Film Noir

Okay, I have to admit that I have no idea what Film Noir is. So, I looked it up.

Characteristics of Film Noir

1. Film noir is French for "black film". A genre that peaked in the 1944-1955 period. Its origins are the detective novels of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler and the femme fatale novels of James Cain.

2. The historical setting is the contemporary world that has been corrupted and lost its moral certainty. The prevailing cynicism of characters reflects the reality of the atomic bomb, Cold War, totalitarianism, propaganda, Hollywood blacklist, corrupting power of the government and press. The genre reflects society's loss of faith in progress and man's innate goodness.

3. The protagonist character is a loner, introverted, troubled, hard-boiled, pessimistic. He is not the conventional film hero, but rather average and conventional, often is a war veteran or detective, and is defined by his ability to survive and restore normality.

4. The seeker-hero is on a quest in the film. He is repeatedly tested, interrogated, attacked, persecuted and will either emerge safely, uncorrupted, strong or be killed.

5. Things are not what they seem, people change identities, the plot has unforeseen twists and turns.

6. The noir world can be external or internal.

a)The external world is usually the dark, mean streets of the big city

b)The internal world is the violence/trauma/nightmares in the hero's mind.

7. The antagonist is a femme fatale, a dangerous female who lures/tempts/seduces the hero. She is glamorous with dark lips and long flowing hair. She usually already possesses another man, such as a wealthy older husband.

8. The opposite of the femme fatale is the domestic woman, a wife or girlfriend.

9. The voice-over is a subjective/confessional narration who is telling the story out of a need to confess/purify/cleanse his conscience.

10. The visual style of noir is the hard/undiffused look of the tabloid newspaper with cluttered/claustrophobic/dark interiors framed or restricted by the camera frame, many night scenes with overtones of dispair and madness.

11. The iconography of noir uses dark sidewalks, rain-drenched streets, flashing neon signs, fairgrounds and carnivals (associated with madness in German expressionism), the city as vilain/dangerous/hostile. Media icons (ie. telephones) are frequent.

Please Note:

Original article by: Dr. Steven Schoenherr of the University of San Diego

Most of what you see above is copy/pasted from his article with my paraphrasing a little comments thrown in randomly. This is done in such a way that it'd be considered plagiarism by any ethics committee. But its my blog so whatever.