La Chair de l'orchidée (Patrice Chéreau, 1975): This isn’t clearly revealed as a quasi-sequel to the novel No Orchids for Miss Blandish until past its halfway mark, but its acerbic content and generally weird vibe fits. Such perversity functions much better in the 70s where structure can be subverted into a more ambient, less direct approach. What begins as a kind of road movie-slash-offbeat lovers-on-the-run tale peters out quickly due to the deranged mechanics that bind the dissonant mentally-atypical characters and obstruct that narrative potential with isolating systems. In the 40s, including within its British prequel, this would be read as a traditional noir device: the evil forces restraining the protagonists, etc. But this curio has a different agenda. The economic pacing lends itself well to an elastic strategy of world-building that leans into eccentric moments on its way to form a familiar skeleton. The details make the movie, and are given space to breathe due to the playful and witty choices around narrative withholding. Something like repeated knife violence becomes a kind of dry running joke (in spite of the running reason for Rampling's particular defensive violence..) like many of the brutal and strange ventures portrayed, where noir concepts of being trapped in nightmarish scenarios are devalued and transcended by a tone of jeering absurdity.
Rampling’s enigmatic center exudes this energy, applying her own internal logic from an objective distance to keep things rash and off balance, and sometimes a bit silly, even when urgent. Cremer’s character is almost boring in his normalcy comparative to the other players, but his ‘human yo-yo’ responses to tribulations, and the people he chooses to associate with, highlight something deeply troubled and disquieting about him as well - sitting in bed smiling, yielding to a situation he doesn't understand nor really care to (after being invested and determined in scenes just prior??) He disappears for a while, as if the film matches his energy and deviates to more interesting but not always 'important' dynamics in the interim, but when we return to him it's clear that he's the ultimate satirical caricature of a noir protagonist - totally surrendered to an inescapable fate and immobilized with defeated acceptance. All he can say is "that was absurd" and "a silly boy, turned into a man" and "you can't help me" with little affect. It's pathetic and treated as such, finally receiving the sole destiny available to his mental scope, with the swift discarding earned by this attitude and worldview.
I admire a film that begins with a non-dreamy, raw examination of cruel abuse that mirrors our own reality, and then seamlessly transitions into gonzo introductions of devices and behavior that reveal an entirely different world operating under alternative rules. It’s a lot like the mean-spirit Hobbesian attitude of its predecessor only fleshed out more and afforded a deft touch of consciousness to the material’s potential for exaggeration and embellishment. The film wisely exists on a plane between comic antisocial insanity and existential threats of forced containment propagated by those boasting the upper hand of a power imbalance - except, because the idiosyncratic “innocents” are just as wildly unpredictable or curiously complacent, respectively, as the key villains can erratically be, the sense of fatalism feels less concrete; the power imbalance can shift back when your target captives aren’t playing by even your milieu’s bonkers schema. Hans Christian Blech and François Simon are hilarious as the quirky duo of criminal brothers musing on random emotional vulnerabilities in between their cartoonish sinister activity. I wish they were more present throughout, particularly in the back half.
So this was pretty fun. If I gave an overview of the plot, it's pretty standard stuff, but the atmosphere is not noir while the contents wrestle with noir vehicles and attitudes, but ultimately spring free - just like Rampling's insane, resilient heroine whose mission is to break free of the chains imposed upon her. I think the tinkering with conventions makes this a more intelligent picture than it appears to be. Some are more obvious implementations of rebellion and sabotage vis bizarre detours and atmospheric caprice, while others are serpentine and oblique. The denouement is hysterical in its dark macabre, unprompted inserts of information, proving Cremer’s ideas of fatalism wrong for the principal who can envision another way. It's fantastical, almost an invisible proposition of a crazy person willing their worldview and succeeding, or a devolution from the rules of noir and fate into the absurdity of chance, but it works either way. If one wants to only respond to its superficial pleasures, that's fine, but they can be elevated by a critical engagement with genre devices and the illusory condition of constraints. In such a loopy, faux-restrictive world of self-imposed determinism, is it advantageous to be abnormal?
