Geoff Mayer – Encyclopedia of Film Noir

Автор: Geoff Mayer
Название книги: Encyclopedia of Film Noir
Формат: PDF
Страницы: 494
Жанр: Театр и Кино
Качество: Изначально компьютерное, E-book

When viewers think of film noir, they often picture actors like Humphrey Bogart playing characters like Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon, the film based on the book by Dashiell Hammett. Yet film noir is a genre much richer. The authors first examine the debate surrounding the parameters of the genre and the many different ways it is defined. They discuss the Noir City, its setting and backdrop, and also the cultural (WWII) and institutional (the House UnAmerican Activities Committee, and the Production Code Administration) influences on the subgenres. An analysis of the low budget and series film noirs provides information on those cult classics. With over 200 entries on films, directors, and actors, the Encyclopedia of Film Noir is the most complete resource for film fans, students, and scholars

These statements, each from a respected scholar, highlight the diffi culties in
discussing fi lm noir. Williams, for example is correct: melodrama, as a form that
seeks the dramatic revelation of moral and emotional truths, is the fundamental
dramatic mode of Hollywood cinema. The narrative trajectory of mainstream
American cinema, as she points out, is ultimately concerned with the “retrieval
and staging of virtue through adversity and suffering.”6 However, while most nonnoir
fi lms produced in the 1940s and 1950s conform to this pattern, fi lm noir
does not and its most representative examples refuse to unequivocally endorse
the prevailing moral norms. For example, Criss Cross, Robert Siodmak’s 1949
fi lm for Universal Studios starring Burt Lancaster as Steve Thompson: Thompson
is virtuous and innocent. He is also selfi sh, obsessive, morally weak, covetous of
another man’s wife, and vulnerable; his demise at the end of the fi lm is humiliating.
Yet, like most Hollywood fi lms, he is the audience’s entry point into the fi lm as
the director is careful to bind the viewer into Thompson’s experience through
a protracted series of point of view shots. Thompson is, in effect, both good and
bad and the fi lm’s moral stance is compromised as a result. This pattern is evident
in many noir fi lms.
A more compelling problem, as seen in the confl icting views offered above by
Steve Neale and Alain Silver, involves the intrinsic questions of what fi lm noir
is and what its historical parameters are. Containing fi lm noir to one or two neat
periods—such as 1939 to 1958, or 1981 to the present—and to assume that fi lms
produced during these periods share a rigid set of common characteristics is diffi
cult. It is a much more volatile mode than this. Similarly, this volume shows
that fi lm noir is not a unique American form and that other fi lm cultures, such
as the British, have a strong legacy of noir fi lms.7 The Encyclopedia of Film Noir
celebrates the vitality and depth of British fi lm noir through an extensive selection
of representative fi lms.
Furthermore, The Encyclopedia of Film Noir does not limit itself to the large
budget fi lms produced by major studios, such as Paramount and Warner Brothers;
we have tried to include a representative selection of low budget fi lms produced
by so-called Poverty Row studios, such as Republic, Monogram, PRC, and Film
Classics. While the signifi cance of seminal noir fi lms is emphasized throughout
the book, we also acknowledge the importance of many low budget fi lms to the
experiences of fi lmgoers. Many low-budget noir fi lms have disappeared from fi lm
history. Large fi lms like Double Indemnity, for example, benefi ted from Paramount’s
extensive fi nancial resources and its large network of theatres situated in prime
locations throughout the United States, as well as effi cient distribution overseas.
The availability of fi lms such as this, and the frequent scholarly analysis of them for
the past forty years, has resulted in a biased history of fi lm noir. Low budget fi lms,
on the other hand, often had to fend for themselves with little promotion and sporadic
distribution. This meant that fi lms such as Decoy (Monogram, 1946), Blonde
Ice (Film Classics, 1948), and The Great Flamarion (Republic, 1945), disappeared
under the critical radar and are absent from many studies of fi lm noir. Hence, this
volume not only provides an entry on Double Indemnity but also PRC’s Apology for
Murder (1945), starring Ann Savage, Hugh Beaumont, and Charles D. Hicks, in
the roles played by Barbara Stanwyck, Fred MacMurray, and Edward G. Robinson
in Billy Wilder’s fi lm. Both fi lms were based on the same real-life incident—the
1927 murder of Albert Gray by his wife and her lover—which, in turn, inspired
James M. Cain’s novella. Similarly, less obscure low budget fi lms, such as Detour
(1945), which was fi lmed in days (as opposed to weeks or months) on a miniscule
budget, and Gun Crazy (1950), which had a slightly higher budget but extensive
distribution problems, are included alongside fi lms produced by the major studios,
as these Poverty Row productions are as important, if not more so, in providing an
authentic representation of fi lm noir in the 1940s and 1950s.
The Encyclopedia of Film Noir is designed to provide an accessible yet scholarly,
user-friendly but research-informed, comprehensive account of the phenomenon
of fi lm noir—both the classical fi lm noir cycle (approximately 1939–1959) as well
the modern, or neo-noir, period, which constitutes fi lms produced after 1959. The
encyclopedia presents this survey of fi lm noir in two main ways. First, it offers fi ve
substantial overview essays in which the authors investigate signifi cant aspects of
fi lm noir and the various contexts within which it developed. These essays explore
the contested nature of noir, as evidenced above in the radically different position
taken by Neale and Silver; in the vexed question of whether it can considered a fi lm
genre; in its relationship to hard-boiled crime fi ction; in its iconic presentation of
the American city; in political and cultural infl uences associated with the postwar
and Cold War periods (including the activities of the House Committee on
Un-American Activities); and in fi lm noir’s distinctive visual style.
Thereafter, the encyclopedia presents an alphabetically organized set of detailed
entries on the fi lms together with signifi cant American and British directors and
actors associated with fi lm noir. Each actor or director entry contains a selected fi lmography
that is designed to be inclusive, rather than exclusive, and many so-called
borderline noir fi lms are listed alongside more familiar ones. Similarly, each fi lm
entry provides details on cast, characters, and fi lmmakers together with a contextual
overview and critique of its themes, narrative structure, and relevance.
The selected bibliography has been compiled as a guide to help the reader fi nd
specifi c books on specialized aspects of fi lm noir. We tried to cater to both the
novice reader—who requires an introduction to fi lm noir—as well as to the more
experienced noir devotee seeking to extend his or her knowledge of this fascinating
period in fi lm history. Each reader, we assume, is interested in the anarchic
spirit of fi lm noir and this volume is designed to satisfy this demand.