Legendary crime novelist Raymond Chandler had a brief but very successful stint as a screenwriter-for-hire in Hollywood. He officially penned five scripts and supposedly polished up countless others. Despite cranking out a pair of all-time classics and a forgotten gem (the 1946 Best Original Screenplay nominee The Blue Dahlia, the best of the Alan Ladd-Veronica Lake noirs), Chandler hated the experience. This weekend at the Belcourt, as part of the theater’s Romance Is Dead series, you can catch both of the aforementioned classics — Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity and Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train. Adapted from James M. Cain’s foundational crime novel of the same name, Double Indemnity set the template for noir films in which a femme fatale out-schemes a bumbling loser. Barbara Stanwyck gives one of the great film performances of the 1940s as the nefarious Phyllis Dietrichson. Strangers on a Train, an adaptation of crime queen Patricia Highsmith’s novel, will be a hit with any Challengers fans, with its queer-coded love triangle and iconic tennis scene. Visit belcourt.org for showtimes.
Feb. 6-8 & 10 at the Belcourt
2102 Belcourt Ave.