The Noir List Discussion and Suggestions (Genre Project)
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therewillbeblus
- Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm
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Randall Maysin Again
- Joined: Tue Dec 14, 2021 3:28 pm
Re: The Noir List Discussion and Suggestions (Genre Project)
The Kremlin Letter (John Huston, 1970). Well this was overall a considerably better film than expected, if an oily and greasy one. I think its highly mixed reputation is highly mixed because of the moral disgust of some reviewers, not the film's other qualities. The film is essentially a John le Carre novel that has had every trace of le Carre's moral tenor and humanistic approach to however flawed characters systematically weeded out and erased, to the point where the film seems perhaps reprehensibly, or perhaps artistically illegitimately, cynical. There is sort of a hero and someone/a side you do end up rooting for, quite clearly, and yet everyone is mercenary and kind of disgusting. There is much to be said for the plot, which honestly is rather masterful, hugely intricate, viscous, petty, and airless, conveying a sense of going nowhere beautifully--a very unadventuresome spy film this, despite a little travelogue-ishness near the beginning. Huston's direction of the actors and staging is perhaps overly lethargic at times, even for this plot.
SpoilerShow
Even the ingenue (Barbara Parkins) is listless and affectless and somehow slightly revolting, or like a sacrificial lamb for whom the film doesn't seem bother to actually evoke much, if any sympathy.
SpoilerShow
The ending is, of course, appalling, but also struck me as being totally unrealistic, borderline ridiculous, and kind of makes the entire film seem like a piss-take. I just don't think evil in places like this manifests itself like that--the Richard Boone character's final act seems like something out of a depraved, hideous version of a Looney Tunes cartoon, not bureaucratic real life.
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therewillbeblus
- Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm
Re: The Noir List Discussion and Suggestions (Genre Project)
Blues in the Night is as bizarre as a genuine musical noir should be, though its success rides on balancing strange dimensions under a rigorous formal control. The tone meshing is incredibly sloppy, with much of the content coming off as ridiculous, but Anatole Litvak and his crew's craft is so strong that -like De Palma or Verhoeven- he can take shlock and turn it into gold. The montages are out-of-this-world impressive, and the screw-tightening flourishes enliven some performances, particularly Betty Field's over-the-top femme fatale.
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domino harvey
- Dot Com Dom
- Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:42 pm
Re: The Noir List Discussion and Suggestions (Genre Project)
Yes, it’s a wonderful whatsit that somehow slipped through the cracks at the studio with much of its tonal variations intact.
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therewillbeblus
- Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm
Re: The Noir List Discussion and Suggestions (Genre Project)
A timely moment to dump some noir writeups, I guess
The Tall Target (Revisit): Wildly entertaining period noir full of delightfully surprising turns that threaten to upend Dick Powell's rogue efforts to protect the president at each stage of the game. The high stakes are rattled with tension as our protagonist barely hangs on by a thread - Powell strips himself, or is forcibly stripped of nearly every asset and piece of credibility he has, which supports each twist with extra heft. The finale may not live up to earlier set pieces, and one character's involvement might be too obvious, but it hardly matters in such a brisk and eventful film.
Reign of Terror aka The Black Book (Revisit): Another period noir from Mann with emphasis on style, but the relentless momentum of its plotty narrative trajectory is what sells this as a great work. No history prerequisites required for enjoyment, but an appetite for brash activity and violence is -Robert Cummings fits right in as a dynamic lead forced to play both sides convincingly, but every player gets a chance to chew scenery - especially Richard Basehart as a particularly evil incarnation of Robespierre. It's gothic historical fiction so pulpy you can cut it with a knife.
Dark Stranger: Arthur Ripley directs an episode of Edmond O'Brien getting vacuumed up into his own dimestore novel, cast against type from the preferred narrative of his identity. It makes sense that the helmer of The Chase would be drawn to this surreal mess, but the metacontextual aspects everyone seems to baldly accept wind up sucking the fun out of the story instead of adding clever touches to it. The reveal is anticipated from a mile away, and it's plainly uninteresting, just as the ambiance lacks any mood to sell it with feeling. Speaking of no feeling, O'Brien spends his time courting Joanne Woodward in a career-worst performance that's essentially Stepford-wife robotic - though I suppose one could argue that she's a paper-thin caricature created by a terrible writer! Either way, this is a waste of time that even fans of Ripley's work should avoid.
