Film noir movie details

Film noir (film noir, noir means black in French) is the Hollywood detective film, especially themes that emphasize a morality of unclear delineation between good and evil and motivation from sexuality. The classic Hollywood film noir period is widely recognized as having lasted from the 1940s to the end of the 1950s. The visual style of film noir during this period, with its depressing black-and-white style, is derived from German Expressionist cinema, while many of the typical plots and common perceptions of classic film noir are derived from Depression-era crime novels in the U.S. The term film noir is derived from the French language, and was first used by the French critic Nino Frank in 1946, but at the time, the concept was unknown to the majority of the U.S. film industry. understand the concept. Film historians and critics did not define film noir until after the fact; many of the filmmakers who would later be credited with making film noir claimed to have been unaware of making a new genre at the time. The five-point definition of the earliest classic film noir included fantastic, strange, erotic, love-hate or good-versus-evil occurrences to the shield, and brutal, but this definition was again considered too simplified to define film noir.

The urban setting, the darkness of the night, low lighting, shadows, especially those cast by shutters or slow fans, rain, private detectives, a fatally attractive (and beautiful and dangerous) heroine, smoke, a low camera position, and a monologue by the hero are all features of classical film noir, which creates an atmosphere of emptiness, pessimism, and decadence.

There are many types of film noir, such as gangster films, police films, and social issue films, and many traditional and non-traditional visual effects are used. Many critics consider film noir to be a genre in its own right, while many believe it is not. Film noir often takes place in urban settings, but sometimes film noir is set in small towns, suburbs, the wilderness, or even on the highway, just as Westerns don't always take place in the West. Similarly, film noir traditionally features a private detective as the hero and a femme fatale, but most film noirs don't have these two characters, so film noir isn't defined by character in the same way that a gangster movie can be.

Film noir is also not as easy to define as a horror movie with monsters or paranormal events, a sci-fi movie that flies backward in time, or a song-and-dance movie that sings and dances. Film noir is more like Screwball Comedy, which has been widely accepted as a film genre and is defined by generalized qualities, but has some constituent elements. Some elements can definitely be found in this genre, but often not all of them are present in the same movie.

But film noir has a wider range of subject matter and content than offbeat comedy, and is therefore more difficult to define. There are some film scholars, such as Thomas K. Shatz, who has written on the subject. Thomas Schatz, see film noir as a style rather than a genre. Another author who has written extensively on the subject of film noir is Alain Schiffer. Alain Silver, another author who has written extensively on the subject of film noir, considers film noir to be a cycle and a phenomenon, although he believes that film noir, like any other genre, has certain visual effects and thematic codes. Other critics treat film noir as a "mood", "movement" or "sequence", or categorize some films into a "period". "There is as yet no definitive definition of film noir. Film noir is not only influenced by early cinema, but also by Baroque art and stylistic paintings with black and white contrasts and "low lighting" (e.g. chiaroscuro and tenebrism). In film art, film noir has its roots in the German Expressionist films of the 1910s and 1920s.

Film noir was influenced by the literature of crime fiction and speculative fiction. Early works of fiction by Dash Hammett and James Caan, as well as Black Mask magazine, led the way, with 1929's Red Harvest, Hammett's first work of fiction. The 1941 film noir The Lord's Nest and the 1942 film The Glass Key are both by Hammett. Double Insurance and The Postman Always Rings Twice were adapted from Cane's novels. Raymond Chandler quickly rose to fame with his novel The Big Sleep and became the most famous writer of cold hard speculative fiction. Not only were his novels such as The Big Sleep adapted into film noir, but he also wrote the screenplays for noir movies such as Double Indemnity. Hammett and Chandler both focus on private detectives, Cane favors the exploration of the psychology of the hero who is not so heroic, Cane's style is known as the black novel. 1, the origin (1941-1945) is usually thought to be from JOHN HUSTON's film "The Maltese Falcon" (The Maltese Falcon, 1941) began

2, the golden period (1946-1951) is also thought to be (1946-1956)

3, the decline (1951-1958), only the most famous of the following are the best known. 1958) The following are only the most famous film noirs.

