The Blue Gardenia

The Blue Gardenia (1953) is a Fritz Lang crime drama you can watch online on iFILM. Telephone operator Nora Larkin gets a letter from her soldier fiancé — he's marrying someone else. Heartbroken, she accepts a dinner invitation from a stranger, drinks too much, and wakes up at home with no memory of the night. The morning paper carries the headline: man found dead, her handkerchief at the scene.

Nora has no alibi and no idea whether she did it. Columnist Casey Mayo starts hunting the so-called "Blue Gardenia" killer through the press, but his motives are more complicated than catching a murderer. Anne Baxter plays Nora with a convincing blend of guilt and confusion; Richard Conte is the reporter walking a moral tightrope. Nat King Cole appears to perform the title song in a memorable club scene.

Lang uses almost no action — the tension comes entirely from Nora's fractured memory and the walls closing in around her. It's a lean, unsettling piece of Hollywood noir that holds its cards on guilt until the very last scene. Stream The Blue Gardenia (1953) online on iFILM.