He Walked By Night: Fake semi-doc police procedurals are my least favorite type of noir, but this was above-board thanks primarily to the quick pace and enveloping yet tempered style of the picture (John Alton plus an uncredited Mann surely contributed greatly to this achievement). The violence is brutal and its consequences are portrayed in an effectively curt manner. I enjoyed how the film gives as much time to the killer feeding his cute dog as a wife of his victim grieving - its all-around objective gaze is punishing but cool and distanced, casting aside tragedy right after giving it a sensitive close-up. The movie cares but allows brevity to be enough, and, like Fincher, is more interested in professional process than anything else - from the detective work to the villain's self-surgery. Unfortunately all these parts don't add up to a memorable whole, and in the end I wished we were given some more investment in character to make this a kind of lite-Crime Wave, which it doesn't even come close to embodying. Props for doing The Third Man's ending first though.
99 River Street: This has got to have one of the stupidest set-ups in noir history: Jewel thief is so infatuated with a woman that he brings her along to his crime business meeting, making out with her the whole time, only to find out that.. wait for it.. criminals don't like it when civilians see their crimes! He's somehow surprised at being outcast, and has to do away with her, which suddenly comes pretty easy to him. What a dope. Anyways, from there things heat up and get exciting due to Payne's hotheated would-be-patsy taking the lead. At first he’s emasculated time after time (there's even an opportunity taken to sully him via a rando acting audition occurring out in public! What?) only to come back harder in each and every instance. Payne's ex-boxer-turned-cabbie has an urgent temperament that finally gets a release in the back half as he cracks down on the plot against him, and it's a joy to behold. It’s an uneven picture, but worth checking out for the cathartic bits, including an unanticipated morality in Payne's demeanor that shines brightly between the beatdowns. The finale's kinda lame though.
The Prowler (Revisit): Van Heflin's sleazy cop dominates the opening act of this Losey masterpiece. A specialist of slippery role-shifting, the protector becomes the abuser (or the titular prowler) from the outset, and things move on unpredictably from there. While the film eventually settles into a reverse-Double Indemnity sitch, Trumbo's script is exalting. Even when activity seems to follow a foreseeable rhythm, there are still nuggets of idiosyncratic menace and ambiguity in personality and motive sewn into the fabric of these dynamics as the progression unfolds. The audience isn't primed for the familiar beats in part because these characters are just slightly unknowable (and cheekily to one another just as much as to the viewer - Evelyn Keyes sells this blind hysteria well), creating a surreal effect that distances us further from them in a dramatically unsettling fashion.
Sunset Boulevard (Revisit): I've already written about this film on the forum, so I'll keep this brief - I still really want to like this but find it rather obnoxious. The satirical self-reflexivity is a bit overblown -though I do appreciate the bite of a dead screenwriter narrating the story with a silver tongue- but Wilder and co. generally know what the material is and run with it semi-constructively. I always come back to the sadness inherent in the transactional relationship and Holden's performance of guilt in particular; how he lashes out and engages in a series of behaviors that don't spell out his 'tough love' sensitivity but hint at it underneath the veneer of pure greed. As far as I'm concerned it's his film more than Swanson's. The sense of place is well-drawn - the sets are striking and feel lived-in (that garage, with the leaves and all, etched in my mind forever). It just.. doesn't add up to anything worthy of its little sardonic touches or sincere attempts at dramatics. The sum of its parts is weak, even if a few of the brushstrokes are amusing. Its gaudiness is only partially self-conscious and ironic, but the bulk of it is oblivious and cringe-inducing.
