Draft Picks: 10 Drinking-Buddy Movies

In this loose adaptation of the Dashiell Hammett tale, the couple that drinks together thinks together. Nick and Nora Charles (William Powell and Myrna Loy) are a dapper socialite couple who manage to solve mysteries without ever setting down their martini glasses. (Seriously. When Nora learns Nick has already downed six martinis, she orders five more, lined up, so that she can catch up with him.)

Of course, danger has a way of sobering you up in a flash (it’s also a nifty aphrodisiac, as the Charleses demonstrated for later sleuthing couples like the ones on TV’s Hart to Hart and Moonlighting). Then again, the case is really beside the point, as the Thin Man films are largely exercises in style and wit. Powell and Loy made six of them, though they cut back on the cocktails after the first two. Still, Nick and Nora remain the prime examples of what we think we’re like when we drink: sexier and smarter. Here’s to the only two tipplers who actually were.

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