Film Noir 2022
Screening Dates
  • August 6, 2022 8:20
  • August 12, 2022 6:30
  • August 22, 2022 8:45
Events
New Restoration

“Some extravagant noir stylings from director John H. Auer.”

Museum of Modern Art, New York

Held in high regard by Martin Scorsese, whose film preservation project, The Film Foundation, helped rescue and restore it, this lurid lust-triangle noir from B‑movie auteur John H. Auer delivers a who-got-popped mystery with heat! A higher-end production for lower-rung studio Republic, The Flame stars John Carroll as George McAllister, pariah of a well-heeled family and mastermind of a nasty swindle that has his Parisian doll marrying his dying billionaire brother (Robert Paige). Things get messy—and murdery—when she falls for the chump. Like many a noir yarn, the fatalistic story is told in flashback by a character giving up the ghost. The film took a critical drubbing upon release; its stock has since risen after being included in Scorsese’s ​“Republic Rediscovered” series, presented at MoMA in 2018. City That Never Sleeps, also by Auer, featured in our 2021 noir season.

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