The Racket: With stars like these, we should've gotten a better movie. Robert Mitchum plays a good 'ol boy cop going after Robert Ryan's big-time crime boss with Lizbeth Scott as witness in tow, and the result is hardly more than a forgettable programmer. Ryan confiding his family problems in Mitchum and then becoming upset by his 'who cares' reaction is a good example of the puzzling activity this film tries to drum up for some kind of effect, but falls flat on its face each time. It's no surprise that Hughes cycled through five directors, as the tonal and narrative resolutions are routine, leading to a banal and final product. It'd be more appealing if they were drastically incongruous because at least that would be stimulating in some direction.
Hollow Triumph aka The Scar: Absurdly plotted but fantastically surprising noir, with inconsistent doses of strong style and inspiring directorial wit. Paul Henreid, a gangster on the run from other gangsters he's robbed, finds a doppleganger and decides to take his identity before wild complications ensue. There are some lulls, but the economical pacing hardly allows them to drag down the picture. From the crackerjack opening robbery to the clever twist on inescapable fatalism in the last act, this is a leisurely good time peppered with juicy supporting parts and strong location shooting. If you're able to suspend disbelief, you’ll probably find something to like here.
He Ran All the Way: John Garfield is a feral hood caught up in a manhunt, and relentlessly engages in immoral self-preservation when he shacks up with an unsuspecting family. A precursor to stuff like Desperate Hours and Good Time, this potboiler rides on Garfield's anarchic spirit, and the tension is almost painful as we wait for a terrible implosion amidst the psychological torture Garfield unleashes on Winters et al. This might be perfect if cut to an even leaner hour, but it's a strong firecracker of a movie that's well worth seeing if just for Garfield's perf handsomely shot by Howe.
Body and Soul: A well-crafted boxing noir / fictional biopic by Rossen. There's not too much to say about this one - the performances, direction, writing are all solid, and the time allotted to each section of Garfield's life is well-timed and edited. Even though everyone is good here, I thought Lilli Palmer was the standout as his primary romantic partner - she radiates the screen in a novel, quirky manner at times. Great use of montage, too.
Kiss Me Deadly (Revisit): The apotheosis of film noir is also its most experimental and nihilistic work, that's somehow also one of the more entertaining genre entries. Inspiring everything from nouvelle vague to cyberpunk sci-fi, Aldrich's urgent picture aims its fury at a range of targets, from narcissistic personalities to the studio system to the world at large. Today would be a good day to revisit it again if I hadn't already four times this year.
The Tall Target (Revisit): Wildly entertaining period noir full of delightfully surprising turns that threaten to upend Dick Powell's rogue efforts to protect the president at each stage of the game. The high stakes are rattled with tension as our protagonist barely hangs on by a thread - Powell strips himself, or is forcibly stripped of nearly every asset and piece of credibility he has, which supports each twist with extra heft. The finale may not live up to earlier set pieces, and one character's involvement might be too obvious, but it hardly matters in such a brisk and eventful film.
Reign of Terror aka The Black Book (Revisit): Another period noir from Mann with emphasis on style, but the relentless momentum of its plotty narrative trajectory is what sells this as a great work. No history prerequisites required for enjoyment, but an appetite for brash activity and violence is -
SpoilerShow
There's one up-close gunshot to the face that feels impossible to include here, but it made the cut!
Dark Stranger: Arthur Ripley directs an episode of Edmond O'Brien getting vacuumed up into his own dimestore novel, cast against type from the preferred narrative of his identity. It makes sense that the helmer of The Chase would be drawn to this surreal mess, but the metacontextual aspects everyone seems to baldly accept wind up sucking the fun out of the story instead of adding clever touches to it. The reveal is anticipated from a mile away, and it's plainly uninteresting, just as the ambiance lacks any mood to sell it with feeling. Speaking of no feeling, O'Brien spends his time courting Joanne Woodward in a career-worst performance that's essentially Stepford-wife robotic - though I suppose one could argue that she's a paper-thin caricature created by a terrible writer! Either way, this is a waste of time that even fans of Ripley's work should avoid.
