1940s - The Great Age of Film-Making

The late 1930s to the early 1950s marks the most interesting period in British and American film-making. In particular, the move from standard genre (gangster, comedy, horrror) to a darker, more mature approach. This produced some of the finest moments in all cinema.

1939 has been described as the peak for Hollywood, but I would disagree. I see it as the end of the standard genre style. The Roaring Twenties is the swansong of the gangster film, but already James Cagney's sad downfall from big shot to taxi driver anticipates the emergence of film noir.

This darker style was assisted by European directors and writers coming to Hollywood as the Nazis influenced spread, and the world became engulfed in a second world war.

By 1949 and White Heat, Cagney's Cody Jarrett has become a more complex, isolated figure than previous hoodlums.

For me, the highlights as the forties progressed are The Maltese Falcon, Seventh Victim, Double Indemnity, The Postman Always Rings Twice, Build My Gallows High (Out of the Past in the US), Odd Man Out, White Heat and The Third Man. Add to these the contributions of Alfred Hitchcock, Fritz Lang and Robert Siodmak and you have a body of films that is unequalled.