Despite our busy schedules, as author and podcaster (Sergio Angelini), author and actor (Nick Cardillo) and author, blogger, cat herder and book club moderator (yours truly), the Three Amigos frequently touch base, either to gather for a draft of great mysteries in film or literature, or to discuss what our next draft should be. This year, it has been a pleasure to sit down with the boys and choose our Top Twenty Literary Detectives and our draft of  The Greatest Film Sleuths. It has been especially meaningful to have YOUR participation, my dear readers, in helping us craft the order of these lists. 

Ready for one more???

This idea came from our Nick, which is funny because when the inspiration for this draft first appeared in movie theatres, Nick was about fourteen years shy of being a twinkle in Mrs. Cardillo’s eye! Let’s face it: 1982 was not a banner year for mystery movies. Of the over two dozen genre films that came out, most were proof that the first iteration of the slasher film was dying its own slow death. Still, you could pay around $3.00 for a ticket (I looked it up) and watch a masked killer stalk pretty girls in a college dorm, a sorority, on the ski slopes, in a national park, in a mortuary, or just by answering the phone!

There were a few notable films that year. I have spoken many times of my fondness for Evil Under the Sun – the stylish-to-the-point-of-camp follow-up to Death on the Nile – and Rehearsal for Murder, a clever TV-movie that was then turned into a stage play so that I could direct it at my high school. But no film was more notable – or odd – than Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid, directed by Carl Reiner and billed as “a neo-noir mystery-comedy film” that served as both a parody and an homage to the late great days of classic noir. 

The movie was filmed in black and white, both because that’s how film noir should look, and because Plaid is partly a collage film, in that the story is told both with original footage and with the insertion of clips from classic noir films spanning the 1940’s. It stars Steve Martin as private investigator Rigby Reardon, and Rachel Ward as Juliet Forrest, who hires the private dick to investigate her father’s death. Director Reiner even inserts himself into the cast, as he did most famously with his greatest creation, The Dick Van Dyke Show, where he played egomaniacal star (and Rob Petrie’s boss) Alan Brady.

I’ll be honest: I think very little of this movie. Yes, it’s interesting to see Steve Martin “interacting” with Humphrey Bogart as Philip Marlowe, or dressing up as Phyllis Diedrichson to seduce information out of Fred MacMurray, or playing Cody Jarrett’s mother to visit James Cagney in prison and worm information out of him. Yet, even as I write this down, none of those moments are as funny as you might hope and, in fact, most of the so-called humor in the film is puerile in the extreme. Mel Brooks did it better; so did the Airplane movies. 

Maybe you’ll enjoy the film more than I did; for now, let it serve as the inspiration for our autumn draft. Reiner incorporates clips from nineteen films noirs from the 1940’s. You can usually see the clips coming a mile away, as certain characters from these films become witnesses, victims and villains in Martin’s journey to solve the mystery of Ward’s father’s death. Still, a clip from a classic is a clip from a classic. And there are so many great films, including some of my favorite noirs, some I question even being film noir, and a few I’ve never seen before. 

Nick suggested that we rank these titles into a list, which means we have a lot of watching (and re-watching to do). And because I want to get YOU into the act, I’m announcing the draft now, even though we won’t be getting together for it until Noir-vember! But first, here’s the list:  

• Johnny Eager (MGM, 1941) – This one is new to me, and the premise sounds more romantic than the usual noir: Robert Taylor is Johnny, a paroled criminal who falls for Lana Turner, who is a sociology student (?!) and who also happens to be the stepdaughter of Edward Arnold, who plays the D.A. who put Johnny in jail! Kinky!

• Suspicion (RKO, 1941) – Well-known and not beloved Hitchcock adaptation of Frances Iles’ Before the Fact, best remembered for giving one the chills when Cary Grant puts Joan Fontaine to bed with a glass of milk.

• This Gun for Hire (Universal, 1942) – I’m looking forward to discovering this one, an adaptation of Graham Greene’s novel, A Gun for Sale, starring Veronica Lake and Robert Preston, who gets top billing over Alan Ladd and Laird Cregar!

• The Glass Key (Universal, 1942) – Speaking of Alan Ladd (paired again here with Veronica Lake), I swore I would never watch this adaptation before reading Dashiell Hammett’s novel. Let’s see if I have the time to crack open those pages! 