He Walked By Night: Fake semi-doc police procedurals are my least favorite type of noir, but this was above-board thanks primarily to the quick pace and enveloping yet tempered style of the picture (John Alton plus an uncredited Mann surely contributed greatly to this achievement). The violence is brutal and its consequences are portrayed in an effectively curt manner. I enjoyed how the film gives as much time to the killer feeding his cute dog as a wife of his victim grieving - its all-around objective gaze is punishing but cool and distanced, casting aside tragedy right after giving it a sensitive close-up. The movie cares but allows brevity to be enough, and, like Fincher, is more interested in professional process than anything else - from the detective work to the villain's self-surgery. Unfortunately all these parts don't add up to a memorable whole, and in the end I wished we were given some more investment in character to make this a kind of lite-Crime Wave, which it doesn't even come close to embodying. Props for doing The Third Man's ending first though.
99 River Street: This has got to have one of the stupidest set-ups in noir history: Jewel thief is so infatuated with a woman that he brings her along to his crime business meeting, making out with her the whole time, only to find out that.. wait for it.. criminals don't like it when civilians see their crimes! He's somehow surprised at being outcast, and has to do away with her, which suddenly comes pretty easy to him. What a dope. Anyways, from there things heat up and get exciting due to Payne's hotheated would-be-patsy taking the lead. At first he’s emasculated time after time (there's even an opportunity taken to sully him via a rando acting audition occurring out in public! What?) only to come back harder in each and every instance. Payne's ex-boxer-turned-cabbie has an urgent temperament that finally gets a release in the back half as he cracks down on the plot against him, and it's a joy to behold. It’s an uneven picture, but worth checking out for the cathartic bits, including an unanticipated morality in Payne's demeanor that shines brightly between the beatdowns. The finale's kinda lame though.
The Prowler (Revisit): Van Heflin's sleazy cop dominates the opening act of this Losey masterpiece. A specialist of slippery role-shifting, the protector becomes the abuser (or the titular prowler) from the outset, and things move on unpredictably from there. While the film eventually settles into a reverse-Double Indemnity sitch, Trumbo's script is exalting. Even when activity seems to follow a foreseeable rhythm, there are still nuggets of idiosyncratic menace and ambiguity in personality and motive sewn into the fabric of these dynamics as the progression unfolds. The audience isn't primed for the familiar beats in part because these characters are just slightly unknowable (and cheekily to one another just as much as to the viewer - Evelyn Keyes sells this blind hysteria well), creating a surreal effect that distances us further from them in a dramatically unsettling fashion.
Sunset Boulevard (Revisit): I've already written about this film on the forum, so I'll keep this brief - I still really want to like this but find it rather obnoxious. The satirical self-reflexivity is a bit overblown -though I do appreciate the bite of a dead screenwriter narrating the story with a silver tongue- but Wilder and co. generally know what the material is and run with it semi-constructively. I always come back to the sadness inherent in the transactional relationship and Holden's performance of guilt in particular; how he lashes out and engages in a series of behaviors that don't spell out his 'tough love' sensitivity but hint at it underneath the veneer of pure greed. As far as I'm concerned it's his film more than Swanson's. The sense of place is well-drawn - the sets are striking and feel lived-in (that garage, with the leaves and all, etched in my mind forever). It just.. doesn't add up to anything worthy of its little sardonic touches or sincere attempts at dramatics. The sum of its parts is weak, even if a few of the brushstrokes are amusing. Its gaudiness is only partially self-conscious and ironic, but the bulk of it is oblivious and cringe-inducing.
The Racket: With stars like these, we should've gotten a better movie. Robert Mitchum plays a good 'ol boy cop going after Robert Ryan's big-time crime boss with Lizbeth Scott as witness in tow, and the result is hardly more than a forgettable programmer. Ryan confiding his family problems in Mitchum and then becoming upset by his 'who cares' reaction is a good example of the puzzling activity this film tries to drum up for some kind of effect, but falls flat on its face each time. It's no surprise that Hughes cycled through five directors, as the tonal and narrative resolutions are routine, leading to a banal and final product. It'd be more appealing if they were drastically incongruous because at least that would be stimulating in some direction.
