Classic film noir

The Maltese Falcon.

The Maltese Falcon was released on the 18^th of October 1941 New York, USA.it was consider it the first in the dark film noir genre in Hollywood. The Warner Brothers, so impressed with his work signed John Huston to screen write and direct the film. It stared Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor. Bogart plays a private detective, Sam Spade, takes on a case that involves him with three eccentric criminals and a manipulating Brigid O’Shaughnessy, played by Aston, competing to obtain a jewel encrusted falcon, the audience with a distinctly down-beat conclusion and bitter taste.

Double Indemnity.

Double indemnity was released on the 24^th of April 1944 in USA. A sleazy thriller about adultery directed by Billy Wilder the film went on to be one of the classic film noir’s and was nominated in seven categories for Academy Awards. The film is centred round planning a murder of a husband involving an insurance sales man (Fred Mac Murray) by the house wife (Barbra Stanwyck) like most film noir the motive is money.

History of film noir

The years immediately following the end of World War Two marked the start of a crucial phase in the creation, definition and popularising of both literary and cinematic noir. There were several concurrent developments: the Hollywood production of a growing number of pessimistic, downbeat crime films, the post-war release in Europe of a large backlog of American films, the publication in France of a new series of crime novels and the appearance in America of a new kind of book, the paperback original. Films released in America just before the end of the war. The first detective film to use the shadowy, nihilistic noir style in a definitive way was the pivotal work of novice director John Huston in the mystery classic The Maltese Falcon, which presented a new, darker perspective on the characters and themes of hard-boiled fiction with grim tone to the material. Many sources have claimed that director Boris Ingster's and RKO's Stranger on the Third Floor (1940) was the first full-featured film noir. Film noir stems from b movies where they could push boundaries and experiment, As b movies they had to be cheap and invented new ideas, concepts and had to make do with what they could afford. Europeans fled from nazi to America some into Hollywood and with them brought mood, darkness, anxiety. German expressionism helped with the mood lighting use of sunrise.

Film noir codes and conventions

The low-key lighting schemes of many classic film noirs are associated with stark light/dark contrasts and dramatic shadow patterning. The shadows of Venetian blinds or banister rods, cast upon an actor, a wall, or an entire set, are an iconic visual in noir, Characters' faces may be partially or wholly obscured by darkness. While black-and-white cinematography is considered to be essential attributes of classic noir. Film noir is also known for its use of low-angle, wide-angle, and skewed shots, with shots of people reflected in one or more mirrors or other distorting objects.

Film noir often used music that could be going on in the background and also used it for displaying characteristics of the cast. Sound tracks in genuinely complex ways, stories using sound alone; its popularity had accustomed listening audiences to understand complex layering of sound.

Film noir borrows its paraphernalia from other forms, usually from the crime and detective genres, but often overlapping into thrillers and horror. Film noir is often associated with an urban setting such as Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York. Noir would often used the same sets and scenes from gangster movies as they couldn’t afford their own as often industrial settings; refineries, factories and train yards.

The narrative is generally obscure and frames the entire primary narrative as a flashback, narration, sometimes used as a structuring device. Noir is generally associated with first-person narration.

Film noirs tend to revolve around heroes who are more flawed and morally questionable than the norm, often fall guys, femme fatales and corrupt policemen. Among these characters there would be a lot of cigarette smoking.

Crime, usually murder, is an element of almost all film noirs where jealousy is the centre. Other common plots the protagonists are implicated in heists or con games, or in murderous conspiracies often involving adulterous affairs and heroes who are morally questionable.