Classic film noir (1940-1959)

United States The Lord's Nest Bloodbath, Double Indemnity, The Glass Key, The Postman Always Rings Twice, Spy in North Africa, Under the Gaslight, Sunset Boulevard, Niagara, Vertigo, and Kiss of Death.

Other Japanese Akira Kurosawa's Noryo Inu (Lost Dog), etc.

Classic western martial arts film noir

The Righteous Among the Sun

Post-classic film noir

USA Emergency Warrant, Breaking Bad, Chinatown, Taxi Driver, American Gigolo, Brute Force, Internal Affairs, Postman Always Rings Twice, Iron Mask, Iron Mask. ", "The Iron Mask", "The Sixth Sense", "Blackmail", "Coldblooded Humans (Movie)", "The Seven Deadly Sins (Movie)", "Thrilling Points of Surprise (The Usual Suspects)", "Fighting Club", "Kiss Twice, Shoot Twice", etc.

Other "Heaven and Hell", "Carmen of Mongkok", "Fallen Angels", "Flatliners - Girls", The Search for Guns, Infernal Affairs, The Blind Well, Lust, Caution, etc.

Post-classic western martial arts noir

Killing Without Pardon

Post-classic psychological noir

The Fighting Club, Memory Puzzle

Post-classic sci-fi noir

The Devil's Terminator, The Wonderful Wonderful, The Silver Winged Assassin, Slasher Quest, etc.

Others Killer," "Mission Hacker," "Minority Report," and "Futurama"

Post-classic hybrid noir

"Batman (1989 film)," "Batman Returns," "Batman: Hour of War," and "V for Vendetta"

Post-classic noir movie-flavored television filmography

"Lawman's Catch-22," "Miami Vice," and Police Story (TV series)", "The Sopranos", "Six Feet from Heaven", "The Shield (TV series)", "StarCraft 2005"

Movie Noir Review

Movie Noir Review : Sixty Years of Treacherousness

The term "film noir" as a genre's origins first appeared at the 1946 Cannes Film Festival. The French critics saw the emergence of a new genre and named it after the characteristics of the new genre they had in mind. Since then, the term "film noir" has become very popular and has been widely adopted by critics. This article is a retrospective of the 60th anniversary of film noir.

Film noir refers to two aspects: firstly, the subject matter of the movie is mostly from the dark side of the society; secondly, the overall viewpoint of the movie is rather gloomy and the protagonist is pessimistic about life. However, it is the form of the movie that matters most. The content and the form have to be combined with each other, and both of them are "black" in order to be categorized as film noir, not purely defined by the theme. The form of film noir is characterized by sharp contrasts between light and darkness in the cinematography and lighting, and the use of shadows to cut the image or part of the actors' faces, as well as the use of light and dark contrasts to distort the visual effect and create a special effect, which is obviously influenced by German Expressionism. These characteristics of filming, together with the theme of reflecting the dark side of society and morality, are the so-called "film noir". In addition, film noir's sets and locations were often indoor and night scenes, which enhanced the dark effect.

The fall of France during World War II resulted in Hollywood movies not being released in France for six to seven years. It wasn't until 1946, after the war, that the French were able to see American Hollywood movies again. At that time, the U.S. sent four sets of films to the Cannes Film Festival, and French film critic Nino Frank published an article that a new type of film - "film noir" - appeared in the U.S. film industry after the Second World War; this type of film has a lot of rain, smoke, shadows, and gray lighting, and is therefore called film noir, which mainly refers to its darkness and overall darkness. The term "film noir" is used mainly to refer to the overall visual effect of the darkness. Another French critic, Pierre Chertier, followed suit by writing an article on the emergence of a new genre of American cinema, film noir. Both articles used the term "film noir", and the impression that the four sets of films were the same was fixed.

The four films are: The Maltese Falcon (1941), directed by John Huston. "The Maltese Falcon 1941, directed by John Huston. Murder, My Sweet (1944), directed by Edward D my try k. The four films are: The Maltese Falcon (1941), directed by John Huston; The Maltese Falcon (1941), directed by John Huston. "Double Indemnity 1944, directed by Billy Wilder. "The Woman in the Window, 1944, directed by Fritz Lang.

