FILMS FOR THE FALL. It's an awesome autumn at New York's Film Forum. The revival of the 1974 Vietnam documentary Hearts and Minds may be long gone, but there's still time to catch Tarnation, the most impressive new film I've seen this year. (But beware if you have problems with film memoirs about very dysfunctional families.) Also playing is the newly restored version of Samuel Fuller's The Big Red One. (But beware if you have problems with long, jarring, autobiographical war movies.)

Coming up is an excellent "Essential Noir" festival. Some of my favorites are missing (where's The Big Combo?), but it's still a great opportunity to choose among 17 double features representing a world populated by tough guys, tougher gals, and screeching getaways, all captured with snappy black-and-white photography (and often conceived by top-notch writers). Some recommendations follow. (If you plan to see a lot of these movies, consider Film Forum membership.)

November 26-28
MILDRED PIERCE. James Cain's sordid soaper, featuring a devastating performance by Joan Crawford, shares a double bill with another James Cain story: DOUBLE INDEMNITY.

December 1
GUN CRAZY. Crafty B-movie director Joseph H. Lewis paired Peggy Cummins and John Dall in this still-fresh Bonnie and Clyde prototype, on the same bill as THEY LIVE BY NIGHT.

December 7-8
PICKUP ON SOUTH STREET. Samuel Fuller's crackling Cold War crime drama stars Richard Widmark, who made his debut six years earlier in KISS OF DEATH.

December 8
THE MALTESE FALCON. Humphrey Bogart, Peter Lorre, and Sidney Greenstreet made noir history in this version of the Dashiell Hammett story, programmed with THIS GUN FOR HIRE, based on a Graham Greene story.

December 10-11
THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE. Another James Cain adaptation, paired with the stunningly shot LADY FROM SHANGHAI.

December 12-13
GILDA. Probably the best tungsten-related movie ever, it stars a radiant Rita Hayworth. Then comes Ava Gardner in the Ernest Hemingway adaptation THE KILLERS.

December 14
THE BIG SLEEP and MURDER, MY SWEET. A great Raymond Chandler double-feature. Go ahead and try to figure out who's a better Philip Marlowe: hard-boiled Bogart or former choirboy Dick Powell. (Just don't sprain your brain trying to figure out The Big Sleep!)

December 17-18
SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS and TOUCH OF EVIL. Noir hits the PR world in Sweet Smell (starring Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis), then travels to the Tex-Mex border for the creepy corruption drama Touch of Evil (featuring Welles, Charlton Heston, Janet Leigh, Marlene Dietrich, and Akim Tamiroff plus Scopitone queen Joi Lansing).

December 19-20
SHADOW OF A DOUBT and OUT OF THE PAST. Shadow is one of Alfred Hitchcock's best; Kirk Douglas and Robert Mitchum go chin-to-chin and chest-to-chest in Past.

Also coming to the Film Forum (on December 22) is In the Realms of the Unreal, Jessica Yu's new documentary about outsider artist Henry Darger.

On the lighter side of repertory cinema, the American Museum of the Moving Image (AMMI) in Astoria will run a Preston Sturges festival in December, screening eight great American comedies. All are worth seeing, but if you had to pick just one double feature, consider traveling to AMMI on the early winter afternoon of Sunday, December 28 to see The Lady Eve and The Palm Beach Story. (If you can take three movies in one day, stay for Il Posto, one of the best first-job movies ever.) If you think you'll return to AMMI several times over the coming year, membership may be advisable.