--- In
rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, William Ahearn
<williamahearn@...> wrote:
> Another aspect I'm working on is the myth that noir
is
> a purely American form. Maybe I'll discover
BollyNoir
> . . .
That's much truer of hardboiled; in fact, I think it's
undisputed. But noir, if you make the definition broad
enough, could go back a long ways and include the Greeks,
some of Shakespeare, Dostoyevsky, Franz Kafka and who knows
what else. In film, "noir" was first applied to American
films, but the Germans were making noir films in the silent
era and the French made their share of great noir films, so
it looks more like a collective phenomenon, a type of story
that appealed widely to people (possibly because of hard
times, a certain cynicism, people liking antiheroes, the loss
of personal security and so on).
Best,
mrt
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