7 Best Classic Noir Movies to Watch if You Loved 'Spider-Noir'

Play it again, Spidey

Spider-Noir may have been unceremoniously canceled after a compelling first season, but Nicolas Cage's turn as the spider hero will forever remain a classic and authentic entry in the noir genre. Truly, the Prime Video series is nothing like the live-action Spider-Man films that have preceded it. The show is much more similar to the films it’s inspired by (minus the web-slinging, of course). Being a hard-boiled detective story with morally ambiguous characters, all accented by moody lighting and a running inner monologue, Spider-Noir draws heavily from the genre known as “film noir.” Coming into prominence in the 1940s and 1950s, film noir covers a range of genres, but the movies that fit the bill are mostly crime dramas, often with a detective or private eye at the center. They're also fairly cynical in nature, as they depict a corrupt world informed by the desperation of the Great Depression and the horrors of World War II.

The director of Spider Noir’s first two episodes previously told Polygon which movies informed the look and feel of the series. He mentioned four of them, and along with those, I included a handful of personal recommendations in the list below, for those who are all done with Spider-Noir and find themselves itching for a bit more of that same moody vibe, check out some of these movies.

7 Chinatown (1974)

Directed by Roman Polanski (yes, that Roman Polanski), Chinatown stars Jack Nicholson as J. J. "Jake" Gittes, a private detective in 1930s Los Angeles who is hired by a woman claiming to be Evelyn Cross-Mulwray (Faye Dunaway) to investigate her husband's infidelity. But the seemingly routine case soon pulls Jake into a sprawling web of murder and corruption that puts his own life in danger.

If you’re new to film noir, Chinatown is a good place to start for a few reasons: It’s fairly modern — or at least comparatively modern next to many of the films on this list — it’s in color, and it stars an actor nearly everyone will recognize. The film is often cited as one of the greatest ever made, in part because of the way it blends classic noir conventions with the sensibilities of a modern psychological thriller. Although it arrived well after film noir’s golden age in the 1940s and ’50s, Chinatown may be the definitive example of neo-noir. So it’s hardly surprising that Spider-Noir director Harry Bradbeer cited it as an influence on his own modern take on the genre.

6 Casablanca (1942)

Another of Bradbeer’s suggestions — and another movie often cited as one of the greatest films ever made — is Casablanca. Directed by Michael Curtiz, the film centers on Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart), an American expatriate who runs a nightclub in Morocco during World War II. When his former lover Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman) unexpectedly reenters his life, she asks him to help her husband escape Nazi-controlled territory.

With the unparalleled romantic chemistry between Bogart and Bergman and an exciting, high-stakes wartime story, Casablanca lives up to its reputation as both a sweeping romantic epic and an all-time great film. It isn’t generally considered film noir, leaning more toward romance and wartime drama, but it shares several of the genre’s defining visual elements, including stark lighting and smoky interiors. Rick Blaine may also be Bogart’s greatest role. Since Nicolas Cage modeled his Spider-Noir character in part on Bogart, it’s easy to see why he and Bradbeer looked to Casablanca for inspiration.

5 Touch of Evil (1958)

Written and directed by Orson Welles, Touch of Evil centers on Mexican prosecutor Ramon Miguel “Mike” Vargas (Charlton Heston), who is honeymooning with his American wife, Susan (Janet Leigh), in a Mexican border town. Their trip is interrupted when a car crosses into the United States and explodes, killing two people. Vargas joins the investigation, only to find himself caught between a corrupt American police captain and a Mexican crime family with reasons to want him out of the way.

The first true film noir from the genre’s classic era to appear on this list, Touch of Evil leans heavily into noir’s crime-story roots. The movie is especially beloved for its cinematography, from its wildly stylized camera angles and movements to its low-key lighting and heavy shadows. Bradbeer also named it among his inspirations, and its influence is easy to imagine in Spider-Noir’s darker moments, particularly its dimly lit street scenes.

4 The Killing (1956)

Stanley Kubrick’s The Killing was the final source of inspiration Bradbeer mentioned in the interview, and it likely informed the grittier side of Spider-Noir, particularly the criminal empire run by Silvermane (Brendan Gleeson).

The Killing follows recently released ex-con Johnny Clay (Sterling Hayden), who assembles a crew of criminals for an elaborate racetrack robbery. It was Kubrick’s third feature film, released when he was just 27, and its nonlinear structure and stark violence helped distinguish it at the time. Blending the shadowy style and fatalism of film noir with the tension of a heist thriller, The Killing remains an excellent film in its own right, even if it’s often overshadowed by Kubrick’s later masterpieces.

3 The Maltese Falcon (1941)

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The Maltese Falcon is the third film on this list often cited as one of the greatest ever made. It’s also a quintessential film noir, which is why I was a little surprised Bradbeer didn’t mention it during our conversation. It may still have influenced him or Nicolas Cage, however: It’s another Humphrey Bogart movie, and this time Bogart plays private eye Sam Spade, one of fiction’s most famous and influential detectives.

Created by Dashiell Hammett for his 1930 novel The Maltese Falcon, Spade helped redefine the popular image of the fictional investigator. Unlike polished super-geniuses such as Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot, Spade was a hard-edged, morally complicated figure who helped establish the template for generations of detectives to come.

Directed by John Huston, The Maltese Falcon follows Spade as he becomes entangled in the hunt for a priceless artifact coveted by an assortment of shady — and wonderfully entertaining — characters. It’s a great movie and perhaps the definitive example of classic film noir.

2 The Thin Man (1934)

W.S. Van Dyke’s The Thin Man is often described as “proto-noir” because it arrived before the genre fully took shape in the 1940s. William Powell stars as Nick Charles, a retired detective who returns to New York City with his wealthy wife, Nora (Myrna Loy), and finds himself drawn into a missing-person case. Although the film contains the mystery, murder, and shadowy characters that would become hallmarks of noir, it’s ultimately more comedy than crime drama, powered by Powell and Loy’s chemistry, snappy writing, and rapid-fire banter. Spider-Noir isn’t primarily a comedy either, but much of it is very funny in the same fast-paced, dialogue-heavy way as The Thin Man.

1 Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)

If all this black-and-white business is a little much for you, there’s always Robert Zemeckis’ beloved live-action/animated feature Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Beyond being a great comedy and a technical marvel, the film is fundamentally a noir story. Set in 1947, right in the middle of the genre’s heyday, it follows hard-boiled, hard-drinking private eye Eddie Valiant (Bob Hoskins) as he investigates an increasingly elaborate mystery. It also features one of the most memorable femme fatales in movie history — even if she insists she’s just drawn that way.