The above four films were all made with night and interior scenes, with dark lighting, and the human nature and the social establishment shown in the films were all gloomy and corrupt, and both the visual effects and the contents of the films were all dark and gloomy. The main characters of Hollywood detective movies at that time were three types: police detectives, private detectives and insurance investigators.

The image of the detective in film noir is also similar to that of the individual hero in the Western, which can be regarded as a new variant inherited from the Western. The city is civilized, after a long period of baptism of urbanization, film noir detectives do not have to "open up the barbaric" fight, most of the personal life and the fight against crime; know that they can not save the day, but struggling to maintain their personal survival and personal honor, with a strong sense of frustration and disillusionment. These detectives tend to show a worldly negativity, pervaded by a pessimistic mood, not without a sense of single-handed loneliness.

Forerunner

The forerunner of film noir was the gangster films (gangsters) of the early thirties, whose content revolved around American gangs. Alcohol was banned by the Puritans in the early days of the United States, but people were as addicted to alcohol as ever and could not live without it. As a result, illegal businesses such as underground brewing and selling of alcohol came into being, and gangsters often planned organized and serious crimes such as bootlegging because of the lucrative profits. There are two main sets of gangster films, one is "Public Enemy" (Public Enemy) 1931, directed by William Wellman, and the other is "Scarface" (Scarface) 1932, directed by Howard Hawks.

"Public Enemy" is a classic and prototype of the gangster film. Its theme is close to the American naturalist novel, which believes that there is a direct and organic connection between social conditions and human nature, and the movie links the formation of criminals' psychological motives for committing crimes to the poverty of the society at that time, and the movie indirectly condemns the injustice of the American society. The subject matter of "Scarface" is quite unique, as the protagonist is a gangster who specializes in bootlegging. The movie combines bootlegging with crime, and is deliberately set in the 1930s during the Great Recession in the United States. At that time, almost all the people in the United States were struggling with poverty and hunger, and there was an influx of hobos and beggars. The movie is based on the real historical era, and then utilizes location or documentary-like interiors to create a sense of reality. The ending of "Scarface" did not bring the protagonist gang leader to justice, and thus initially failed to pass the film censors and could not be released. After two years of hassle, the studio changed the ending of the film by hanging the gangster and adding a condemnation of the crime in the opening and closing credits before the film was approved for release. The present-day restoration of the film restores the original look and makes it clear what the director intended. Critic Manny Farber noticed these films as early as the 1930s, but at the time, he could only see the revised versions, which are not the same as the present-day remastered versions; from this example, it is clear that the director's original intent is important.

The relationship between the original intent and the text and artifact of a movie is very close. In the past, during the Hollywood studio system, the director did not have the right to make the final cut, and sometimes the final look of a movie might be far from the director's artistic intent. This is not uncommon, as movies are not only art, but also industrial and commercial products, which have to take into account the audience and the release situation, and inevitably have to make compromises in many ways. (PS: "B Society" Bird ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ comes to mind)

Both "Public Enemy" and "Scarface" focus on the darker side of society and can be seen as pioneers of film noir. The way film noir deals with the problem of crime is different from gangster films, in which the criminals appear to be more powerful than the others, and the gangs are not only organized and large in scale, but also commit large-scale criminal activities. The crimes in film noir are only small-scale, mostly small cases investigated by detectives, and the movie will touch upon the evils and the depravity of human nature in the process of investigation. Although both gangster movies and film noir movies are based on crime, there is a difference in approach and attitude, which makes the stories of film noir movies often end up breaking through the taboos of the Film Censorship Office and the expectations of the general audience.

