Writer, director, producer and actor Jules Dassin was one of Hollywood's most remarkable talents. Between 1947 and 1955 he directed a string of stylish, gritty, and hard-hitting Film Noir classics including Thieves' Highway and Night And The City. Blacklisted in the communist witch hunts of the House Un-American Activities, he would continue that run with Rififi, directed in France. Each film is a diamond hard classic, weathering the test of time with sharp edges intact. Tales from The Urban Jungle brings together the two films which started that extraordinary streak of hits. In Brute Force, Burt Lancaster is Joe Collins, one of a number of convicts squeezed into cell R17 and intent on breaking out. Desperate to return to his cancer ridden wife (Ann Blyth), and to escape the clutches of sadistic warden Captain Munsey (an unforgettable performance from Hume Cronyn) who enjoys a reign of terror over the inmates. Meanwhile, in The Naked City, a blonde ex-model is murdered in her bathtub a