Hollow Triumph aka The Scar: Absurdly plotted but fantastically surprising noir, with inconsistent doses of strong style and inspiring directorial wit. Paul Henreid, a gangster on the run from other gangsters he's robbed, finds a doppleganger and decides to take his identity before wild complications ensue. There are some lulls, but the economical pacing hardly allows them to drag down the picture. From the crackerjack opening robbery to the clever twist on inescapable fatalism in the last act, this is a leisurely good time peppered with juicy supporting parts and strong location shooting. If you're able to suspend disbelief, you’ll probably find something to like here.
He Ran All the Way: John Garfield is a feral hood caught up in a manhunt, and relentlessly engages in immoral self-preservation when he shacks up with an unsuspecting family. A precursor to stuff like Desperate Hours and Good Time, this potboiler rides on Garfield's anarchic spirit, and the tension is almost painful as we wait for a terrible implosion amidst the psychological torture Garfield unleashes on Winters et al. This might be perfect if cut to an even leaner hour, but it's a strong firecracker of a movie that's well worth seeing if just for Garfield's perf handsomely shot by Howe.
Body and Soul: A well-crafted boxing noir / fictional biopic by Rossen. There's not too much to say about this one - the performances, direction, writing are all solid, and the time allotted to each section of Garfield's life is well-timed and edited. Even though everyone is good here, I thought Lilli Palmer was the standout as his primary romantic partner - she radiates the screen in a novel, quirky manner at times. Great use of montage, too.
Kiss Me Deadly (Revisit): The apotheosis of film noir is also its most experimental and nihilistic work, that's somehow also one of the more entertaining genre entries. Inspiring everything from nouvelle vague to cyberpunk sci-fi, Aldrich's urgent picture aims its fury at a range of targets, from narcissistic personalities to the studio system to the world at large. Today would be a good day to revisit it again if I hadn't already four times this year.
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therewillbeblus
- Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm
Re: The Noir List Discussion and Suggestions (Genre Project)
Angel Heart (Revisit): Absolutely ludicrous neo-noir-horror, even before the shark-jumping twist comes that soils every good element that came before. Alan Parker just doesn't know how to create a strong atmosphere, nor engage in the right kind of meditation on details to warrant such swift narrative propulsion. We simply don't care about anything that happens - mainly unexplained grisly deaths - because he didn't take the time to feel out the characters or concoct even briskly involving dynamics between them and Rourke. De Niro phones in a small but significant part, while Rourke slums it a bit too hard; neither selling what they desperately need to in the end.
The Driver (Revisit): Excellent stylish slice of reductive (in the most positive sense) neon-noir. The larger-than-life character actors amusingly offset Ryan O'Neal's silent steady, particularly Joseph Walsh's frantic hood, and of course Dern's salivating hound copper. Meanwhile Isabelle Adjani's introverted vessel works well scene-paired with O'Neal's temperament. Though clearly a plagiarizing-level inspiration for Drive, I always liken this more to Le Samouraï's narrative trajectory and character dynamics. There isn't an ounce of fat on this bone. The ending can feel like a bit of a deflating letdown, but it's also the most fitting cap to the action thanks to the driver's stoicism.
Chinatown (Revisit): [Mostly a slightly edited compilation of other writings on the forum] Set to the perfect tempo and engaging across all aspects of filmmaking, Polanski's brooding drama and mystery become less about the whodunit plot and more about the mystery of the drama, i.e. will the fatalism inherent in these systems finally be broken? I love how after an unrelenting methodical pace, the final scene descends into chaos on a dime, seemingly shot in a single take as it recalls a Kafka-esque nightmare- exploiting the subjective surrealism in raw realist experiences of pandemonium.
