Out of the Past

Quintessential. A film so integral to the noir canon that it's difficult to speak of in terms that aren't cliche. The script is quick-witted, shot in razor-sharp contrast, with Mitchum at the top of his game. More personally, it was an essential building block of my own cinephilia. It's a shrewd and twisty picture about skeletons that come bursting out of the closet, and the convoluted but ultimately futile attempts to push them back in. Dishonest reconciliation leads to doom.

If you were to take all of the defining characteristics of film noir in high quality and throw them into a blender, you'd end up with this. The amazingly stark chiaroscuro, voice-over narration, private eyes, a sultry femme fatale, disjointed plot, a mysterious past - it's all here. And it's all done to perfection.

When Kirk Douglas (in a really laid back performance) offers Robert Mitchum a cigarette as he enters, Mitchum says, "Smoking," and raises his hand to reveal an already lit cig. I don't even smoke and I think that's badass.

Detectives, underworld figures, femmes fatale, double-crosses and heaps of murder... pretty standard noir, but a fine example of the genre. Robert Mitchum is superb in the lead.

Sweet movie. Great plot and superb direction make Out of the Past one of the most competent film noir movies I have seen. The main characters are all derivative, but I think that's also what makes them so impressive. It's like all of the best aspects of the legendary genre brought together at their superior form. The visuals in particular are worth noting being nothing short of breathtaking. Fantastic movie, it's highly recommendable to anyone into noir or looking for a good place to start.