Rene,
Re the rest of your comments:
"Are you aware of any books on film noir that aren't
'flawed?' I can't think of any."
Well, that's because I haven't written it yet.
Seriously, though, if Lyons and Petievitch go to such great
lengths to debunk the notion that film noir is a function of
visual style, doesn't it follow that there's a large body of
thought holding the opposite opinion? There'd be no point to
their rebutting arguments that haven't been made.
"What's your point in (re)telling this slightly amusing but
hoary old anecdote [the Dmytryk lecture story]?"
My point, since you ask so courteously, was that film noir
was the result of professional filmmakers trying to find a
way to tell stories that was both visually appropriate and
economical, NOT the result of a conscious artistic
movement.
"So you come up with a definition of neo-noir by finding the
(non-existent) common elements of the
(classic) film noir."
I misread the original question (which I guess calls my
absolute infallibility into question, but that's another
topic). I thought you were asking me how I could possibly
come up with a definition of film noir based on the visual
elements rather than the content; I missed the "neo"
prefix.
But I'd already indicated, by that time, that I wasn't sure
there actually was such a thing as
"neo-noir," given that many of the films called by that name
lacked the visual qualities defining
"classic" noir, and that there was a self-consciousness to
the ones that had it. So why would I even WANT to define it,
if I'm not convinced it exists in the first place.
As for the "non-existence" of common visual elements, you,
after all, were the one who attributed the coining of the
phrase "film noir" to Nino Frank, who, you said, came up with
the term after viewing six Hollywood crime films, THE MALTESE
FALCON, LAURA, DOUBLE INDEMNITY, MURDER MY SWEET, and THE
WOMAN IN THE WINDOW. (Where's the sixth, by the way; I only
count five.)
I admitted that I'd never seen THE WOMEN IN WHITE, but,
inasmuch as it was directed by Fritz Lang, who DID use
noir-style visuals in movies like THE BIG HEAT and CLOAK AND
DAGGER, I'd be willing to bet that it had the same sort of
visual stylistics.
Assuming it did, and putting it together with the other films
that led Frank to coin the term, what are the common
elements? Aside from their all falling roughly into the broad
genre of "crime story," it's certainly not the content. They
run a pretty wide gamut. There are two PI films, one romantic
suspense
(featuring a policeman/hero, though it's hardly a police
procedural), one "doomed criminal protagonist" story, and one
"ordinary guy gets swept into suspensful situation a la
Hitchcock" story.
So, assuming I'm right about WOMAN IN THE WINDOW, the element
common to all five films is the visual quality that enhances
the story-telling by setting the mood.
And if it's the visual quality that defines film noir
(and Frank's choice of the definitive examples of the form
indicates that this is PRECISELY what it is) it follows that
films that don't have this quality
(whatever their merits, which may be, and often are,
considerable) AREN'T film noir.
You may disagree with this, but I don't think you can call it
a circular argument. It IS a syllogism, which, I guess, is
yet another indication of the Jesuit influence (but, after
all, Rene, the Jebs only had me for four years; I had eight
years of Franciscans before them and a secular state
university afterwards, so you can't blame St. Ignatius Loyola
completely), but it's not a circular argument.
"Did Chandler, Hammett, Cain have no bearing in terms of
source material & script writers such as Jonathan
Latimer, Steve Fisher, Philip Yordan, Martin Goldsmith
& many others?"
Story is clearly an important part of any film, but if a
particular script can be filmed either with or without the
particular visual stylistics I've referred to, and if those
visual stylistics are what define film noir, then it follows
that story isn't the controlling factor.
And, in all probability, they had some impact on what term
Frank coined to describe the films he saw, since it's likely
he noticed that many of the source novels had appeared in
France under the SERIE NOIR logo.
I'll allow that film noir visual approach was particularly
appropriate to the film adaptations of books by writers like
Hammett, Chandler, Cain, etc., and to original screenplays by
the scriptwriters you mention. And, as I said, filmmakers
were trying to find a way to tell a story visually that was
appropriate to the material, so it follows that the material
had some bearing on the visual choices they made.
But there've also been fine films made from books or scripts
by the writers you mention that didn't use those signature
visual effects.
Moreover, and at the risk of repeating myself, the story
content of film noir, not just the five mentioned by Frank,
but the whole body of film noir travels, you must admit,
across a pretty wide spectrum.
It's for that very reason that I resist the notion of
"noir content," at least in film (and, to a large degree, in
prose fiction, as well). It's a question of mood and
atmosphere (I believe, though I may be misquoting you here,
that you yourself said, in a prior post, that noir was a
matter of mood), and in film, mood and atmosphere are set
visually.
Again, at the risk of repeating myself, MARLOWE, though
having much in common with MURDER MY SWEET in terms of
content, and everything in common in terms of character (at
least in terms of its main character) doesn't have the dark,
sinister atmosphere of the earlier film. And that lack of
atmosphere is not a function of the source material, the
script, or the performances. It's a function of the visual
style.
"It's been many years since I've seen them but I recall
Charlie Chan and SHerlock Holmes movies that had a dark look.
Are these noirs in your book, Jim?"
Well, I've never heard of cozies being included under the
rubric of noir, but I have to admit that, in terms of visual
style, you might be able to make a case here. Certainly
CHARLIE CHAN AT THE OPERA and THE SCARLET CLAW establish a
dark, sinister atmosphere visually, and, for traditional
whodunits, have some pretty hard-nosed elements. Tough
mainland cops and a lot of urban grittiness in CHAN, and an
apparent vicious serial killer, particularly gruesome
murders
(including one child), and Holmes packing a .38 snubbie that
wouldn't be out of place in the gun hand of Marlowe or Spade
in CLAW.
As I said about the Universal horror films, if you want to
include them, I'll raise fewer objections than if you insist
on including films that pointedly lack the noir visual
elements.
JIM DOHERTY
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