Not only does the ending reflect Polanski's cynical worldview following Tate's death, the immoral haze of the 70s drowning out 60s naive optimism, etc., but it's perfectly fitting a noir worldview as an extension of the macro-systems of power that are inescapable and their effects on the most micro-vehicles in our vicinity. "Chinatown" isn't just a symbol for the fatalism behind society's moral erosion, but it's the erasure of all that's beautiful, loved, innocent, worthy, the 'possible' that is close and dear to us and that leaves a mark when it's erased. Evelyn's eye is the answer: her off-color iris that makes her special, a unique detail that brings singularity and meaning to her physical existence and a signifier that Nicholson notices and ignites a surge of loving energy between two moral people. But it doesn't belong, and it's no match for what's coming. It may not be my favorite neo-noir (that needle slowly moves towards Inherent Vice as the years progress), but it is one of the most unimpeachable artworks and a defining noir, enough to be in consideration for the "greatest." How does one contend with this picture? I think some great artists like Fincher have spent entire careers trying.
The Driver (Revisit): Excellent stylish slice of reductive (in the most positive sense) neon-noir. The larger-than-life character actors amusingly offset Ryan O'Neal's silent steady, particularly Joseph Walsh's frantic hood, and of course Dern's salivating hound copper. Meanwhile Isabelle Adjani's introverted vessel works well scene-paired with O'Neal's temperament. Though clearly a plagiarizing-level inspiration for Drive, I always liken this more to Le Samouraï's narrative trajectory and character dynamics. There isn't an ounce of fat on this bone. The ending can feel like a bit of a deflating letdown, but it's also the most fitting cap to the action thanks to the driver's stoicism.
Chinatown (Revisit): [Mostly a slightly edited compilation of other writings on the forum] Set to the perfect tempo and engaging across all aspects of filmmaking, Polanski's brooding drama and mystery become less about the whodunit plot and more about the mystery of the drama, i.e. will the fatalism inherent in these systems finally be broken? I love how after an unrelenting methodical pace, the final scene descends into chaos on a dime, seemingly shot in a single take as it recalls a Kafka-esque nightmare- exploiting the subjective surrealism in raw realist experiences of pandemonium.
SpoilerShow
Huston fake-crying and then dragging an innocent Katherine away into the dark like a literal monster, as the camera continues to pan on the wreckage and impotence of Nicholson, is a more unsettling ending than any of Polanski's horror films. Absolutely chilling.
SpoilerShow
So that eye getting shot clear out is the most blatant symbol of Chinatown's pull- from the enigmatic systems pulling the strings right down to the palpable organic material that defines us individually and to the ones we love. Destroying that eye is the only way this film could properly end.
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domino harvey
- Dot Com Dom
- Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:42 pm
Re: The Noir List Discussion and Suggestions (Genre Project)
Somehow I still possess quite a few unseen Noir discs, and some of these have been in my possession for a while, like this set that has been sitting in the stacks since it was released almost fifteen years ago. #kevyipwasinnocent
Bad Girls of Film Noir Vol 2:
Night Editor (Henry Levin 1946) Based on a popular radio program, this brief noir gives us a superfluous framing story, probably to pad the time, around an intriguing premise: a cop having an affair with a society dame witnesses a murder while out at a lover’s lane, but is talked out of stopping the villain by his paramour. As you’d expect, an innocent is arrested and somehow sent to the electric chair within a matter of days (time has the same function here as it does in Fringe or Angels and Demons), giving the cop a ticking clock to make things right. Predictable, moralistic, entertaining.
One Girl’s Confession (Hugo Haas 1953) Cleo Moore steals $25k from her boss, hides it, turns herself in, does her time, and then gets out and… works as a waitress, because she can’t get the money for fear of reprisal, even though literally no one is watching her? Whatever, the plot doesn’t matter here, especially once the charismatic Haas pops up as Moore’s new gambling-prone boss. Even better is Helene Stanton as Haas’ girlfriend, Smooch (what a name!), and the wordless shot of her pretending to sleep while pocketing money from Haas’ card game into her bra is worth sitting through everything else here.
