Film
Criss Cross
Robert Siodmak's backwards-told noir opens on the eve of disaster and works out how an ordinary armored-car guard talked himself back into his ex-wife's orbit and straight into her gangster husband's crew. Lancaster is magnetic, De Carlo unreadable in the best way, and the Bunker Hill locations turn Los Angeles into a trap with no exit. Bleak, tight, essential viewing for anyone who likes their romance doomed and their heists cursed.
If you liked this
The Killers1946
Lancaster's first great noir role, and Siodmak again, telling a doomed heist story through fractured flashbacks — if Criss Cross grabbed you, this is where that engine first ran, colder and even more hopeless.
But The insurance-investigator framing device can feel slower and more procedural than Criss Cross's tighter spiral.
Double Indemnity1944
The template femme fatale scheme: an ordinary man talked into murder by a woman already three steps ahead of him. Wilder's dialogue crackles even as the trap closes around them.
But Barbara Stanwyck's wig is genuinely distracting, and the tone is drier and wittier than Criss Cross's aching sincerity.
Out of the Past1947
Peak noir fatalism — Mitchum drifting back into a life he thought he'd escaped, a woman he can't quit, and a plan doomed before it even started.
But The plotting gets genuinely tangled — double-crosses within double-crosses that reward a second watch more than a first.
The wildcard
Something you would not have found on your own.
Le Samouraï1967
Both films watch a professional criminal walk knowingly toward his own destruction for a woman and a code of honor; Melville openly built his cool fatalism on American noir like this one, just twenty years on and an ocean away.
Alain Delon as a hitman so controlled he barely blinks, undone by the same fatal thread as Steve Thompson — a code, a woman, a job that was never as clean as he thought.
But Almost wordless for long stretches — if you want Criss Cross's nervy energy, this is its opposite: glacial, minimalist, French existentialism instead of American sweat.
More like this (8)
The Asphalt Jungle1950
The heist-movie blueprint: a crew of specialists, a job that goes wrong for human reasons rather than technical ones, and a script that treats every crook like a tragic figure.
But It's more ensemble than romance — if you came for the doomed-lovers angle, this one's colder and more procedural.
Scarlet Street1945no page yet
Another Fritz Lang/Edward G. Robinson study of a decent man wrecked by a woman and his own weakness, ending as merciless as anything from the period.
But Slower burn than Criss Cross, and its cruelty is more psychological than kinetic — no heist, just humiliation.
The Postman Always Rings Twice1946
Lovers plotting against an inconvenient husband, told with the same sweaty inevitability — you know it ends badly, and watching them believe otherwise is the whole tragedy.
But Lana Turner and John Garfield's chemistry is more overtly sexual and less tortured than Lancaster and De Carlo's.
Gun Crazy1950
A couple who can't stop feeding each other's worst impulses, hurtling toward a finish they both half-want. Faster, pulpier, and more openly romantic about its own doom.
But It's B-movie in budget and scale — rougher edges, less polish than Siodmak's studio craftsmanship.
The Killing1956
Kubrick's clockwork heist unravels for the same reason Criss Cross's does — one man's private weakness the plan never accounted for. Precise, cold, brilliantly structured.
But The racetrack milieu and clipped narration keep you at arm's length; there's less heat here, more mechanism.
Body Heat1981
The Double Indemnity/Criss Cross engine rebuilt for the '80s, sweatier and more explicit: a man led by lust and greed into a plan he should never have trusted.
But It plays its noir roots fairly straight rather than transforming them — you may clock the twists early if you know the genre.
American Animals2018
Same structural idea as Criss Cross — decent people wreck themselves executing a heist that was really about something else, like ego or boredom — but told with real interview footage instead of shadows and voiceover, showing the fantasy has a factual, embarrassing underside.
A true story of four college kids who plan a rare-book heist and fall apart under the weight of their own plan, told half as documentary with the real men narrating their own disaster.
But The doc/drama hybrid format is a gimmick some viewers find clever and others find distracting from the story itself.
Baby Driver2017
Both are built on the same skeleton — a man dragged back into one last criminal job because he can't walk away from someone he loves — but Wright plays it as kinetic pop spectacle where Siodmak played it as inescapable tragedy.
A getaway driver pulled back into one last job by love and loyalty, dressed up in candy colors, needle-drops, and stunt driving instead of venetian-blind shadows and doom-laden narration.
But It's slick, upbeat, and mostly bloodless — if you want Criss Cross's genuine despair, this trades it for style and a shot at a happy ending.
People
Cast
Burt LancasterSteve Thompson
Yvonne De CarloAnna
Dan DuryeaSlim Dundee
Stephen McNallyDet. Lt. Peter 'Pete' Ramirez
Esy MoralesOrchestra Leader
Tom PediVincent
Percy HeltonFrank
Alan NapierFinchley
Meg RandallHelen
Richard LongSlade Thompson
Joan MillerThe Lush
Directing
- Fred FrankAssistant Director
- Seward WebbAssistant Director
- Robert SiodmakDirector
- Connie EarlScript Supervisor
- Jack HivelySecond Unit Director
Writing
- Don TracyNovel
- Daniel FuchsScreenplay
- William BowersWriter
Production
- Michael KraikeProducer
- Keith WeeksProduction Manager