Welcome to the ICM Forum.
Check out our Magazine

If you notice any issues please post in the Q&A thread. Email issue should be fixed. If you encounter this issue, contact PeacefulAnarchy
Podcast: Talking Images (Episode 74 released May 15th: JLG in the 80s: Are the Films Worth Checking Out?)
iCinema Magazine: WE ARE LIVE! (We just need more content)
ICMF-FF7: Join the ICMForum Film Festival Programming Team
World Cup - Season 5: Round 1 Schedule, Match 1H (Jun 11th)
Polls: 2015 (May 28th), 2010s (May 30th), Argentina (May 31st), Doubling the Canon - Ratings (May 31st)
Challenges: Doubling the Canon, Western, Oceania
About: Welcome All New Members, Terms of Use, Q&A

ICM Forum's Favorite Film Noirs, 2nd Edition; Nominations

500<400, Favourite 1001 movies, Doubling the Canon, Film World Cup and many other votes
User avatar
Lonewolf2003
Donator
Posts: 16153
Joined: December 29th, 2012, 7:00 am
Contact:

ICM Forum's Favorite Film Noirs, 2nd Edition; Nominations

#1

Post by Lonewolf2003 »

iCM Forum's Favorite Film Noirs
2nd Edition

Nominations
Image

Film noir, or noir for short, was originally a moniker retroactively giving to a certain type of American movies from the 40s and 50s by French critics. It's therefor a unusual "genre", cause it probably wasn't until the rise of neo-noirs in the 60s-70s that a filmmaker actively set out to make a noir (like one would with other genres). Since the term first been coined, the definition been debated, its characteristics discussed and the movies being considered broadened. It's debatable if it actually is a genre, or a style, cycle, phenomenon, mood or series. Like film historian Mark Bould said film noir remains an "elusive phenomenon ... always just out of reach". Or like Kim Newman said noirs are like porn, they're hard to define but one knows one when one sees it. While film noir will be subject to endless debates, it is is defined "not by a fundamental attribute, but by a general disposition and a group of elements, some—but rarely and perhaps never all—of which are found in each of the genre's films." That's why we will try to choose our favorite film noirs again.

Because noir is such a tricky "genre" to define, when you feel a movie is eligible (and a favorite according to your own definition) than you can include it. When in doubt about a movie you can ask others about it here of course.

DEADLINE = January 3rd 2023
  • IMDb- or iCM-lists are accepted. (If you can't make one of those, ask another user to help you out.)
  • Lists can be any length.
  • Shorts, mini-series and TV-episodes from anthology series where the episodes are unrelated, are allowed. Tv-series aren't allowed.*
    *A mini-series is 16 episodes or less, not multiple seasons, and not planned to be longer but canceled, and is intended as a single unified work and not episodic.
  • Each nominee can only be named once (of course)
  • Lists can be ranked or unranked or partially-ranked. In a partially-ranked list, the top X films are ranked and everything after that point is unranked. When not specified I will consider a list as ranked.
Some help:
Noirs you rated on IMDb
Like always, use this at your own discretion; not all movies mentioned you might consider noirs and some you would could be missing.

Last edition from 2015:
Top List Full Or Extended List Result Thread Nomination Thread
:ICM: Top 150 :ICM: Complete List Results Thread Nominations Thread


Voters (43)
Please check if your list is stated, ordered and linked correctly. And is set to public. For iCM lists you can also set it to "Friends" and befriend me. Don't edit your post, but make a new post or at least notify me of the edit in a new post.
Last edited by Lonewolf2003 on January 4th, 2023, 4:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.
User avatar
Perception de Ambiguity
Posts: 4474
Joined: July 9th, 2011, 6:00 am
Location: in space the stars are no nearer
Contact:

#2

Post by Perception de Ambiguity »

We do not have to understand new things, but by dint of patience, effort and method to come to understand with our whole self the truths which are evident.Image
LETTERBOXD | MUBI | IMDb | tumblr.
User avatar
Torgo
Posts: 7181
Joined: June 30th, 2011, 6:00 am
Location: Germany
Contact:

#6

Post by Torgo »

Cool, 150 films to look forward to which are better than any Godard.
User avatar
OldAle1
Donator
Posts: 8328
Joined: February 9th, 2017, 7:00 am
Location: Dairyland, USA
Contact:

#7

Post by OldAle1 »

