Noir Alley: Eddie Muller on They Live By Night (1949)

They Live By Night (1949) -- (Original Trailer)

RKO’s trailer is not far off the mark for director Nicholas Ray’s eventually-acclaimed debut feature, They Live By Night, starring Farley Granger and Cathy O’Donnell.

They Live By Night (1949) -- (Movie Clip) You Like Your Old Man?

Innocent Keechie (Cathy O'Donnell) gets friendlier with fugitive Bowie (Farley Granger) while the leader of his prison-break gang, her uncle Chickamaw (Howard da Silva), moves things along, in Nicholas Ray's directing debut, They Live By Night, 1949.

They Live By Night (1949) -- (Movie Clip) Who's Your Fella?

Nervous escaped convict Bowie (Farley Granger), injured again in another misadventure with the gang led by her fugitive uncle, is nursed again by innocent Keechie (Cathy O'Donnell), remembering he bought a gift for her, in Nicholas Ray's They Live By Night, 1949.

They Live By Night (1949) -- (Movie Clip) They're Thieves, Just Like Us

Keechie (Cathy O'Donnell) fetches Bowie (Farley Granger), injured and left behind after the jailbreak, to his fellow thieves, her uncle Chickamaw (Howard da Silva) and T-Dub (Jay C. Flippen), and her own crook father (Will Wright), the first meeting of the principals, in Nicholas Ray's They Live by Night, 1949.

They Live by Night (1949) -- (Movie Clip) Opening, This Boy And This Girl

The unorthodox and violent opening from the first feature directed by one of Hollywood's least conventional directors, Cathy O'Donnell with Farley Granger, then Howard da Silva and Jay C. Flippen, in Nicholas Ray's They Live By Night, 1949.

They Live By Night (1949) -- (Movie Clip) Just A Black Sheep

Bowie (Farley Granger) and Keechie (Cathy O'Donnell), now fugitives and separated from his gang, make some quick decisions when their Greyhound stops at a diner, in Nicholas Ray's They Live By Night, 1949.