Bullet

This 1955 Cold War-era film noir is something of a misfire (great title, though), and you can't go wrong with any movie in which quintessential screen mug George Raft is referred to as "the boss." He's Joe Victor, a deported former crime "big wheel," who's "back in business" after accepting an offer of $100,000 ("that's real velvet") from foreign agents to kidnap a scientist at work on some top secret project. Joe assembles "the boys" as well as Joyce (Audrey Trotter), an increasingly conflicted femme fatale (she's "respectable now"), to seduce the unsuspecting doc. Little Caesar himself, Edward G. Robinson, is intriguingly miscast as the dogged Montreal police inspector on Victor's case. Raft, however, is in fine form as he barks out orders and takes no guff. --Donald Liebenson