Torgo wrote: December 5th, 2022, 8:23 pm Cool, 150 films to look forward to which are better than any Godard.
But how about all the Godard films that can be consider film noir? PARADOX
It was the truth, vivid and monstrous, that all the while he had waited the wait was itself his portion..
User avatar
Torgo
Posts: 7181
Joined: June 30th, 2011, 6:00 am
Location: Germany
Contact:

#8

Post by Torgo »

Image

In the end, only master Neff knows the answers to this one; I'm merely his disciple.
Or maybe the Breathless conundrum can be solved as once was written:
It was the best of Godards
It was the worst of noirs
User avatar
mightysparks
Site Admin
Posts: 32617
Joined: May 5th, 2011, 6:00 am
Location: Perth, WA, Australia
Contact:

#10

Post by mightysparks »

"I do not always know what I want, but I do know what I don't want." - Stanley Kubrick

iCM | Letterboxd | Linktree | TSZDT

Image
User avatar
TraverseTown
Posts: 632
Joined: January 25th, 2013, 7:00 am
Location: New York
Contact:

#11

Post by TraverseTown »

Still don't know what Noir is but I'll give it a shot

https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/trav ... versetown/ Ranked
User avatar
3eyes
Donator
Posts: 8037
Joined: May 17th, 2011, 6:00 am
Location: Philadelphia
Contact:

#12

Post by 3eyes »

:run: STILL the Gaffer!
User avatar
1SO
Posts: 1077
Joined: December 30th, 2011, 7:00 am
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Contact:

#14

Post by 1SO »

User avatar
prodigalgodson
Posts: 1319
Joined: July 30th, 2011, 6:00 am
Location: Los Angeles
Contact:

#15

Post by prodigalgodson »

Sorry if I missed it while searching, but do we have a separate poll for neo-noirs?
User avatar
Fergenaprido
Donator
Posts: 9026
Joined: June 3rd, 2014, 6:00 am
Location: Canada
Contact:

#16

Post by Fergenaprido »

prodigalgodson wrote: December 14th, 2022, 5:45 pm Sorry if I missed it while searching, but do we have a separate poll for neo-noirs?
Nope. They're included in this poll.
Cinematic Omnivore 🧚‍♂️🦫
User avatar
Fergenaprido
Donator
Posts: 9026
Joined: June 3rd, 2014, 6:00 am
Location: Canada
Contact:

#17

Post by Fergenaprido »

I went to go update my list for this poll.... and discovered I didn't participate last time. I suppose I had seen so few noirs back then that I didn't bother. Which makes sense.

So, here's my list, though it's still a work in progress and I'm hoping to catch another dozen or so before the deadline, depending on how the rest of the month goes.

https://www.imdb.com/list/ls566413593/ (fully ranked)

I still need to add the films I saw for last month's challenge too, plus look at other ballots and see if I left any of the borderline cases out.

Oh, and I've now seen 100 of the Top 150. This is a rare forum list I should be able to platinum eventually.
Cinematic Omnivore 🧚‍♂️🦫
blocho
Donator
Posts: 7724
Joined: July 20th, 2014, 6:00 am
Contact:

#18

Post by blocho »

It's been a long time since the last noir poll. I expanded my list from 45 to 73.

https://www.imdb.com/list/ls031143811/
Unranked
Last edited by blocho on January 4th, 2023, 7:11 pm, edited 4 times in total.
User avatar
prodigalgodson
Posts: 1319
Joined: July 30th, 2011, 6:00 am
Location: Los Angeles
Contact:

#19

Post by prodigalgodson »

http://www.imdb.com/list/ls566466892/

Roughly ranked. Tough list to make. I'm not crazy about having Inherent Vice in the top 20 but excluding Out of the Past.

EDIT: Shit, I woke up this morning realizing I forgot to include The Long Goodbye! Sorry Act of Violence, another Ale favorite. Also I decided Road House should be in, so there goes possibly the most iconically-photographed noir The Big Combo.
Last edited by prodigalgodson on December 19th, 2022, 4:51 pm, edited 2 times in total.
User avatar
Fergenaprido
Donator
Posts: 9026
Joined: June 3rd, 2014, 6:00 am
Location: Canada
Contact:

#20

Post by Fergenaprido »

prodigalgodson wrote: December 18th, 2022, 1:40 am https://www.imdb.com/list/ls566466892/