The impact of hard-boiled detective fiction

The rise of hard-boiled detective fiction in the United States not only reversed the entire tradition of British detective fiction, but also had a significant impact on film noir. In the past, the protagonist of detective fiction, starting with Edgar Allan Poe, more than the superiority of birth, not through the world, with their own curiosity and investigate the case, relying on the clues reasoning, and does not need to go into the community to search for materials, but also does not rely on the investigation of the case to earn a living wage. Its successor is Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes. Doyle's "Sherlock Holmes" series, the protagonist Sherlock Holmes from the British high society. A more popular one is the 'Charlie Chan' mysteries by Earl Derry Bingers, who is always well-dressed and well-groomed. Another writer, Agatha Christie (Agatha Christie), writes about detectives who are mostly from the upper class, and the structure of the novels is similar to that of a jigsaw puzzle game, in which the process of the pursuit is always a mystery, creating suspense and attracting readers, and it is only at the end that the real culprit is discovered.

Toward the end of the twenties and the beginning of the thirties, hard-boiled detective novels emerged in the United States, completely reversing the tradition of British detective fiction. The representative writers were Dash ell Hammett and Raymond Chandler, whose novels were mostly set in the metropolis, with the crimes in the metropolis, such as Los Angeles, as the theme, not just a suspenseful game of tracking down the murderer, and the characters belonged to the trampled lower class, unlike the previous British detective novels with the upper class as the background. Most of the protagonists of hardboiled detective novels are outwardly cold and inwardly frustrated, depressed and disillusioned. They remain detached from the case, appear cynical, worldly, and helpless because they see through the world, always smoke excessively, are never well-dressed, and have a messy office. These detectives are somewhat akin to heroes with a touch of existentialism; they see the evils of the establishment and know that there is little they can do to change or overthrow it. The protagonists have a rather pessimistic and negative outlook on life, but their conscience remains intact. However, this kind of detective with conscience in his negativity always discovers the dark side of human nature again in the end, which makes him even more shocked; however, in order to make a living, he has to continue his career as a detective. Hammett and Chandler's work transforms the old British jigsaw puzzle style detective novels into dark novels depicting the dark side of the city.

The Western literary world of the 1930s promoted a modernist, internalized style of writing that gradually excluded the external reality of the environment. 'Hammett' wrote 'The Eagle of Malta' (1930) and Chandler wrote 'The Big Sleep' (1939), but inherited the tradition of nineteenth-century realism, which touched on social issues in a metropolitan setting. Hammett has always maintained a left-wing liberal stance, criticizing the American capitalist system, and as a result was once criticized by the far right in the early 1950s, to the extent that he was unable to work. Although Hammett's novels of the thirties do not have strong left-wing coloring, they are mostly taken from the dark side of society, and most of the protagonists are cynical but unable to do anything, which in fact reflects the author's personal stance.

Almost all of Hammett's and Chandler's 1930s works were made into movies in the 1930s and 1940s. Hammett's The Glass Key (1931) and Thin Man (1932), and Chandler's The Lover, The Murder (1940), and The Lost Man (1940) were all made into films in the 1930s and '40s. Three of the four American films in the 1946 Cannes Film Festival mentioned at the beginning of this article were adapted from hardboiled detective novels. Chandler portrayed Marlowe (Philip Marlowe), the famous twentieth-century American private detective, in Farewell, My Lovely (Murder, My Sweet). Hammett portrayed private detective Sam Spade (Sam Spade) in "The Maltese Eagle"; "Spade" means "shovel", indicating that a private detective has to "shovel" (dig) secrets. "James M. Cain, the original author of Double Insurance, is also a writer of hard-boiled detective novels, and the screenwriter is Chandler. Cain's most famous work is "The Postman Always Rings Twice" 1946, which has been adapted into a movie three times. It is clear that there were a number of film noir adaptations of hardboiled detective novels at the time, and the two were closely related.

Accidental appearance

There are several reasons for the rise of film noir in the 1940s. The first was the cultural-material base of production (cultural-material base of studio system). At that time, film noir was mainly produced by the big studios in an assembly line production mode. The studios had to keep producing movies to maintain their business, and sometimes they needed to produce some smaller and shorter second-line movies to fill the gaps in the production line. At the time, Hollywood was monopolized by the eight major studios, and all filmmakers had to be contracted by the studios, which could exchange actors and production staff with each other. In addition to monopolizing the production of films, the studios also monopolized the distribution of films throughout the United States and operated movie theaters to show their own films. It was not until the U.S. federal government required Hollywood to decouple production and distribution under the "anti-trust law" that the monopoly of the studios was broken, resulting in the total demise of the old Hollywood studio system in the early 1970s. Before the demise of the studio system, no one could get out of the "net" of the studio system.

