It is a shame the brilliant shot used for the opening credits of The Narrow Margin (1952), by great noir director, Richard Fleischer, is obscured by the credits. In a single elegantly paced panning shot, cinematographer, George E. Diskant, establishes the noir atmosphere of the movie.

Fleischer’s major noirs:

Bodyguard (1948)
Follow Me Quietly (1949)
Trapped (1949)
The Clay Pigeon (1949)
Armored Car Robbery (1950)
The Narrow Margin (1952)

Diskant’s noir credits include:

Kansas City Confidential (1952)
On Dangerous Ground (1952)
The Racket (1951)
They Live by Night (1948)
Riffraff (1947)

Following Hammer Film Noir Collector’s Set last year, that packaged six noirs from the early fifties, VCI Entertainment on Jun 26 will release the second volume in the series.

Hammer Film Noir Collector’s Set 2, contains eight more Hammer noirs:

Terror Street (1953)
Wings of Danger (1952)
The Glass Tomb (1955)
Paid to Kill (1954)
The Black Glove (1954)
The Deadly Game (1954)
The Unholy Four (1954)
A Race For Life (1954)

Extras include Audio Commentaries, Original Theatrical Trailers, Artist Bios, Advertising Galleries and Photo Galleries.

The DVD set will retail for US$39.99, but you can pre-order from Amazon for only US$29.99.

A post today on the Monochrom.Blog lead me to an excellent article by Chris Fujiwara on this topic in his review, in the Boston Globe on 15 January 2006, of the book, The Philosophy of Film Noir (2006), a collection of essays from the University of Kentucky Press that explores the philosophical underpinnings of movies from the classic noir period and after.

Chris Fujiwara, a writer living in Chelsea, is the author of, Jacques Tourneau: The Cinema of Nightfall (Johns Hopkins University Press), and was working on a critical biography of Otto Preminger at the time he wrote the article.

I have not read The Philosophy of Film Noir, and my post of June 20, The Big Heat: Film Noir As Social Criticism, is purely coincidental, but Fujiwara’s discussion of the influence of Eureopean extistentialism on American noir in the the 40s and 50s is supportive of the views expressed in my post. I recommend the full article to you, and offer these highlights:

The philosophy of noir has also been linked to the European literary and philosophical movement known as Existentialism, though frequently when commentators use that term, it’s less with the writings of Sartre and Camus in mind than as a stand-in for ideas like ”absurdity” and ”alienation.” In an essay portentously called ”Film Noir and the Meaning of Life,” his contribution to ”The Philosophy of Film Noir,” Steven M. Sanders, an emeritus professor of philosophy at Bridgewater State College in Massachusetts, claims that ”the thread running through the design of film noir is the sense that life is meaningless.” Noir, Conard writes, is nothing less than ”a sensibility or worldview that results from the death of God.”…

This kind of analysis isn’t new, but it highlights something that isn’t always discussed about noir: That the genre, which evokes such quintessentially American icons as Bogart and a shadow-filled Los Angeles, actually finds its roots in Europe… [my emphasis]

As ”The Philosophy of Noir” reminds us, during its peak era, noir was the form that imported ”European” alienation, doubt, and dread into the framework of the American crime film.

I should also acknowledge in this post the comment from Lloydville of mardecortesbaja.com to my June 20 post:

You make a good point…  film noir definitely derived in part from European existentialism . . . but existentialism itself was influenced by Poe, via Baudelaire, so the lines of connection are complex.

We can’t see film noir as simply a European product, an import, because it was so wildly popular with the American public, which must reflect an existential malaise that did reach North America after WWII, aroused by the horrific spectacle of the conflict and by the atomic bomb. It reflected a subconscious dread deeply rooted in the American psyche.

Appropriately, Fujiwara concludes his article by saying: As always, however, the definition of noir itself remains in the shadows.

For what it’s worth, a new AFI list of the Top 100 Movies of All Time has been published, with only nine movies with noir credentials making the list:

3 Casablanca (-1)
9 Vertigo (+52)
16 Sunset Blvd. (-4)
21 Chinatown (-2)
29 Double Indemnity (+9)
31 The Maltese Falcon (-8)
48 Rear Window (-6)
55 North By Northwest (-15)
97 Blade Runner ( -)

I would contend that only four of these movies: Subnset Blvd, Chinatown, Double Indemnity, and The Maltese Falcon are true noirs. So only three out of a 100 is bad. Even if one is not an afficianodo of film noir, I cannot comprehend how Orson Welles’ The Third Man, is not on the list.

These 22 noirs were listed in the ballot of 400 films sent to voters, but did not make the final cut:

The Big Sleep
Gilda
Gun Crazy
I Am A Fugitive From A Chain Gang
LA Confidential
Laura
Little Caesar
The Lost Weekend
Memento
Mildred Pierce
The Night Of The Hunter
Out Of the Past
The Postman Always Rings Twice
Rear Window
Scarface
Strangers On A Train
The Sweet Smell Of Success
The Thin Man
The Third Man
Touch Of Evil
White Heat

Sin City (2005) director, Frank Miller will direct a new feature film noir for Universal. The movie will be an adaptation of the Raymond Chandler novella, Trouble is My Business, which has not been previously produced for the screen, and will star Sin City lead, Clive Owen.

Universal and production partner, Strike Entertainment, obtained the rights for the story from UK-based Chorion. The studios hope this film will kick off a series of PI Philip Marlowe flicks.

Films Noir based on Chandler novels:

The Big Sleep (1946)
Lady in the Lake (1946)
Strangers on a Train (1951)
The Long Goodbye (1973)

I am prompted to make this post after reading this week’s post from Lloydville from mardecortesbaja.com: The Genealogy Of Noir.

In the broadest perspective, film noir belongs in the long tradition of American Gothic fiction, that dark vision crystallized in the tales of Hawthorne and Poe. A kind of counterbalance or reaction to American optimism, this tradition can have an almost savage quality, as though the decision to explore the shadowy realms of the American psyche has led to a determination to follow that path to its uttermost end, to the absolute limits of nightmare… In the true noir, we can identify totally with the protagonist — not least in his fated doom, or provisional salvation, in a world that has gone terribly wrong, for reasons that aren’t clear and that it probably wouldn’t help much to understand.

This is a good analysis far as it goes. But what about the European experience, and the influence of directors such as Lang and Tourneur?

Existentialism is European in origin and owes little to the US war experience, which for US civilians contrary to the European experience of the war, was essentially a vicarious trauma.

For example, Lloydville, in a previous post sees Fritz Lang’s, The Big Heat (1953), as a reflection of a collective paranoia rooted in post WW2 angst, but which again is a European phenomenon, not a North American experience. The Big Heat to me is more a socio-political critique of 50’s America. The protagonists dare to question injustice and corruption, which is a palpable reality not a delusion: the mobsters kill Bannion’s wife and threaten his child, with the police and politicians actively complicit. Justice is won only at a terrible cost and with no assistance from the ruling order. There are no femme fatales in this movie, only strong women, who do the dirty work required to bring a male-owned system of oppression and corruption to account.

Kansas City Confidential (1952)

‘Exploding like a gun in your face!’

The full movie can be viewed free on-line at retrovision.tv

Kansas City Confidential was directed by Phil Karlson and stars John Payne. Karlson and Payne teamed up a year later for another noir, 99 River Street and again in 1955, in Hell’s Island. Perennial movie bad guys Lee Van Cleef, Neville Brand and Jack Elam play the film’s heavies. Although the title would suggest that the story takes place in Kansas City, most of the film takes place in Mexico.

This was director Karlson’s second film noir. He also directed Scandal Sheet, a modest success, also released in 1952.

I just discovered this wonderful NY movie poster house.

Their collection of original noir posters is truly magnificent, and includes many foreign posters. Prices are very reasonable. Check out these samples: