D.O.A (1949) film noir, remake was made with Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid. This is better!
Raising Arizona (1987) Coen brothers, a classic and must to see.
Reservoir Dogs (1992) Tarantino, what more can I say?
Se7en (1995) Possibly scariest movie ever with Brad PItt and Morgan Freedman, about the seven deadly sins. Not for the faint at heart!
Shadow of a doubt(1943) Hitchcock, film noir, thriller.
Silence of the Lambs (1991) Good related text
Fargo(1996) Coen bros again. Really cool, using female pregnant protagonist.
L.A.Confidential (1997) I'm sure you've all seen it..if not..DO!
The Boys (1998) One of the scariest Aussie thrillers anywhere. Toni Collette and David Wenham.
Insomnia (2002) fairly recent with Robin Williams and Al Pacino.
Also, here's some texts. Seriously ppl its worthwhile just going to the library and spending an hour picking out 5 texts to read over a month or two.
Jeffrey Deaver "The bone collector"
Sue Grafton "A is for alibi"(whole series)
James PAtterson "The beach house"
kathy Reichs "deja dead"
Dashiell Hammett "The thin man"
Umberto Eco "The name of the rose" (the detective is a monk!)
Mario Puzo "The Godfather"
Minette Walters 'The glass house"
Gabriel Lord (can't think of a title but they're aussie and really cool)
Hey that's my old post from before.. I'm just going to add some to it:
Shawshank Redemption (1994) SO SAD,prison sub-genre, Tim robbins and Morgan Freedman are great together.
Pulp Fiction (1994) Quentin again, he's my fav, so yeah, just watch it. It's a homage to 70's director Sam peckinpah, the time frame is all over the place, but it's good.
Rear Window (1954) Alfred Hitchcock. Classis crime, voyeurism, Grace Kelly and Jimmy Stewart.
Gilda (1946) Rita hayworth, in HER movie. Casinos, music, singing, flirty women, sex..one for the boys and the girls.
Double Indemnity (1944) film-noir type thriller.
The Maltese Falcon (1941) we Did this as an introduction to crime, very typical crime movie, with great use of conventions like red herrings and such. And, Sam Spade the archetypal detective is soo seductive.
Psycho(1960) I'm sure you all know it. Boy loves Mummy just a little too much.
Silence of the Lambs, Red Dragon or Hannibal. Good crime fiction, loads of notes available on them.
Red Rock West(1992) Nicholas Cage in a small indie film, one of his best though.
The fugitive (1993) Classic tale of a man wrongfully accused
Falling down (1993) Michael Douglas, urban reality. An unemployed defence worker frustrated with the flaws in society, begins to psychotically and violently lash out against them.
Dog Day Afternoon(1975) In August, 1972, S.Worbitz robbed a bank. 250 cops, the FBI, 8hostages and 2000 onlookers will never forget what took place. A man robs a bank to pay for his lover's sex change operation;it turns into a hostage situation and a media circus. Very unusual film. Pacino is great, in this indictment on the media, society and discrimination.
The Sting (1973) Paul Newman and Robery Redford team up as eye candy in 30's chicago. This plot gets copied a lot, very good though.
Idiot Box(1997) Ben Mendelson and Jeremy Sims, AFI winner, westie no hoper hoods with too much time on their hands. Good characters, irony and suspense used well. Focus is on the criminals.
Ok, written text wise, Phantom Comics work incredibly well. Also, A good book I just recently read is "The Act of God" by Susan Sloan. It focuses on the supposed criminal, and has the biggest twist at the end. Also, search some of thses authors:
Lisa Scottoline: good feminist type lit.
Grisham
Archer
Jeffery Deaver
Robert Tanenbaum
Harlen Coben
Barry Maitland
Tess Gerritsen-awesome collection of books, begin with 'The Surgeon" really scary, really great.
Dominick Dunne has a book of short crime stories called "Justice"
Other places to look of you've exhausted this list is old newspaper articles, search SMH or the Telegraph. Also try recent stuff on the Sydney Writers Festival, I know they had crime workshops, there would be notes floating somewhere on the net.
If anyone's really stuck on analysing texts, try sparknotes. I wouldn't recommend it all the time, but for background info they can be good.
Hope everyone is doing well, I know I'm struggling with bloody SBS, but I am beginning to appreciate CONVENTION, CONVENTION, CONVENTION!
Also, remember lots of these texts are ones that EVERYONE uses (like Se7en) but some of them are unusual. Go for the ones you feel comfortable about writing about, not nesc. the "cool" ones.
