Pitfall (Andre de Toth, 1948)

I confess to never even having heard of this until very recently, but it's very fine indeed. A melodrama in film noir clothing, even at this relatively early stage in the genre the film is able to play with the conventions – there's a femme fatale who isn't one, as well as forgotten briefcase that doesn't turn out to be the fatal mistake we assume it will be, and the first violence comes from a source that is only predictable in retrospect. Much as I like Dick Powell in films like Murder, My Sweet he's a more convincing ordinary man who willingly gets himself into trouble (because he thinks it won't really be that much trouble) than he is a Philip Marlowe. Lizabeth Scott, Jane Wyatt and Raymond Burr are all strong and effective. Dramatic photography is used sparingly and non-gratuitously. The "non-femme fatale" is thrown away rather cruelly at the end, but though this saves the middle class marriage, I think one could make a case that the film does at least raise the question of whether it's a price worth paying, and for whom.