, Maureen O'Hara, “A Woman's Secret.”

“A Woman's Secret” (1949) 

A failed singer confesses she shot her friend, and in flashbacks we see the events leading up to the shooting. But her manager and a detective doubt her story and cannot establish a reasonable motive.

“Backfire” (1950)

While recuperating from wartime back injuries, a veteran is visited on Christmas Eve by a beautiful stranger with a cryptic message. Flashbacks are used extensively to piece together a fragmented story as characters recount past events.

“The Big Clock” (1948)

The film opens at night with a magazine editor stealthily moving about in the deserted skyscraper where he works. A giant timepiece, which will prove important to the story, looks down on the building’s lobby. A murder investigation is underway and flashbacks add to the pressure principal characters experience.

“Black Angel” (1946) 

When a wrongly accused man is convicted of a singer's murder, his wife tries to prove him innocent, aided by the victim's ex-husband. In a flashback, the ex-husband tells the story of the woman’s death from his point of view. 

Hume Cronyn, Burt Lancaster, “Brute Force.”

“Brute Force” (1947)

At a tough penitentiary, a convict plans to rebel against a power-mad chief guard. Flashbacks offer insights into the prisoners’ backgrounds, motivations and the circumstance that led to their incarceration. 

“Call Northside 777” (1948) 

Chicago reporter P.J. McNeal re-opens a decade-old murder case, a perfect opportunity to see the details in flashbacks.

“Confidential Report” (also known as Mr. Arkadin) (1955) 

A mysterious billionaire hires an American smuggler to investigate his past, which leads the investigator down a rabbit hole of cold-war European intrigue. As the smuggler interviews others, we see the billionaire’s life in flashbacks

“Crossfire” (1947) 

A man is murdered by a demobilized soldier he met in a bar. An investigator puts together the pieces of the puzzle and we see in flashback how and why the crime occurred.

Lee J. Cobb, William Holden, Nina Foch, “The Dark Past.”

“The Dark Past” (1948) 

An escaped psychopathic killer takes a police psychiatrist, his family and neighbors hostage. The documentary style film is told in flashback as the psychiatrist recounts his days as a psychology professor, and the events that led him to do police work.

“Dead Reckoning” (1946) 

A soldier runs away to avoid receiving the Medal of Honor, so his buddy gets permission to investigate. Romance and death soon follow. We see the story in flashbacks as an investigating officers recounts the facts of his query to a priest.

“Double Indemnity” (1944)

An insurance salesman falls for his customer’s wife and is lured into a murder scheme. When it all blows up in his face he makes a recording of his confession on the office Dictaphone machine and we get the story in flashback.

“Dual Alibi” (1947) 

Twin trapeze artists fall out over a lottery ticket and a woman. Flashbacks frame the story and explore themes of betrayal and personality contrasts. 

Zero Mostel, Humphrey Bogart, “The Enforcer.”

“The Enforcer” (1951) 

A lead prosecutor is frustrated in his attempts to send the boss of a murder for hire syndicate to the chair. He pores over evidence hoping to find a fresh lead, and as he does we see the investigation in flashbacks, and in flashbacks within the flashback.

“Gun Crazy” (1950) 

Two gun-obsessed young people launch a crime spree. An extended flashback gives insight into the young man’s psychological makeup and his fascination with guns.

“The House on Telegraph Hill” (1951) 

A concentration camp survivor finds herself involved in mystery, greed and murder after she takes on the identity of a dead friend to gain passage to America. We learn of her past history in flashback.

“I Wake Up Screaming” (1941) 

Police detectives interrogate a sports promoter accused of murdering a beautiful model. We get the entire backstory as he starts from the beginning and tells what happened in a long flashback sequence.

Ava Gardner, Burt Lancaster, “The Killers.”

“The Killers” (1946)

Hitmen arrive in a small New Jersey town to kill an unresisting victim, and an insurance investigator uncovers the victim’s past involvement with a beautiful, deadly woman. As the investigator interviews people involved in the case, we see the story in flashbacks.

