Film noir the most influential of the early noirs. A slew of now-renowned noir "bad girls" followed, such as those played by Rita Hayworth in "Gilda" (1946), Lana Turner in "The Postman Always Rings Twice" (1946), Ava Gardner in "The Killers" (1946), and Jane Greer in "Out of the Past" (1947). The iconic noir counterpart to the femme fatale, the private eye, came to the fore in films such as "The Maltese Falcon" (1941), with Humphrey Bogart as Sam Spade, and "Murder, My Sweet" (1944), with Dick Powell as Philip Marlowe. The prevalence of the private eye as a lead character declined
The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946 film) behaves coolly toward him; the three of them have dinner together and Nick announces that he will be selling Twin Oaks and that Cora and he will be moving in with his infirm sister in northern Canada. That night, Cora is desperate; Frank finds her in the kitchen with a knife she says she was going to use on herself. She tells him she could have maybe suffered along with anything if he had not come back. The three of them are driving to Santa Barbara the next night, to sign off on the sale of Twin Oaks and for