The first example I will talk about is “The Maltese Falcon” (1941) directed by John Huston, this film starred, huge film noir star, Humphrey Bogart, and Mary Astor. Sam Spade (Bogart) is a private investigator, meeting prospective client Miss Ruth Wonderly (Astor). Wonderly hires Spade to help find her missing sister. After receiving a substantial retainer, Spade’s assistant, Archer (Jerome Cowen), helps out and that night she is killed. The film is about Spade trying to find out why his assistant was killed. This is known as one of the classic film noirs, and one of the best films of all time. Unusual camera angles—sometimes low to the ground, revealing the ceilings of rooms are used to emphasize the nature of the characters and their actions.
The second example is “Double Indemnity” (1944) directed by Billy Wilder, and starring Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck. Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray) is a successful insurance salesman. Neff first meets the sultry Phyllis Dietrichson (Barbara Stanwyck) during a routine house call to renew an automobile insurance policy for her husband. A flirtation develops, at least until Phyllis asks how she could take out a policy on her husband's life without his knowing it. Neff realizes she is contemplating murder, and he wants no part of it. Neff is pursued by Dietrichson who ups her flirtation, and get Neff to agree that the two of them will kill her husband. It is about the downfall of the plan, and the betrayal of the “femme fatale”.
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