• Keeper of the Flame (MGM, 1943) – Most of the pairings of Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy are sparkling comedies, but a couple of them are not. This one is . . . not my favorite (I prefer State of the Union), but it has been a long time since I watched it, and I’m looking forward to a rematch. (Note: the use of this film is actually uncredited in Plaid as only the scene of a car wreck is used; it is the instigating mystery of both films!)

• Double Indemnity (Universal, 1944) – Arguably the crème de la crème of classic noir . . . Stanwyck, MacMurray, Robinson – need I say more?

• The Lost Weekend (Universal, 1945) – Ughh, I really don’t like movies about drunks, but Billy Wilder directed it and both Sergio Angelini and Wikipedia categorize it as film noir, so I guess I’m stuck!

• The Big Sleep (Warner Bros., 1946) – God, the 40’s were filled with great movies, weren’t they? Bogie at – if not his best (that’s The Maltese Falcon) then at his sexiest. Watch him romance Lauren Bacall, Martha Vickers, and Dorothy Malone. Watch him solve the murder of the chauffeur – oh, right, not even Raymond Chandler knew who killed that guy!

• Humoresque (Warner Bros., 1946) – A sort of companion piece to Deception, but I’ve never seen it before and the pairing of the always fascinating John Garfield with Joan Crawford makes me excited to watch this for the first time. 

• Deception (Warner Bros., 1946) – Bette Davis, Paul Henreid and Claude Rains are reunited after Now, Voyager, a film I would much rather be watching than this turgid thing. (Maybe I’ll like it better this time.)

• The Killers (Universal, 1946) – Burt Lancaster and Ava Gardner head a sterling cast in a classic noir that I can’t remember having seen!! (Clips from this one are used a lot in Plaid!)

• The Postman Always Rings Twice (MGM, 1946) – It’s Double Indemnity without the insurance angle or Stanwyck or MacMurray or Robinson. Instead, we have Lana Turner and John Garfield gettin’ tawdry before they kill poor ol’ Cecil Kellaway. Can’t wait to watch!

• Notorious (RKO, 1941) – One of my favorite Hitchcocks: Grant, Bergman and Rains – it doesn’t get better than this! 

• Dark Passage (Warner Bros., 1947) – Another favorite, with Bogie and Bacall dodging Agnes Moorhead on the streets of San Francisco! Love it!

• I Walk Alone (Paramount, 1947) – I think the only thing I know about this one is that Jack Benny did a parody on his radio show. (Or was it “I Stand Condemned?!?”) Another new-to-me noir starring Burt Lancaster and Lizabeth Scott.

• Sorry, Wrong Number (Paramount, 1948) – Barbara Stanwyck give her most graceful and subtle performances as a – oh, wait! I’m kidding! Stanwyck has 89 minutes of hysterics in her bed as the surprise ending you should have seen coming closes in on her! 

• White Heat (Warner Bros., 1949) – “Top of the world, ma!”

• The Bribe (MGM, 1949) – I’d never even heard of this one before I got the list! Post-war racketeering and Washington politics collide. Robert Taylor, Ava Gardner, Vincent Price and Charles Laughton participate!!

• In a Lonely Place (Columbia, 1950) – Maybe the darkest film Humphrey Bogart ever made. Each time I see it, I get scared for Gloria Grahame all over again!

So how will YOU be part of the Plaid Draft? If you examine the list, you will notice that there are NINETEEN films, which does NOT divide evenly between three drafters. Nick, Sergio and I will each get SIX spots on the draft list, with the order of our placement to be determined through a trivia contest. 

YOUR responsibility is to select one of the films above that you feel MUST be placed in one of the TOP FIVE POSITIONS. In the comments section below (or in the comments on social media where you find this post – Instagam, Bluesky, Facebook, or X), simply tell us your favorite film on the list. The movie that gets the most votes will become READER’S CHOICE and is guaranteed a slot in the Top Five. Furthermore, the drafter who wins the trivia contest will be given the privilege of placing the Reader’s Choice film in the slot of his choosing (from 5^th to 1^st place). 

This gives YOU an important say in the top rankings of the list, and it gives all three of the Amigos the incentive to bone up on our film noir. So get cracking! Send us your suggestions for Top Film; if you have any uncertainty, take the next few months to watch any or all of these films. We’ll be accepting suggestions up till November 1. 

See you in Noir-vember!!