Women’s Prison (Lewis Seiler 1955) Belated Caged cash-in (and truly the number of Letterboxd reviews claiming this is the first “women in prison” movie shows how valuable that app is as a crowdsourced resource) that knows it cannot compete with Cromwell’s film in artistry or acting and so it amps up the melodrama to a million (and casts Jan Sterling again, creating a false link between the two films). And I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love every minute of this film’s well-intentioned but highly didactic collection of worst case scenarios and social messaging. Husband and wife team Howard Duff and Ida Lupino are also on board, and they do their best with their one-dimensional Good and Evil representations. But it’s the little things that add up here, like a matron telling her colleague that she’s going to go see a prison movie after work to critique its flaws, or the movie’s variation on the Snake Pit wherein everyday woman Phyllis Thaxter is absurdly brutalized by the staff upon her arrival while the inmates themselves are wholly supportive and without malice, or, y’know, Lupino's superintendent kicking the shit out of a pregnant Audrey Totter. Not subtle, and not trying to be. Recommended.
Over-Exposed (Lewis Seiler 1956) Cleo Moore learns the craft of photography and uses it to get ahead in the nightclub scene in a fairly conservative “Ambitious woman gets comeuppance” narrative. Other than being indicative of the death of the genre around this time due to the rise of TV, the only other thing of note here is the bizarre footnote that the screenplay is co-credited to beat author Gil Orlovitz, perhaps best/only known as the other author whose work was seized for obscenity alongside Allen Ginsberg’s Howl. No such liberties, or poetries, undergone here, though. Watchable, overlit, disposable.
Bad Girls of Film Noir Vol 2:
Night Editor (Henry Levin 1946) Based on a popular radio program, this brief noir gives us a superfluous framing story, probably to pad the time, around an intriguing premise: a cop having an affair with a society dame witnesses a murder while out at a lover’s lane, but is talked out of stopping the villain by his paramour. As you’d expect, an innocent is arrested and somehow sent to the electric chair within a matter of days (time has the same function here as it does in Fringe or Angels and Demons), giving the cop a ticking clock to make things right. Predictable, moralistic, entertaining.
One Girl’s Confession (Hugo Haas 1953) Cleo Moore steals $25k from her boss, hides it, turns herself in, does her time, and then gets out and… works as a waitress, because she can’t get the money for fear of reprisal, even though literally no one is watching her? Whatever, the plot doesn’t matter here, especially once the charismatic Haas pops up as Moore’s new gambling-prone boss. Even better is Helene Stanton as Haas’ girlfriend, Smooch (what a name!), and the wordless shot of her pretending to sleep while pocketing money from Haas’ card game into her bra is worth sitting through everything else here.
Women’s Prison (Lewis Seiler 1955) Belated Caged cash-in (and truly the number of Letterboxd reviews claiming this is the first “women in prison” movie shows how valuable that app is as a crowdsourced resource) that knows it cannot compete with Cromwell’s film in artistry or acting and so it amps up the melodrama to a million (and casts Jan Sterling again, creating a false link between the two films). And I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love every minute of this film’s well-intentioned but highly didactic collection of worst case scenarios and social messaging. Husband and wife team Howard Duff and Ida Lupino are also on board, and they do their best with their one-dimensional Good and Evil representations. But it’s the little things that add up here, like a matron telling her colleague that she’s going to go see a prison movie after work to critique its flaws, or the movie’s variation on the Snake Pit wherein everyday woman Phyllis Thaxter is absurdly brutalized by the staff upon her arrival while the inmates themselves are wholly supportive and without malice, or, y’know, Lupino's superintendent kicking the shit out of a pregnant Audrey Totter. Not subtle, and not trying to be. Recommended.
Over-Exposed (Lewis Seiler 1956) Cleo Moore learns the craft of photography and uses it to get ahead in the nightclub scene in a fairly conservative “Ambitious woman gets comeuppance” narrative. Other than being indicative of the death of the genre around this time due to the rise of TV, the only other thing of note here is the bizarre footnote that the screenplay is co-credited to beat author Gil Orlovitz, perhaps best/only known as the other author whose work was seized for obscenity alongside Allen Ginsberg’s Howl. No such liberties, or poetries, undergone here, though. Watchable, overlit, disposable.