“Killer's Kiss” (1955) 

Standing on a railway station platform, a down and out prizefighter flashes back on the events of the past two tumultuous days. Losing a bout turns out to be the least of his worries.

“Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye” (1950) 

A courtroom trial is a fitting starting place to give us the facts of a case presented in flashback. We see that after a violent prison break, a clever, ruthless criminal corrupts everyone around him.

“The Lady from Shanghai” (1947) 

In flashback we observe the story of a seaman who is hired to tend to a bizarre yachting cruise. He ends up mired in a complex murder plot.

Gene Tierney, “Laura.”

“Laura” (1944) 

A muck-raking journalist tells in flashback of his close personal relationship with Laura, an attractive young woman who meets an untimely end. He’s at odds with a police detective investigating the murder who falls in love with the victim.

“Leave Her to Heaven” (1945)

A writer recounts, in flashbacks, how he fell in love with a young socialite and married her, but her obsessive love for him proved to be the undoing of them both.

“The Locket” (1946)

Just before his wedding, the bridegroom hears a disturbing tale characterizing his beloved bride as troubled and unstable. This may be a record holder of sorts for the most complex structure of nested flashbacks — that is, flashbacks within flashbacks.

“The Mask of Dimitrios” (1944)


A mystery writer becomes intrigued after the murdered body of a vicious career criminal washes up in the Bosphorus. As he interviews various individuals we see the story in flashbacks.

Joan Crawford, Moroni Olsen, “Mildred Pierce.”

“Mildred Pierce” (1945) 

A hard-working mother inches towards disaster as she divorces her husband and opens a restaurant to support her spoiled daughter. The title character tells police about the events leading up to a shooting, and we see them in a series of flashbacks.

“Murder, My Sweet” (1944) 

Private investigator Philip Marlowe, facing a police interrogation, spills the story that began with an ex-con in search of his former girlfriend, Velma. A complex web of corruption is unearthed and we see it all in flashback.

“Night Has a Thousand Eyes” (1948)

After a phony stage mentalist mysteriously acquires supernatural powers to see the future, he decides to leave the stage to live a quiet life. Flashbacks are a key element that deepen the mystery and explore the psychological torment of the protagonist.

“No Man of Her Own” (1950) 

We’re held In suspense as we learn, in flashback, the story of a pregnant woman who adopts the identity of a railroad-crash victim and starts a new life with the woman's wealthy in-laws.

Jane Greer, Robert Mitchum, “Out of the Past.”

“Out of the Past” (1947) 

A small-town gas station owner’s past catches up with him. Formerly a private eye, he’s forced to return to the life he’d been trying to escape. Gangsters and a dangerous woman await his return. Even the film’s title screams flashback, and it dishes them out aplenty.

“Possessed” (1947) 

After being found wandering the streets of Los Angeles, a catatonic woman tells a doctor the complex story of how she wound up there. Flashbacks offer insight into her psychological makeup and establish her as an unreliable witness.

“Repeat Performance” (1947) 

On New Year's Eve 1946, Sheila Page kills her husband Barney. She wishes that she could relive 1946 and avoid the mistakes that led to tragedy. Presto, her wish comes true and the film becomes a year-long flashback.

“The Second Woman” (1950)

In flashback, we see the story of a woman visiting her aunt in California. She meets a neighbor and begins to suspect that he’s in grave danger.

Barbara Stanwyck, “Sorry, Wrong Number.”

“Sorry, Wrong Number” (1948) 

An invalid with an overbearing personality eavesdrops on a phone conversation about a murder plan. Her philandering husband leaves her alone for the evening, and she recalls his suspicious behavior in a series of flashbacks. 

“Sunset Boulevard” (1950) 

Pitch black humor and an inspired use of flashbacks are both strong elements in this story of a hack screenwriter who tries to save his flagging career with the help of a faded silent film star.  She’s determined to return to the screen, but things don’t work out for either of them.  

