The Noir List Discussion and Suggestions (Genre Project)

[domino harvey]

Five French Noirs From Me to U (no gift receipt)

La machine a decoudre (Jean-Pierre Mocky 1986) Inevitable future Vinegar Syndrome release (derogatory). Mocky stars as a demented eye surgeon who trawls around executing people who refuse to donate to his charity hospital. I’m guessing the serie noire this is based on is somewhat less ridiculous than this adaptation, if only because it would have to be. Of special note is how Mocky repeatedly grinds the action to a halt so he can enact some kind of humiliation fetish against Patricia Barzyk (the first half of the movie is functionally pornography). I wouldn’t go as far as to say I’m offended because I recognize that the vulgarity here is the point and clutching pearls is to some degree giving the film more credit than it’s due, but I also don’t think a film as tasteless as this merits any deeper discussion… though surely this must be the most inexplicable Godard recommendation of all time!

Le cave se rebiffe (Gilles Grangier 1961) Jean Gabin at his portliest is a retired counterfeiter who is roped into a new scheme to make fake Dutch notes in this overlit and under realized borefest. All the dumb plot machinations never really answer the question of why Gabin gets half the take when literally the only thing he brings to the table is knowing a fence to funnel the fake bills. Awful, artless, embarrassing. This is based on a novel by the same author as Grisbi, but you’d never know it.

Le Mome (Alain Corneau 1986) Typical hotheaded 80s cop decides he must liberate a prostitute from her pimps, with or without her consent. This is an odd film, scored solely by a handful of endlessly repeating Otis Redding songs and ending with an impressive extended car chase capped by the liberal use of a rocket launcher (!). But surely the oddest part of the film is that the dramatic script was written by comic actor Christian Clavier (who nevertheless does not star in it). I could not help but wonder if this project started as a comedy, as the idea of constantly trying to free a prostitute who doesn’t want to be freed and just keeps running back to her macs could be the base of a great bawdy satire on the masculine instinct to “save” women. As a drama, it’s a bit overwrought, though, and I don’t care for how much slaver Corneau devotes to leering nude shots of his starlet, of which there are many, many, many. But the strangeness of this one kinda won me over by the end. Corneau continues to be an intriguing director worth more study…

Le Mome vert-de-gris (Bernard Borderie 1953) Eddie Constantine stars as Lemmy Caution, an undercover FBI man who loves nothing more than repeating back the dialog just spoken to him. Beyond that skill, I guess he solves crimes or whatever, I don’t know, who cares. This is all exceedingly boring and yet still spawned a whole lot of follow-ups (some mercifully better than this), including the one most of us have already seen

Les yeux cernes (Robert Hossein 1964) Michele Morgan investigates who murdered her estranged industrialist husband in an Austrian logging community. As per my earlier thesis that most Hossein films only contain the aesthetic of the director he’s imitating, here it’s (rather unbelievably, given the plot) Antonioni and as such it all looks great. But the only reason to watch this is Marie-France Pisier’s wonderfully bratty perf as the bored coquette stuck waitressing at the inn. She brings a great energy to all the otherwise languid goings on. As for the mystery, well, you’ll probably figure out whodunnit as early as I did, but the plot hardly matters here. [P]

[Jean-Luc Garbo]

Is that Pisier in the picture above?

[therewillbeblus]

Is that Pisier in the picture above?

Sure is! She's fantastic here, especially in an early seduction scene that's given ample space to breathe, way beyond the point I expected it to conclude

I think I felt about Hossein's Les yeux cernes the way domino did for his La Mort d'un tueur. I loved it thanks mostly to the sheer beauty of its fully-realized atmosphere, which makes the narrative more enchanting and unpredictable even if it's not always interesting on paper. While I too guessed the answers to the mysteries at its center, they're clever and earned by the stylized design that shapes the story. Come for the formal wit - far more eclectic than I anticipated, picking up more tricks as the film progresses to delightful returns

[FrauBlucher]

Has anyone have anything to say (Domino) about Litvak’s BLUES IN THE NIGHT (1941)?

[domino harvey]

Excellent film, a great whatsit that doesn’t quite fit any conventional genre markers. There are at least a few other fans on here as well

[therewillbeblus]

Really enjoyed an obscure MGM programmer noir from 1945 tonight, Dangerous Partners, in large part because it successfully shrouds in mystery just what the hell could possibly be going on for almost the entire running time of the film. I can think of few Hollywood mysteries that ever sustained confusion to these lengths while trailing us along with the audience surrogates, sketchy protagonists who don't understand either but use what they do know to try to cheat others out of their money. It was great fun. And then afterwards I went onto Letterboxd to log it and saw that the one line description spoils the reveal. It's not even the official one, as the IMDB description retains the film's mystery and makes it sound as intriguing as it is:

After surviving a plane crash, a couple tries to find out why one of the passengers was carrying four wills for a million dollars, with each one naming him as the beneficiary.

Wow, you weren't kidding.. Dangerous Partners is a bizarre concoction - In the first half the mystery is developed as we go along, but we’re getting introduced to characters who just get off'd or trade roles as the plot unfolds without proper context, so its ensuing confusion has a dual effect that’s either repelling or involving depending on the scene's subtle tone. I loved the film for taking such big swings and operating so far away from typical narrative judgment. By the time the back half starts, we're a bit more grounded, partially because we've acclimated to the internal logic of the film, but also due to a welcome deceleration of pace and staying with its old (and new..) principals. There's no point in saying more as it would spoil the picture, but the TCM broadcast is on YT for anyone interested in checking out this weird little gem

[domino harvey]

Spring Cleaning:

the Harry Palmer Trilogy

the Ipcress File (Sidney J Furie 1965) In the spirit of reexamining my off the cuff thesis that there are no great spy movies, I revisited this and watched for the first time its subsequent sequels thanks to finding a good deal on the OOP Imprint box. I rate this a bit higher on rewatch because I can appreciate how this version of Caine’s Palmer treads the line of appealing to youth culture due to his general insolence and authority flouting while still essentially retaining his main function as safe wish fulfillment for a middle aged male audience. Unfortunately the third act of this is rather ridiculous and out of step with the rest. Furie clearly studied at the altar of Fuller and Huston with his compositions, which add nothing.

