I just came across this interview with George Pelecanos and
was struck by what I think is a dead-on criticism by him of
much hardboiled lit. and films -- that too often we see men
who are unusually affected by the schemes and demands of
women who make the men do things they ordinarily wouldn't.
Pouty lips and heaving bosoms, sad stories and breathy
entreaties don't seem so realistic (maybe that's not the
right word ... compelling, perhaps) as either they might have
in another decade, or might have on my first reading of them.
Am I being too harsh?
###
<
http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/archives/cover/1998/print_cover0821.
html>
I'd basically come to the point
where I was sick of
noir, because now it's become a
parody of a parody.
It's like in movies_in the late
stages of the '50s,
noir movies became a parody,
like Kiss Me Deadly, a
great film, but it's a parody
of noir. And so modern
noir literature has become this
James M. Cain riff
where a guy is sucked into the
web of a black-widow
spider woman who makes him kill
people. It's always
wealthy white guys, they lose
everything 'cause
they're drunk on pussy or
whatever.
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