“They Won't Believe Me” (1947) 

On trial for murdering his girlfriend, a philandering stockbroker takes the stand to claim his innocence and describe the actual, but improbable-sounding, sequence of events that led to her death. The witness stand is a perfect location to present the story in flashbacks.

“Vengeance Is Mine” (1949) 

Believing himself to be dying, a man hires an assassin to kill him so he can frame an enemy for the death. Flashbacks offer gradual revelation of key events and offer psychological depth.

Paul Parcellin writes about crime films and TV. Follow him on Bluesky: @paulpar.bsky.social 

D.O.A.: Small Town Man Visits Big City, Murder Follows

Frank Gerstle, Edmond O’Brien, “D.O.A.” (1949).
The doctor delivers some astonishingly bad news.

Frank Bigelow needs to find the truth,
but he's driven by a deeper motivation

By Paul Parcellin

When you think of noir, it’s probably not 18th century British author Samuel Johnson who first springs to mind. But his most famous quote really nails the crux of “D.O.A.”: “When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.”

Apt words for Frank Bigelow ( Edmond O’Brien), the cursed hero of “D.O.A.,” who is under a death sentence, but not the kind that involves a rope. His is a story of rotten luck, an obsessive search for the truth and the mind’s nimbleness as the final grains of sand funnel through the hourglass.

But first, the top reason to see “D.O.A.” is the opening sequence, perhaps the greatest setup in all of noir. Bigelow arrives at Los Angeles City Hall at night, as if drawn in by its illuminated spire, a beacon in the dark. He enters and makes the long trudge through the hallways leading to police headquarters and the camera follows him all the way. Arriving at the homicide bureau, he reports a murder.

Bigelow tells his story.

“Who was murdered?” the head detective asks. 

“I was,” he says.

Thus begins one of noir’s most definitive existential crises. A man living under a death sentence has mere hours before he expires. What will he do with his remaining time, we wonder? The lowdown comes in a long flashback in which we learn that the past few days have been a frenzied struggle. Bigelow, a small town accountant, first got sucked into a dark vortex of doom some months ago, long before he realized his predicament. He accidentally landed in the middle a scheme to sell stolen iridium, a valuable metal. He’s innocent of any wrongdoing, but fate cares not about culpability. 

Details of the story behind this delayed-action murder get a bit complicated and difficult to digest as the story winds toward its harrowing conclusion. But the backstory is less important than Bigelow’s frenetic struggle to get to the bottom of the mystery that torments him to distraction. 

At the story’s core is a powerful obsession with finding the truth and a frenzied investigation that seems imperative, yet pointless. He could have gone to the police immediately but chose to go it alone. You might correctly assume that Bigelow’s head-first dive into the nitty gritty of the case is his way of shutting out thoughts of the Angel of Death’s inevitable visit.

His downward spiral begins when he leaves his loving girlfriend, Paula (Pamela Britton), behind in their small desert town. Frank plans to let down his hair in the big city, San Francisco, while deciding whether or not he will walk the plank with Paula — a plan that, frankly, is a bit on the cruel side. She hates the idea of him cavorting around town, yet feels she has no choice but to let him go get his freak on.

House band, The Fishermen, drive the beatnik crowd wild.

Once in the confines of his big city hotel room he’s up for a bit of sinning, and it turns out he’s come to the right place. By chance, he meets a group of traveling salespeople who are partying like it’s V-J Day, and he’s invited to join the fun. 

“Jive-crazy” hipsters dig
the crazy beat at
the Fisherman jazz club.

Drink flows freely and this group of inveterate squares lands at a beatnik jazz bar, of all places. It’s the film’s most surreal and fun sequences as the hep crowd grooves to the frenzied beat of a live sextet blowing hard bop.

Clearly, it’s a square’s idea of what a jazz club is like. The joint is a cartoonish den of iniquity where loose morals and uninhibited self-expression are on display, a place where oddballs and commies probably smoke “marihuana.” Above all of that, it’s a spot to meet “jive crazy” girls, and Frank’s game for that.