It was difficult for movie theaters to show only films produced by their own studios, and since one set of films in a theater didn't seem to be enough, they were paired with a set of shorter dramas. It was called "double feature or double bill", and one of these was a second feature. Studio bosses, producers, producers and even the audience would focus on the "main feature", leaving more room for the director or writer of the second feature. With less intervention, second features are sometimes better able to express the director's personal style, the writer's personal point of view, and even the peculiar art of cinematography. Most of them are inexpensive, interior-oriented and have few actors.

Second-tier detective thrillers are all done in the studio. Robert Stomach, the director of "The Killers," has directed a number of second-tier films, but that doesn't mean that all noir is second-tier, and some are studio priorities. Take detective novels as an example, although they have always been regarded as popular and popular works, and hardly worthy of the hall of fame, studios have also purchased the rights to some detective novels and adapted them into movies. At that time, Hammett and Chandler's novels were popular in the United States, and the studios thought that the popular works would be able to attract the audience. If these detective novels fell into the hands of good directors, they often produced the qualities of film noir, and even infiltrated personal views and perspectives. An example of this is Hawks' "Long Day's Journey Into Night", adapted from Chandler's book and written by William Faulkner, starring Humphrey Bogart as private detective Marlowe, who also played Sam Spade, the protagonist of "The Maltese Falcon", and also a private detective. The private detective in Hammett and Chandler's novels has since been compared to Humphrey Bogart. Bogart's performance style and look almost became the basic paradigm for detectives in film noir.

By the 1950s, television was on the rise. Television was free entertainment, and the movie industry faced a major threat, as movies were no longer the only option. Television in the fifties was unable to show movies, but it was able to broadcast live dramas or variety shows, so viewers preferred to stay at home and watch television, losing moviegoers. Those who still came to the cinema spent their time watching the "main" movies rather than the second-tier ones. As a result of these historical changes, movie operators stopped showing second-run movies, and second-run movies declined in popularity.

With the rise of television, the movie industry was able to save the day with the "big screen," the curved wide screen of the New Art Complex that appeared in the 1950s in a rather strange composition. In addition, the big screen (spectacle) as a call to arms, the twentieth century Fox even because of the filming of "Cleopatra" (Cleopatra) investment over the 'great' and went bankrupt. Big screen spectacle can only have a temporary effect, and it is difficult for studios to constantly use it as a means of attraction. The film noir movie had many night scenes, few characters, and was mainly about investigating crimes, so what could be shown on the screen was very limited. In addition, it was filmed in black and white, and did not have the attraction of color, so it was not suitable for the trend of color "big screen". Film noir could not match the cultural consumption pattern of the time, and declined in the late 1950s, with Orson Welles as the final film. Orson Welles' Touch of Evil 1958 marked the end of the genre.

Film noir and urban crime

Early America was a jungle capitalist system, with an economic model of the law of the jungle, where labor was exploited to the hilt and there was no social welfare. Under a completely laissez-faire capitalist system, the Great Recession of the thirties saw the exodus of displaced persons flooding the cities, and unemployment skyrocketed to almost half of society's population. The overall social fabric of the time was close to collapse, with seemingly everyone involved in corruption and bribery, and an atmosphere of unrest and anxiety pervaded the city. President Roosevelt came to power with the New Deal, a government intervention to save capitalism from crisis. While creating jobs, the new government repealed the prohibition laws, cracking down on bootlegging on the one hand, and giving the government a tax on alcohol sales on the other. Although the crime rate of bootlegging by gangs has been reduced, criminal organizations have infiltrated into other areas, and the crime rate in metropolitan areas is still high and has become a source of crime. The metropolis has a high population concentration and is home to many different ethnic groups, including immigrants from Ireland, Italy, Eastern Europe, Germany and Northern Europe. In the case of "Murderer", for example, the protagonist of the play is from Northern Europe, the police officer is Italian, and the heir to the estate is a European immigrant; it is clear that the city is a place where different ethnic groups, classes, and religions mingle.

