FORCE OF EVIL (1948)
Noir melodrama about a lawyer (John Garfield) who schemes with a gangster to form a monopoly over the numbers racket, the underground illegal lottery. But the takeover plan has some complications.
This is a masterpiece of socialist storytelling, hammering home the idea that brutal and selfish world of business squeezes the humanity out of us. I can’t believe this movie exists; who would have the idea to make a gangster movie about the numbers racket that focuses almost entirely on the common people hurt by it, making a gangster story a tearjerker about the impact of capitalism on honest, working people. The ensemble cast is astounding, every character tearjerking and memorable. And this movie has some of the hippest, sexiest noir dialogue. And I think this one is perhaps the greatest example of the wonderful noir device in which a brilliant plan is unravels because of irrational, sentimental attachments to family and morality. The things that ruin our grand plans are often the things that make us human.
