Film Noir from Royal Books, Inc.

New York: Random House, 1954. First Edition. First Edition. Basis for the 1957 film noir, the only film in the cycle to be shot on location in Cuba, directed by Richard Wilson, written for the screen by Jo Eisinger, and starring Errol Flynn. Very Good plus in a Very Good plus dust jacket. Faint… Read more

London: Michael Joseph, 1953. First UK Edition, preceding all others. Elegantly INSCRIBED by author on the title page, likely to a friend or early reader of the novel: "My dear Steve / This book has many faults, but thanks to you I feel that at least the medical & chemical details are correct. / Nick." Basis for the… Read more

New York: William Morrow, 1946. First Edition. First Edition. Basis for the 1947 blazing Technicolor film noir "Desert Fury," starring Lizabeth Scott and Burt Lancaster. Rare in or out of jacket. Very Good plus in a Poor dust jacket. Owner name to the front endpaper, with light toning to the spine and top board edges. Jacket has significant… Read more

London: Boardman, 1936. First UK Edition, preceding all others. Basis for the 1947 film noir directed by Peter Godfrey and starring Humphrey Bogart and Barbara Stanwyck. Good lacking the rare dust jacket, with lightly foxed boards and page edges, small bumps to the tips, and an evenly faded spine.

Beverly Hills, CA: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer [MGM], 1946. Vintage double weight reference photograph of director Tay Garnett discussing a scene with Lana Turner and an intent James Garfield on the set of the 1946 film. Mimeo snipe on verso. Based on the 1934 novel by James M. Cain. Remade in 1981 in a grim, nihilistic adaptation by David… Read more

N.p.: N.p., 1979. Draft script for an unproduced film, likely a first draft. Based on the acclaimed 1978 novel by James Crumley. After Walter Hill's critical and commercial success with "Warriors" (1979), and the critical success of "The Long Riders" (1980), he focused his energies on adapting "The Last Good Kiss," in which he was hoping to cast… Read more

Los Angeles: Twentieth Century-Fox, 1946. Original pressbook for the 1948 film noir. A quintessential "amnesia victim as protagonist" noir with superior dialogue and presentation (courtesy of the talented Joseph L. Mankiewicz), "Somewhere in the Night" stars John Hodiak as a war veteran suffering from complete memory loss, with only two clues to his past: a bitter letter… Read more

London: National Film Corporation, 1965. Second Draft script for the 1967 film, here under the working title "Female of the Species." Based on the adventurer character Hugh "Bulldog" Drummond, which appeared in 24 novels and short stories, beginning with "Bull-Dog Drummond" (1920), created by H. C. McNeile under the pseudonym Sapper, and continued after his death, from… Read more

New York: Coward McCann, 1946. First Edition. First Edition. Basis for the 1947 film noir directed by Michael Curtiz and starring Claude Rains, Joan Caulfield, Audrey Totter, and Constance Bennett. Near Fine in a Very Good plus dust jacket. Jacket lightly edgeworn, with a short closed tear to the front panel, and a lightly faded… Read more

New York: E.P. Dutton, 1963. First Edition. First Edition. Basis for the 1966 film noir, starring Glenn Ford, Ricardo Montalban and Rita Hayworth. Very Good plus in a Very Good plus dust jacket. Owner name to the front endpaper. Jacket lightly rubbed, with spine ends lightly worn and a tiny chip (not affecting titling) to the… Read more

London: Michael Joseph, 1945. First UK Edition. Basis for the superb 1947 British film noir directed by Carol Reed and starring James Mason. Jacket design by A. E. Barlow. Near Fine in a Near Fine dust jacket. Small, neat contemporary owner name to front endpaper and title page. Jacket spine and flap folds lightly toned, with a short… Read more

New York: King Features Syndicate, 1949. Vintage photograph of Burt Lancaster and Corinne Calvert on the set from the 1949 film noir. "Inside Hollywood by Nat Dallinger" mimeo snipe and "Mar 18 1949" stamp on the verso. A noirish adventure about Paul Vogel (Paul Henreid), a sadistic police inspector stationed somewhere in Africa, where he hopes… Read more

Los Angeles: Samuel Goldwyn Productions, 1946. Treatment script for an unproduced film by screenwriters Daniel Fuchs and Phil Rapp, dated 10/16/46. First page of carbon typescript treatment is a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions, Inc., signed and dated by Fuchs in holograph ink, with date illegible. Daniel Fuchs began his writing career in his mid-twenties with the… Read more

New York: Random House, 1939. First Edition. First Edition. Basis for the 1941 film noir "Out of the Fog" directed by Anatole Litvak and starring John Garfield and Ida Lupino. Near Fine in an about Near Fine dust jacket. Jacket with some faint, shallow creasing in a spot or two, spine very slightly toned, with… Read more

West Hollywood: Eagle-Lion Films, 1947. Collection of five vintage studio still photographs from the 1948 British film. One with Dion McGregor Collection stamp on the verso. After sustaining a head injury in a bus crash, young scientist Jim Ackland (John Mills) convalesces in a boardinghouse where a young woman (Kay Walsh) is brutally murdered. Now a prime suspect… Read more

Beverly Hills, CA: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer [MGM], 1967. Vintage studio reference photograph of Lee Marvin and Angie Dickenson from the 1967 film, with mimeo snipe on the verso. Based on the 1963 novel "The Hunter" by Donald E. Westlake. Along with "Bonnie and Clyde," "Point Blank" is a foundational late 1960s crime film, setting the stage for… Read more

Universal City: Universal Pictures, 1944. Vintage photograph of the Tower reader's edition of Cornell Woolrich's crime novel, written under the pseudonym William Irish, for the 1944 film. Robert Siodmak's first Hollywood noir, and one of the finest in the canon. Based on Cornell Woolrich's first novel, written in 1942, about a secretary who searches for the titular… Read more

Garden City: Doubleday, 1961. First Edition. First Edition. Basis for the 1962 film noir "Experiment in Terror," adapted by the Gordons from their novel, directed by Blake Edwards, and starring Glenn Ford and Lee Remick. Rare in dust jacket. Very Good plus in a Very Good plus dust jacket. Slightest lean, very faint soiling to the front… Read more

Culver City, CA: Columbia Pictures Industries, 1978. Two studio still photographs from the 1954 film, struck by Columbia Pictures Television in 1978. Housed in a Columbia Pictures Television photos envelope stamped with title. Budd Schulberg based his 1955 novel "Waterfront" on the screenplay. Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando) dreams of being a prize fighter while tending his… Read more

N.p.: Allied Artists, 1968. Collection of seven vintage studio still photographs from the 1968 US release of the 1966 film, housed in their original brown paper envelope stamped "Battle of Algiers B7," with annotations on envelope in holograph marker. Italian neorealist director Gillo Pontecorvo's careful, documentary style account of the guerrilla war for Algerian independence from… Read more