Roughly ranked. Tough list to make. I'm not crazy about having Inherent Vice in the top 20 but excluding Out of the Past.
"This list is not public"
Cinematic Omnivore 🧚‍♂️🦫
User avatar
OldAle1
Donator
Posts: 8328
Joined: February 9th, 2017, 7:00 am
Location: Dairyland, USA
Contact:

#21

Post by OldAle1 »

prodigalgodson wrote: December 18th, 2022, 1:40 am https://www.imdb.com/list/ls566466892/

Roughly ranked. Tough list to make. I'm not crazy about having Inherent Vice in the top 20 but excluding Out of the Past.
Me neither. Anybody who doesn't have Out of the Past in their top 20 (top 10, actually) should have their list excluded from the votes. And be horsewhipped.
It was the truth, vivid and monstrous, that all the while he had waited the wait was itself his portion..
User avatar
prodigalgodson
Posts: 1319
Joined: July 30th, 2011, 6:00 am
Location: Los Angeles
Contact:

#22

Post by prodigalgodson »

Fergenaprido wrote: December 18th, 2022, 1:49 am
prodigalgodson wrote: December 18th, 2022, 1:40 am https://www.imdb.com/list/ls566466892/

Roughly ranked. Tough list to make. I'm not crazy about having Inherent Vice in the top 20 but excluding Out of the Past.
"This list is not public"
Ah thanks, hopefully fixed now.
User avatar
prodigalgodson
Posts: 1319
Joined: July 30th, 2011, 6:00 am
Location: Los Angeles
Contact:

#23

Post by prodigalgodson »

OldAle1 wrote: December 18th, 2022, 2:03 am
prodigalgodson wrote: December 18th, 2022, 1:40 am https://www.imdb.com/list/ls566466892/

Roughly ranked. Tough list to make. I'm not crazy about having Inherent Vice in the top 20 but excluding Out of the Past.
Me neither. Anybody who doesn't have Out of the Past in their top 20 (top 10, actually) should have their list excluded from the votes. And be horsewhipped.
Haha. Well I've given it enough chances to wow me.
User avatar
filmbantha
Posts: 917
Joined: July 10th, 2013, 6:00 am
Contact:

#25

Post by filmbantha »

I'm not a huge film-noir fan (most of them tend to blur into one another in my memory after a while) but I have managed to put together a small ranked list of favourites and will be interested in using the results to help broaden my horizons.

https://www.imdb.com/list/ls566965554/
beasterne
Posts: 1545
Joined: May 22nd, 2013, 6:00 am
Contact:

#27

Post by beasterne »

Here's my ranked list: https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/favo ... beasterne/

After looking at the past list and seeing where neo-noirs land, I'm thinking we need to consider having a poll focused specifically on that subgenre. Chinatown at #61 in the last poll is crazy low to me (and it's not even one of my favorites). But I'm sure it's largely to do with voters not wanting to rank it high on their ballot of film noirs. It would have to be near or at the top of a neo-noir poll though.
User avatar
sol
Donator
Posts: 16485
Joined: February 3rd, 2017, 7:00 am
Location: Perth, WA, Australia
Contact:

#29

Post by sol »

|iCM | IMDb | Letterboxd | Gold Derby
Image
Long live the new flesh!
User avatar
joachimt
Donator
Posts: 35797
Joined: February 16th, 2012, 7:00 am
Location: Netherlands
Contact:

#30

Post by joachimt »

https://www.imdb.com/list/ls566893521/

I find it hard to decide which is noir and which isn't so I just filtered my fav-movies-list on:
- genre tag "noir" on IMDb
- included in TSPDT's 1,000 noirs
- top 150 of previous poll
ICM-profile
Fergenaprido: "I find your OCD to be adorable, J"
AB537
Posts: 2332
Joined: April 21st, 2018, 6:00 am
Location: Toronto, Canada
Contact:

#31

Post by AB537 »

My submission: https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/ab53 ... lms/ab537/

1-125 ranked, rest unranked.