Of course, he’s out of his element here. The music makes his head spin, but the possibility of connecting with some counter-culture female companionship makes it tolerable. When at last he’s about to hook up with a mysterious blonde, someone slips him a radioactive mickey that sends his life into a tailspin.

It’s as if he’s being punished for his carnal cravings, and the penalty for straying from his girlfriend is death. But beyond that, we wonder who fed him a nightcap of hot nuclear soup. 

We’re left to ponder whether the raucous group that brought him to the bar had any part in the scheme. After all, the head sales nerd persuaded Bigelow to join the group and organized the bar hop. He’s got his wife in tow and at one point he gives Bigelow the stink eye for getting too cosy with the missus — a rather weak motive for murder, but people have killed for less.

It’s not until the next morning that Bigelow realizes that something is off and gets himself examined. The terrifying verdict is in: he’s been dosed with a slow-acting luminous poison and has only several days left to live. 

A couple of medical establishments confirm that he’s a goner, and at first he’s in denial. From the dimly lit confines of a physician’s office, Bigelow bolts into the vast, sun-filled concrete cityscape that is somehow as claustrophobic and airless as the doctor’s office. He’s a man trying to outrun fate and it’s hard not to gasp for breath along with him as he scrambles toward points unknown. 

Pamela Britton, O’Brien. Frank and Paula meet all too briefly.

A cool factoid is that the shots of Bigelow running down San Francisco’s Market Street were taken without city permits. Those he bumps into are not hired extras but pedestrians who are visibly confused about the jostling they get. Director Rudolph Maté shot the film on a small budget, around $500,000, and made the most of limited resources. 

Frank ponders Life.

We witness Bigelow go through the stages of impending death in an extremely compressed timeframe. Pausing at a newsstand bedecked with copies of Life magazine, he watches people interact, but he seems all but invisible to them. He’s like an apparition who observes others but cannot interact with them. His initial terror dissipates and he seems to be wistfully picturing a world in which life will go on without him.

Once the initial shock is absorbed he accepts the bitter reality and snaps into action. In his final hours he’s determined to find out who poisoned him and why they did it. And then … who knows what? Maybe he’ll bring the killer to justice or perhaps he’ll take matters into his own hands. Along the way he acquires a pistol, so both options are open.

This is a drastically different Bigelow than the one who embarked on his junket to San Francisco. He’s focused, emotionally high strung and determined to get answers. 

The film's climax takes place in the Bradbury Building in downtown Los Angeles.

His investigation takes him abruptly from the Bay Area to the City of Angels, and at every turn he encounters another mug or two-timing dame. As the dust begins to settle it becomes clear that there’s a network of people behind the plot against him. But why would they go to so much trouble to kill an accountant from jerkwater USA?

The film’s answer is a bit more complicated than it needs to be, but not quite as byzantine as “The Big Sleep,” perhaps the most convoluted plot in all of noir. 

Neville Brand as Chester. He takes
Frank Bigelow for a wild ride.

Bigelow traces the iridium dealers, meets the widow of the man who tried to warn him about impending danger and tracks down the shady characters behind the illegal sale. He gets taken for a ride by psychotic thug Chester (Neville Brand), and survives a shootout in a pharmacy. 

Bigelow’s mind has become wonderfully focused as the shadow of death hovers over him. He later expires in the homicide bureau after spilling the story to a roomful of enthralled detectives.

Facing certain death can clear cobwebs from the brain, all right, but too often clarity arrives at the eleventh hour.  It’s ironic that had he not gone through this ordeal he might never have realized his feelings for Paula, but by then it was too late. Alas, romance often doesn’t work out in noir. 

Frank Bigelow gains a sliver of self awareness only to die an untimely death. That’s a Pyrrhic victory you might say, and Samuel Johnson would undoubtedly agree.

Originally published in the Nov./Dec. 2024 issue of The Dark Pages. Check out The Dark Pages newsletter at: www.allthatnoir.com/newsletter/

Paul Parcellin writes about crime films and TV. Follow him on Bluesky: @paulpar.bsky.social