After a whirlwind romance in Mexico, a beautiful heiress marries a man she barely knows with hardly a second thought. She finds his New York home full of his strange relations, and macabre rooms that are replicas of famous murder sites. One locked room contains the secret to her husband's obsession, and the truth about what happened to his first wife.
A hack screenwriter writes a screenplay for a former silent film star who has faded into Hollywood obscurity.
Jeff Bailey seems to be a mundane gas station owner in remote Bridgeport, California. He is dating local girl Ann Miller and lives a quiet life. But Jeff has a secret past, and when a mysterious stranger arrives in town, Jeff is forced to return to the dark world he had tried to escape.
A cabaret performer tries to protect her daughter from a mysterious killer while resisting the advances of the prosecutor pursuing the criminal.
After being hired to find an ex-con's former girlfriend, Philip Marlowe is drawn into a deeply complex web of mystery and deceit.
Gruff gumshoe Francis Hogan is hired by a mysterious woman to find her boyfriend who has gone missing. With his perpetually hungry partner in tow, Hogan must untangle a web of intrigue involving the criminal underworld and a dead courier. One double-cross follows another as Hogan investigates the whole sordid affair.
Mrs. Elizabeth Bright Murdock hires Marlowe to find an old rare coin, the Brasher Doubloon, that belonged in her deceased husband's collection. Marlowe begins investigating, but quickly finds himself entangled in a series of unexplained murders.
Private eye Phillip Marlowe wants to get out of the detective racket and into crime writing. But when he's called to the office of editor Adrienne Fromsett, it's not to talk about his story ideas — she wants him to locate the missing wife of her boss, Mr. Kingsby. The assignment quickly becomes complicated when bodies start turning up.
Kathy leaves the newspaper business to marry homicide detective Bill, but is frustrated by his lack of ambition and the banality of life in the suburbs. Her drive to advance Bill's career soon takes her down a dangerous path.
Ambulance driver Frank Jessup is ensnared in the schemes of the sensuous but dangerous Diane Tremayne.
A police detective falls in love with the woman whose murder he's investigating.
A mad bomber holds an innocent family hostage.
A woman suffers from amnesia after killing her husband, who was just about to demand a divorce for having found her engaging in an affair with a lover, who is only interested in her to find where some precious jewels are hidden.
Having met on a train, a smooth-talking psychotic socialite shares his theory on how two complete strangers can get away with murder to an amateur tennis player — a theory he plans to test out.
A rich woman and a calculating insurance agent plot to kill her unsuspecting husband after he signs a double indemnity policy.
A self-assured businessman murders his employer, the husband of his mistress, which unintentionally provokes an ill-fated chain of events.
When a car bomb explodes on the American side of the U.S./Mexico border, Mexican drug enforcement agent Miguel Vargas begins his investigation, along with American police captain Hank Quinlan. When Vargas begins to suspect that Quinlan and his shady partner, Menzies, are planting evidence to frame an innocent man, his investigations into their possible corruption quickly put himself and his new bride, Susie, in jeopardy.
New York City newspaper writer J.J. Hunsecker holds considerable sway over public opinion with his Broadway column, but one thing that he can't control is his younger sister, Susan, who is in a relationship with aspiring jazz guitarist Steve Dallas. Hunsecker strongly disapproves of the romance and recruits publicist Sidney Falco to find a way to split the couple, no matter how ruthless the method.
A romantic drifter gets caught between a corrupt tycoon and his voluptuous wife.
A gambler discovers an old flame while in Argentina, but she's married to his new boss.