As others have observed, this is a tricky category to define. Filters I used included IMDB genre tags, the TSPDT noir list, and genre pages from Netflix and Criterion. Also a bit of common sense for films that are clearly noir but slipped through these cracks (e.g. Baltasar Kormakur's Jar City (2006)).
ICM Forum Challenge winner: 2020 Crime, 2021 UK/Ireland
User avatar
prodigalgodson
Posts: 1319
Joined: July 30th, 2011, 6:00 am
Location: Los Angeles
Contact:

#33

Post by prodigalgodson »

joachimt wrote: December 26th, 2022, 7:11 pm https://www.imdb.com/list/ls566893521/

I find it hard to decide which is noir and which isn't so I just filtered my fav-movies-list on:
- genre tag "noir" on IMDb
- included in TSPDT's 1,000 noirs
- top 150 of previous poll
Ah yes, what list would be complete without top 3 stalwarts The Bad Sleep Well, Le trou, and Fight Club? :D
User avatar
Melvelet
Posts: 2763
Joined: March 29th, 2013, 6:00 am
Location: Berlin, Germany
Contact:

#34

Post by Melvelet »

ImageImage


Current focus: 80s & 90s, Sci-Fi, Horror, Japan
Last.fm | RYM
User avatar
joachimt
Donator
Posts: 35797
Joined: February 16th, 2012, 7:00 am
Location: Netherlands
Contact:

#35

Post by joachimt »

prodigalgodson wrote: December 28th, 2022, 3:24 am
joachimt wrote: December 26th, 2022, 7:11 pm https://www.imdb.com/list/ls566893521/

I find it hard to decide which is noir and which isn't so I just filtered my fav-movies-list on:
- genre tag "noir" on IMDb
- included in TSPDT's 1,000 noirs
- top 150 of previous poll
Ah yes, what list would be complete without top 3 stalwarts The Bad Sleep Well, Le trou, and Fight Club? :D
I wouldn't mind deleting them, if people don't consider those as noir. They are all on TSPDT's Noir list.
ICM-profile
Fergenaprido: "I find your OCD to be adorable, J"
User avatar
insomnius
Posts: 1093
Joined: January 10th, 2013, 7:00 am
Location: Stockholm
Contact:

#37

Post by insomnius »

User avatar
OldAle1
Donator
Posts: 8328
Joined: February 9th, 2017, 7:00 am
Location: Dairyland, USA
Contact:

#38

Post by OldAle1 »

1-65 ranked, 66+ unranked/chronological. May add a few more before the deadline but this is close.

https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/film ... zzlehatch/
stats

By decade:

06 - 1930s
99 - 1940s
95 - 1950s
31 - 1960s
21 - 1970s
22 - 1980s
22 - 1990s
20 - 2000s
15 - 2010s
02 - 2020s

By country - somewhere between 225 and 240 are American or co-productions that include the USA. The rest:

27 - France
19 - UK
11 - Japan
10 - Mexico
05 - Canada, Iran
04 - Argentina
03 - Germany/West Germany, South Korea
02 - Egypt, Hong Kong, Philippines, Spain
01 - Australia, Brazil, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Hungary, India, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, Tunisia

Top directors (3+ films)

08 - Fritz Lang
06 - Alfred Hitchcock
05 - Coen brothers, Anthony Mann, Jean-Pierre Melville, Robert Siodmak
04 - Brian De Palma, Phil Karlson, David Lynch, Orson Welles, Robert Wise
03 - John Brahm, Henri-Georges Clouzot, David Cronenberg, Cy Endfield, John Farrow, David Fincher, Richard Fleischer, Samuel Fuller, Akira Kurosawa, Ida Lupino, Otto Preminger, Martin Scorsese, Billy Wilder
It was the truth, vivid and monstrous, that all the while he had waited the wait was itself his portion..
User avatar
OldAle1
Donator
Posts: 8328
Joined: February 9th, 2017, 7:00 am
Location: Dairyland, USA
Contact:

#40

Post by OldAle1 »

beasterne wrote: December 22nd, 2022, 5:16 pm Here's my ranked list: https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/favo ... beasterne/

After looking at the past list and seeing where neo-noirs land, I'm thinking we need to consider having a poll focused specifically on that subgenre. Chinatown at #61 in the last poll is crazy low to me (and it's not even one of my favorites). But I'm sure it's largely to do with voters not wanting to rank it high on their ballot of film noirs. It would have to be near or at the top of a neo-noir poll though.
Not sure why we'd need a separate poll; a secondary list could always be created of post-1959 (or whatever year you want to use as a cutoff) films. Then again there might be people willing to participate in a dedicated poll who refuse to put anything outside the classic era on their lists for this poll. And people like me who are frustrated that so many people have such a narrow view of what noir is.

Eh, can't win.
It was the truth, vivid and monstrous, that all the while he had waited the wait was itself his portion..
Post Reply