The city is both the center of evil and the melting pot of America. The metropolis is the center of a great deal of, and important, productive activity; many unemployed people flock to the metropolis; and the government uses the metropolis as a center of power. The metropolis is therefore the most appropriate setting for a detective novel that explores collusion between business and government, social corruption, the exchange of benefits, and the complexity of different classes.

Relationship with Western Movies

The pioneering of the West opened up new horizons and new frontiers. When it was finished, the urban landscape as the new frontier. Private detective to bring the law to these "new frontier", as in the westerns, white and aboriginal confrontation, is seen as civilization and savagery of the dichotomy, private detective seems to represent the civilized side, become civilized and savage intermediary, in the city of this "barbaric", and the "barbaric" criminals confrontation.

Film noir and westerns have seen the emergence of individual heroes, the western "Shane" (Shane) 1952, the protagonist Alan Ladd (Alan Ladd). Shane 1952, featuring Alan Ladd as the lone hero, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance 1962, and The Searchers 1956, with John Wayne as the lone hero. Wayne also played lonely heroes who were eventually rejected by their families and communities.

New School Film Noir

Following a shift in historical and cultural circumstances, film noir finally came to a temporary end in 1958. In the 1960s, the academic, civil rights, affirmative action, anti-Vietnam War, and hippie movements were in full swing, dealing a great blow to the American establishment, and in the early 1970s, the Watergate scandal erupted, which led to a revival of film noir as the public realized that government was unreliable, and they became skeptical of and disillusioned with it. Since film noir is inherently skeptical, and its protagonist, the detective, often has a sophisticated understanding of the world, some directors wanted to shoot film noir in color. This type of film can be called "neo-noir", which is shot in color, but does not aim to be bright, with dim lighting and night scenes, and is directed by foreigners, such as Polish director Polanski's Chinatown 1974, which has successfully revived the film noir genre.

This film rearranges the elements of the past film noir, and is quite successful in doing so. In film noir, the detective protagonist, as a personal hero, is often confronted with an ambiguous moral world, while the personal hero of a traditional western is confronted with a world of clear-cut black and white, clear moral judgments, and personal judgments that are much different from those of film noir. In a film noir set in a modern crime city, the protagonist's personal ethical choices are not only vague and ambiguous, but also fail to solve the problem in the end.

The masterpiece of the 1980s is German filmmaker Wenders' Hammett 1982, which is about a hard-boiled detective fiction writer, Hammett, who gets caught up in the world of his own creations. It is a unique piece of "neo-noir", which takes an important writer of 1940s film noir as a protagonist of the movie, and combines the writer's era and the world of film noir. It explores the world of film noir in the context of the author's time. "Hammett" has attracted considerable attention in Europe, reflecting the importance that French and German film critics and academics attached to American film noir from the 1940s to the 1960s. After the discovery of film noir by the French film critics, the film noir school of the fifties was highly regarded, and then it spread to Germany, where Wenders, as a stalwart of the New Wave of German Cinema, directed "Hammett," which is very representative of the film noir world.

In the 1990s, American director Curtis Hanson finally made a film comparable to the classic film noir of that era, L.A. Confidential (1997), which interspersed some of the film footage from Hammett's novel. The film is interspersed with clips from Hammett's novels, all of which featured Veronica Lake, who was so prominent in those films that she became an icon of American cinema. "Iron Mask" deliberately casts Kim Basinger in a role similar to Lake's, even showing clips of Lake's movies in the boudoir, which is an interesting textual interplay, and the two characters have echoes of each other. Kim Basinger's character is a worldly character who goes to Hollywood in search of a dream but ends up working as a high-class call girl, and when she no longer looks like a movie star like Lemurko, others think of her as Lemurko. "The Iron Mask can be regarded as a masterpiece of the 'neo-noir' movie of the 1990s.