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Which movie started the tradition of black-and-white movies with a first person narrative of a cool, suave private detective that investigates on behalf of a client. (generally wears a fedora and a trench coat, maybe smokes, probably white)

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    Although I don't have time to verify at the moment, usually The Maltese Falcon (1941) is credited as the first detective Film Noir film.
    – CGCampbell
    Dec 29, 2014 at 22:32
  • It is The Maltese Falcon that started this tradition for American Films. Prior to that detectives were like Sherlock Holmes. filmnoirstudies.com/essays/outer_limits.asp - Noir itself was born from German Expressionism in the 1920s
    – Ben Plont
    Dec 29, 2014 at 23:16
  • @BenPlont - But Holmes never wore a fedora, at least not in those early films. Dec 30, 2014 at 18:53
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    @SystemDown exactly. That's one reason why there is a difference between Spade and Holmes, and why Maltese Falcon (Spade) is a better answer than a Sherlock Holmes film.
    – Ben Plont
    Dec 30, 2014 at 19:09
  • @SystemDown I was backing up CGCampbell, in his comment. The reason I didn't answer was to give CG time to submit the correct answer, because he got there first, i didn't realize there was a 1931 version.
    – Ben Plont
    Dec 30, 2014 at 19:16

2 Answers 2

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Just to put some constraints on my search. You're looking for:

first person narrative of a cool, suave private detective that investigates on behalf of a client. (generally wears a fedora and a trench coat, maybe smokes, probably white)

This is what is colloquially known as the Hardboiled Detective (WARNING: TV Tropes link), a genre generally credited to Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe and Dashiell Hammett's Sam Spade, who started to gain popularity in the 30's. Hardboiled detectives tended to be tough, cynical, narrated in the first person, had a penchant for attracting dangerous women (the equally iconic Femme Fatales), and true to the fashions of the day wore hats all the time (usually fedoras).

Now taking those two iconic detectives we find that the earliest movie that any of them appeared in is The Maltese Falcon (1931) starring Ricardo Cortez as Sam Spade (10 years before the more famous version starring Humphrey Bogart).

Here's a clip from the 1931 movie.

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  • @BenPlont - Neither did I, until I started researching this. Looks quite good actually. I might have to hunt it down. Dec 30, 2014 at 19:24
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Though it is quite hard to find the very first film that set the trend for Detective Stories.

At the Villa Rose (1920 film) is a film that I know fits the criteria (First Person Narration, Private Detective and White) of your question and is roughly a century old.

The link below is a filtered search of IMDb for the very first Detective Films ever Recorded.
http://www.imdb.com/search/title?at=0&genres=mystery&sort=moviemeter,asc&year=1913

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  • I believe that in this film, Hanaud is a Police Detective, not a Private Investigator.
    – Ben Plont
    Dec 30, 2014 at 19:09

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