Funeral in Berlin (Guy Hamilton 1966) The least of the trio, which starts out too quip-happy (this shit is basically a Marvel movie for the first half hour) before turning into a rather humorless Serious Spy Movie. The plot here is easily the worst of the three as well, with the inciting action so unnecessary that we never really understand why all the wheels even need to be spinning. This is also the film where it becomes clear there is no consistent vision of Palmer from movie to movie. Gone is the gourmand fuckup of the first film, who was much more interesting than this entry’s James Bond But Slower and More Stern. Why bother creating a character when producers can just coast by on Caine showing up on set every day, I guess.

Billion Dollar Brain (Ken Russell 1967) I can understand why this one was so divisive on release. It resembles the other two films not at all in tone, and the manic energy here (Russell walked a bit further past Furie’s kneeling to pray to Polanski) is well-matched by both Karl Malden and especially Ed Begley late in the film. I can understand rejecting Begley’s enormously over the top perf if this movie were anything like the previous ones, but for this film he is so fully in sync with what Russell is attempting that if anything it shows how brilliant an actor Begley was to pick up the wavelength so acutely. Caine is, however, utterly adrift here, in part because I suspect Russell has no interest in this character. Amusingly, even despite the clear contempt Russell has for the material, this is by far the most interesting plot of the trio, and it’s kind of wild In The Current Year to watch what is essentially a virulently leftist anti-accelerationist, anti-AI screed!

After watching these, I do think they highlight one of the aspects I find so uninteresting in these kind of movies: the endless bureaucracy and internal structures, which seem like regional trauma (the British class system necessitates order and hierarchies even in covert operations) and have never once been interesting in any spy movie. Besides, these guys are always double agents. Isn’t that the basic plot of all three of these movies and countless others? Maybe the ideal spy movie starts with getting their hiring process audited by outside consultants.

+

the Seven-Ups (Philip D’Antoni 1973) The only directorial feature of the producer of other similar actioners Bullitt and the French Connection, this is essentially an uncredited spinoff sequel for Scheider’s character in the latter (he even has the same name) as he and his buds operate the titular secret police unit. But the movie isn’t really about that at all, and thank god because we’ve already seen that one many times before and since. Instead what we get is a rapidly spiraling criminal enterprise built on kidnapping mob members and holding them for ransom, with the cops essentially clueless on the outside until they get caught in the crossfire.

There are two good reasons to see this film. One is the lengthy car chase in the middle of the film, which despite people talking about its legacy on LB I’d never heard of before but I probably should have. I’d say it’s an equal of the more famous examples, expertly edited and with real points awarded for its extreme duration (this thing must last at least ten minutes). The second is the novel twist on a familiar device in these policiers:

Spoiler

Here the informant knows nothing and instead uses the detective’s questions to exploit for his own gains.

What a simple but clever idea. But while the movie is lean, it’s also frequently conventional and what little character details we do get seem only to exist to further cliches (I shit you not, this movie does the thing where the obvious future victim starts talking about his kid for no other reason than to paint a target on himself). The film succeeds in spite of itself, but if it had stripped itself down even further like Hill’s the Driver, it might have been a classic.

[Mr Sausage]

In the spirit of reexamining my off the cuff thesis that there are no great spy movies

Would you consider North by Northwest a spy movie?

[domino harvey]

That’s a Hitchcock movie

[swo17]

Would you consider Black Bag a spy movie?

[domino harvey]

Yes. Good movie, but not great

[Never Cursed]

Haven't seen them, but Duplicity and The Bourne Legacy?

[Mr Sausage]

Demonlover? Industrial espionage is still espionage!

[domino harvey]

Okay, so there are many spy-adjacent films which work. But, I’m talking pure blood stuff like these Palmer movies, Le Carre adaptations, Quiller, Bond, etc. Maybe I should say no great British spy movies

[TechnicolorAcid]

Okay, so there are many spy-adjacent films which work. But, I’m talking pure blood stuff like these Palmer movies, Le Carre adaptations, Quiller, Bond, etc. Maybe I should say no great British spy movies

It’s been a while since I’ve seen but I remember On Her Majesty’s Secret Service being pretty great

[knives]

I know it’s not exactly what you mean but what of some of the Greene adaptations like Our Man in Havana? I also really adore the Archers’ Spy in Black.

[domino harvey]

Admittedly I have not seen those. Maybe one day!

[ChunkyLover]

Lang's Cloak and Dagger would be much better if the film didn't focus on Cooper & Palmer being on the run together for the middle length and having little to no chemistry.

[thirtyframesasecond]

That’s a Hitchcock movie

The Lady Vanishes though, as a British Hitchcock spy film??

[Mr Sausage]

I just watched The Phantom Lady for the first time. I know classic noir and crime films often rest on an amusing trope where even the most circumstantial detail is as incriminating as the police finding a bloody knife in your pocket. It's one of those things you just have to roll with. But Siodmak's film has maybe the most ludicrous version of it. I forget the exact wording, but it's something like:

Cop: Look, he's wearing a tie.
Suspect: What's that got to do with anything?
Cop: Your wife was strangled with a tie!
*gasp shock!*

Yeah, got him dead to rights there.