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*** “Criss Cross.” MCA. $29.95. NR.

Though less well known than many others, this is a model of late ‘40s film noir , full of Teutonic angles, low-life, high-key lighting, cynicism, shadows and endless double-crosses. It’s a heist movie from 1949--anticipating more famous examples as “The Asphalt Jungle” and “The Killing”--and it mixes high Germanic style, from director Robert Siodmak and cameraman Franz Planer, with unusually salty and vigorous dialogue by that fine, neglected novelist-screenwriter, Daniel Fuchs. The theme of “Criss Cross” is the destructive power of passion. And in its web-like underworld, greed seems a healthy vice, next to the overpowering dark lusts aroused in Burt Lancaster and Dan Duryea by Yvonne DeCarlo, as a matter-of-fact temptress strutting athletically through the L.A. sunlight.