Jim Thompson Movies

Pulp fiction writer Jim Thompson's novels have been adapted into noirish movies such as The Grifters and this one, directed by Michael Oblowitz. This unusual dark tragedy is narrated by Marty (Billy Zane), a successful investigative reporter who is unhappy with his shy and sick wife. As children, Marty and his twin sister Carol (Gina Gershon) saw their father and his mistress murdered in their home. Their mother (Rue McClanahan) took the children on the road, and they had a tumultuous childhood before finally settling in a small town in California. Marty and Carol had an incestuous relationship, and now they resume it after Marty leaves his wife and job to visit his sister and mother. Carol has been divorced and has become a cheap hooker. Marty soon hooks up with a classy, highly professional policewoman, Lois Archer (Sheryl Lee), who has a secret need to treated abusively, and they spend decadent weekends together at a beach cottage that Lois and her husband own. Marty and Carol plot to get the cabin for themselves after Carol poisons a couple of gangsters who are horning in on her prostitution business. ~ Michael Betzold, Rovi

The Getaway, a remake of Sam Peckinpah's excellent escape thriller of the same name, adapted from a story by Jim Thompson, is the story of ill-fated romance on the run. Doc McCoy (Alec Baldwin) is released from a Mexican prison with the help of gangster Jack Benyon (James Woods) who wants Doc's help in the hold-up of a racetrack. With the help of Doc's wife Carol (Kim Basinger), and Jack's thugs Rudy (Michael Madsen) and Frank (Philip Hoffman), the robbery is successful, but a guard is murdered. Doc also finds out that Carol has had an affair with Benyon. Carol shoots Benyon and the two flee for Mexico and freedom. ~ Linda Rasmussen, Rovi

Based on a book by the great crime novelist Jim Thompson, this dark thriller is set in a small coastal community in New Jersey, where the only action in town is a run-down nightclub called Pavillion. The club's owner, Pete (Jackson Sims), can barely make the payroll for Rags the bartender (William Russell), Myra the barmaid (Jorjan Fox) (who is also Pete's daughter), and clean-up man Ralph (Steve Monroe), so in a bid to bring in more customers, Pete hires a stripper, Danny Lee (Cathy Haase). Danny Lee's act soon turns Ralph's head, which is not good news for his wife Luanne (Loretta Gross). Twenty years older than her husband, Luanne is unable to get out of bed (though the doctor says that there's no medical explanation for this), and while she grudging allows Ralph to sleep with other women, the notion that he might fall in love with someone else sends her into a fit of rage. Luanne's greatest talent (and her most potent weapon) is her gift for gossip, and when she begins to suspect that Ralph might want to leave her for Danny Lee, she starts spreading ugly rumors that have just enough basis in fact to stick. Before long, Luanne has circulated the word that Myra is a drug addict and that her boyfriend Bobbie (Andrew Lee Barrett) is pushing dope at the club, that Pete had an incestuous relationship with Myra, and that Rags was responsible for the death of his family in a car wreck. As this bitter misinformation sweeps through the town, Luanne turns up dead, but this proves to be the beginning and not the end of a wave of violence and ugliness. The Kill-Off was one of three Jim Thompson adaptations to reach the screen within the space of a year, along with The Grifters and After Dark, My Sweet. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Director Stephen Frears' tense adaptation of Jim Thompson's novel The Grifters was one of a number of revival film noirs in the first half of the '90s. Updating the setting to contemporary Los Angeles, the film follows a trio of con artists who are intent on out-foxing each other. Roy Dillon (John Cusack) is a simple, two-bit con, whose life is thrown into turmoil when his estranged mother Lilly (Anjelica Huston) returns home in an attempt to evade the law. Lilly doesn't warm to Roy's girlfriend Myra Langtry (Annette Bening), who is too similar to herself. Soon, the two women are competing for Roy in a battle that is more of a power struggle than a pursuit of affection, and the battle quickly turns dangerous. Huston was nominated for an Academy Award for her work. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rovi

The title Serie Noire refers to a popular French mystery series, and literally means "Black Series." The story is based on American author Jim Thompson's hardboiled detective story A Hell of a Woman, and is close in spirit to the U.S. film noir mysteries of the 1940s. Frank Poupart (Patrick Dewaere) is a 30-year-old loser, a salesman who is barely scraping by, whose wife has just left him "just to think things over." He meets Mona (Marie Trintignant), a quiet, dreamy 15-year-old girl whose aunt has offered her to him for his sexual pleasure in return for a sweater. They become lovers, and both of them see a way out of their impoverished dead-end existence when Mona tells him that her aunt (who is also her landlady) has a large stash of money hidden away. They decide to kill her, and also kill a Greek boxer who owes Frank money, making it look like a murder/suicide. When Frank's wife returns to him, eager to begin their marriage again, he kills her out of sheer frustration. Later he is blackmailed by Staplin (Bernard Blier), his employer, and is left with no loot, no wife, three heinous crimes on his hands, and a clueless adolescent girlfriend. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

Previously filmed in 1942 as The Falcon Takes Over and in 1944 as Murder, My Sweet, Raymond Chandler's Farewell My Lovely was given its third cinematic go-round under its original title in 1975. Spouting the Chandlerish prose as if it were second nature, Robert Mitchum stars as 1940s private eye Philip Marlowe, hired by the goonish Moose Malloy (Jack O'Halloran) to locate his former girl friend. This involves Marlowe in the theft of a jade necklace, which in turn leads to murder. All roads seemingly lead to adventuress Mrs. Grayle (Charlotte Rampling), wealthily married but far from satisfied. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

John Cassavetes guest stars as Pvt. Kalb, newest member of King Company. Saunders (Vic Morrow) is none too happy with the arrival of Kalb, who has a reputation for goldbricking and cowardice--and who may or may not have been responsible for the decimation of the two previous squads to which he'd been assigned. Nor do things bode well for Saunders and his men when, on the eve of a dangerous mission, Kalb sustains a convenient leg wound. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The Killing was director Stanley Kubrick's first major film effort -- though, like Kubrick's earlier films, it was economically produced with an inexpensive cast. In a variation of his Asphalt Jungle role, Sterling Hayden plays veteran criminal Johnny Clay, planning one last big heist before settling down to a respectable marriage with Fay (Colleen Gray). Teaming with several cohorts, Johnny masterminds a racetrack robbery. The basic flaw is that all the crooks involved are losers and small-timers who find themselves in way over their heads despite their supposed cleverness. None of the participants is more pathetic than George Peatty (Elisha Cook Jr.), who is goaded into the robbery by his covetous and far-from-faithful wife (Marie Windsor). As in a Greek tragedy, Johnny's best-laid schemes go awry. Prominently featured in the cast of The Killing are offbeat character actors Tim Carey and Joe Turkel, who'd show up with equally showy roles in future Kubrick productions. The Killing is based on the novel Clean Break by Lionel White. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi