According to The Greatest Femmes Fatales in Classic Film Noir, “The femmes fatales in film noir are mysterious, duplicitous, subversive, double-crossing, gorgeous, unloving, predatory,
Until the end of the 70s French and then American critics regarded film noir not as a genre, but as tone, mood, or style. Paul Schrader even offered to consider as a kind of noir period in the history of cinema, such as the ‘new wave’ or neo-realism (1972). And only in the end of the 70s articles began to appear, offering to consider noir as a genre with its own formula and the structure of the narrative
The most common archetype seen in noir is the femme fatale. The femme fatale becomes a distinct part of film at the end of World War II as well as a threat to transgress the patriarchy (Grossman, p.4). The origins of the femme fatale comes from "the historical need to reconstruct an economy based on a division of labor by which men control the means of production and women remain within the family, in other words, the need to reconstruct a failing patriarchal order" (Jancovich, 2011, p.100). Furthermore, Jancovich claims that the femme fatale was created as an effort to encourage women to revert back to their womanly duties and to quit their jobs that they took on while the men were overseas. He calls them a “demonization of the independent working-woman” ( 2011, p.105).
The movie "On the Waterfront" is an example of Film Noir which literally means black or dark film. Movies like this were more serious and explored more realistic and depressing subject matters. The movie was mainly about the struggle of the working longshoremen in Hoboken, New Jersey against the gangsters who bullied and extorted money from them. The protagonist of the movie is Terry Malloy.
Throughout the course of cinematic history one of the most popular genres of film has been “gangster” or “crime”, in particular a focus on the Mafia. A couple of the most popular films have been The Godfather, The Godfather Part ii, and Goodfellas. Some of the similar characteristics that the audience notices after watching these movies are: violence, power, family, etc. Of course those examples of films come from the perspective of the American directors who made them. Films like La Siciliana Ribelle (The Sicilian Girl) and I Cento Passi (One Hundred Steps) offer a perspective from Italian filmmakers.
In 1967, Richard Brooks made movie version of Truman Capote’s novel “In Cold Blood”. In 1990 Martin Scorsese produced a film version of Nicolas Pileggi’s bestselling novel “Wiseguy”. Both movies are base of true crime events. Featured in these two movies are true events depicting brutal murders. Throughout the films both contain details about the criminal, their crime sprees, and the motivation behind the ruthless killings.
Have you ever wondered how life would be like without movies? Movies bring light, joy, and happiness to our soul. We find it hard to stop watching it. We prefer watching a movie rather than reading a book because it is time consuming, it has special effects, it is visually appealing, and moreover, the social aspect is unique, for example, you can go to the movies with your friends. When talking about films, we first need to know the different types of flicks that are being produced, each type has their own genre and director. Michael Curtiz, who was a Hungarian American film director, directed a film titled Casablanca. This movie is a classic film noir film that is considered to be timeless. The story is good and the characters were one of a kind, the acting alone defines how great the movie is. In addition, the directing is the best because the flick is one of the greatest romantic films of all time, but we did not see that much romance scene in the movie. Roger Ebert, who was a film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times, said the movie “is about a man and a woman who are in love, and who sacrifice love for a higher purpose” (Ebert, par1).
However, in the 1920s, a new era of crime fiction arose: American hard-boiled crime fiction. In this type of crime fiction, a sense of “graphic sex and violence, vivid but often sordid urban backgrounds, and fast-paced, slangy dialogue” is added to the environment (“Hard-boiled dectective…” Ralph Willet). In the Maltese Falcon, a film adaptation of Dashiell Hammett’s the Maltese Falcon, Sam Spade is presented with a case to find Ruth Wonderly (who later turns
INTRODUCTION “We conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place.” -Chief Justice Earl Warren Separate But Equal, directed by George Stevens Jr, is an American made-for-television movie that is based on the landmark Brown v. Board of Directors case of the U.S. Supreme court which established that segregation of primary schools based on race, as dictated by the ‘Separate but Equal’ doctrine, was unconstitutional based on the reinterpretation of the 14th amendment and thus, put an end to state-sponsored segregation in the US. Aims and Objectives:
The Godfather (1972) is said to be one of the greatest films ever made. When this movie was released in 1972, it was nominated for Ten Academy Awards and it won three: Best Picture, Best Actor and Best Adapted Screenplay. The film was adapted from the book with the same name written by award winning author of mafia fiction, Mario Puzo. This film takes place in a span of ten years following the life of Don Corleone, the head of the Corleone Crime Family. It was a film that changed the history of cinema, introducing a very talented filmmaker and several acting legends in the telling of a story of a Sicilian Crime Family. The most memorable scene in the film is the opening scene of the movie which is also my choice of scene to elaborate on mise-en-scene.
N00145563 The Maltese Falcon is a film noir directed by John Huston. The film is based on the novel by Dashiell Hammett of the same name. The film was made and distributed by Warner Bros. and was released in October 1941. In this film, detective Sam Spade, played by Humphrey Bogart, takes on a case from the beautiful but deceptive Miss Wonderly, played by Mary Astor.
German Expressionism has influenced thousands of films and filmmakers since the art movement began in the 1920’s. It is known for its dismissal of the standard conventions of Western filmmaking for a more off-kilter style of storytelling. Some film historians consider Metropolis (1927) to be one of the most groundbreaking German Expressionist films ever made. However, there are many instances throughout Metropolis in which it deviates from the eccentric Expressionist style. There are many obvious occurrences of expressionism during Metropolis, for example the opening machine sequence, but conventional Western techniques are also common in the film.
Over the fifteen weeks of the first semester of film school, we were taught many interesting types and styles of early world cinema which were extremely informative and influenced the filmmaking style of the whole class and made us better filmmakers instantly. One such ‘ism’ which inspired me the most was German Expressionism which is a unique characteristic of Weimar Cinema. In this essay I am going to talk about the history of this ‘ism’, its impact on cinema, some significant works and how it inspired me and influenced my filmmaking style. German Expressionism is one of the earliest artistic genres to influence filmmaking, and one that ostensibly prepared for some other cutting edge artistic styles and techniques. It is an artistic genre
The point of this essay is to show the similarities and differences of the book and the movie by comparing and contrasting. The book and the movie are very much the same, but there definitely distinction between the two. This movie was directed by Francis Ford Coppola and was released March 25, 1983. In the beginning of the movie, they don’t
American detective fiction is no longer the mirror being discussed, and instead, it is a backdrop. The purpose of the article is to prove American detective fiction’s worth, as well as how and why it should be analyzed; the claim is that taking the genre seriously and studying it reveals cultural and societal views of the eras to which each work belongs. If proving the qualities of American detective fiction is the focus, then the spy fiction tangent is a side note at