German Expressionism In Film Detour
Film noir is a cinematic style that began in the early 1940s that focused on the crime and corruption that occurs in everyday life. Film noir was influenced by two major film movements, German Expressionism and French poetic realism (Schrader 8). While German Expressionism influenced lighting techniques, realism affected narrative and cinematography. The Great Depression and World War II shaped film noir’s cynical tone that fate is uncontrollable. A classic example of film noir is the 1945 film Detour, directed by Edgar G. Ulmer. The film follows a flashback narrative of Al Roberts first-hand recollection of two deaths that led to his arrest. In the film, there is significant evidence of the influence from German Expressionism, French poetic realism, and the cultural shifts caused by the Great Depression and World War II. The lighting displayed throughout the film mirrored the theatrical lighting techniques used in German Expressionist films. Detour was …show more content…
In the film, Al is discussing his concerns about being blamed for the murders of Charles and Vera and states, “The world is full of skeptics. Who would believe me?” Ulmer used cynicism and pessimism in Al’s character to symbolize the attitudes of American citizens. During the depression, Americans suffered from high unemployment, mass shortages of supplies, and economic uncertainty. As a result, crime increased as unemployed citizens attempted to put food on the table. This is similar to the scene where Vera hypothesized that Al killed Charles for his money and car. The women characters in “hard-boiled traditions” are symbolized as either pure or evil. Al’s infatuation with Sue’s purity becomes the underlying reason he gets blamed for the deaths. Film noir indicates that women effortlessly drive men to act irrationally. The cynical viewpoint present in Detour warns of the consequences for love-driven
Motifs In Of Mice And Men
404 Words | 2 PagesIn the book everyone does something at least once that makes them flawed. Curley beat up Lennie, Lennie killed a dog, a rabbit, and curley's wife, Carlson shot Candys dog, Curley's wife got herself killed because she didn’t know what she was doing and was flirting with everyone, George lied to the boss so Lennie could be able to work. “He got kicked in the head by a horse when he was a kid.” Everyone did something, just some are a lot worse than others. This relates to the great depression with how everyone was going crazy and the government made a lot of mistakes which makes them flawed.
Maltese Falcon Themes And Techniques
1758 Words | 8 PagesThe Maltese Falcon. It follows the story of the private detective Sam Spade, who gets involved with three criminals in search of a priceless statue. Similar to film noir, neo-noir takes these key themes and repackages them to fit the current views of society. An example of a neo-noir film is Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. The movie tells the story of Harry Lockhart, who goes from being a criminal in New York City to a private detective in Los Angeles.
Poem Analysis: Raw Onion
1877 Words | 8 PagesIn fact, most horror films open with the backstory or something that sets the tone. In this area, NOIR opens rather mildly, although there’s a subtle tone that is established. The idea of the cullers also feels a bit like a zombie film, in which there are hordes of cullers infected by a virus.
Scarlet Street Film Analysis
1299 Words | 6 PagesFilm noir movies often have stylistic characteristics such as exaggerated lighting and shadows. Scarlet Street contained many subjective camera shots while also using exaggerated shadows, for example during the first scene in the movie, there is an emphasis on the mans shadow as he walks into the room. Which brings me to a crucial point, Black and white filmmaking. Black and white style is considered to be an essential attribute for a film noir movie, black and white allows the director to emphasize on distorting images, for example use of the venetian blind shot. Another continuous pattern of film noir is to include main stock characters, this film contains: an anti-hero and a femme fatale, these stock characters are always seen in noir films.
Gender Stereotypes In The Movie Chicago
1496 Words | 6 PagesDespite the movie’s dramatic rendition of real-life events and ideas in regards to women in crime, it gets the point across by using Roxie and Velma’s femininity win the “innocent” verdict. Although it only displayed a one-sided and underdeveloped prohibitionist argument, it was still factual in its portrayal, and the prohibition movement is vital to her case. The final topic, women empowerment, had the most authentic yet subtle portrayal from the symbolism of the puppet in “They Both Reached For the Gun” to the setting if Chicago. Each of the topics can be considered, to some extent, history. Although they’re understated, the themes are still there and contribute a historical side to the film that is important to the plot and
Sunset Boulevard, Directed By Billy Wilder: Film Analysis
511 Words | 3 PagesThese are all strong characteristics of noir narrative. For instance, Norma is just delusional while Joe is caught in a moral battle of genuine love of another screenwriter and the wealth and pity of Norma. The film does use shadows most commonly when referring to Norma's past, particularly the scene where
Cinderella Man And The Great Depression
598 Words | 3 PagesWant to know about the Great Depression? Now I will tell you about it. It was a bad time in the Untied States. This movie mirrors the 20’s till even now, life was good on the surface but the great depression was rumbling underneath.
Essay On Film Noir
935 Words | 4 PagesThe 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).
German Expressionism In Weimar Cinema
1068 Words | 5 PagesOver 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
Casablanca Film Noir Analysis
1687 Words | 7 PagesThose that believe Casablanca is not film noir usually perceive Film Noir as a genre. Noir is not a genre; Noir transcends genres and behaves more accurately as a style of cinema. As styles go, there can be variations of them as we see now with Post-Noir and Neo Noir, noir elements in a different time period of film technology which makes these films slightly different than the style of classic film noir. Themes of cynicism, impending doom, loss, jeopardy of life accompanied by visuals dominated by shadows, strong lines, and overall darkness to the image make up film noir’s style. Noir is not absolute, the beauty of this style is its vulnerability to variation, which is why Michael Curtiz’s Classic Casablanca is film noir.
Heroism In On The Waterfront Terry Malloy
1199 Words | 5 PagesThe 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.
What Are The Ethical Issues In The Movie Set It Off
649 Words | 3 Pages(p. 34)” Set It Off, showed that gangsters didn’t have to be the “man of the city”. Women were also criminals and bosses of their own. Just like all criminals, these women were tense during their first robbery, but that changes quickly when they remembered the reasons why they were in that situation. In one sense, in the movie, they all sat around a conference table and acted as if they were mobsters in the movie “The Godfather”. This shows how these women felt about who they were becoming.
Narrative Conventions In The Searchers
2526 Words | 11 PagesThe Maltese Falcon, a film categorised as Film Noir and The Searchers, a Western genre film, are both from different genres but both reinforce and challenge dominant social and cultural beliefs and values throughout each film. Each genre can be broken down into; codes, conventions and narrative conventions. Codes are aspects of the text that help the audience make meaning.
German Expressionism In Metropolis
754 Words | 4 PagesGerman 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.
Baz Luhrmann's Film-Making Style
903 Words | 4 PagesBaz Luhrmann is known world wide for his eccentric and flamboyant film-making style. Luhrmann’s signature bright colours, fast-paced camera-cuts and zooms, and bold costumes are all key characteristics of his films and assist Luhrmann in putting forward the themes and motifs he regards as essential in each of his works. However, Luhrmann still receives much criticism for not staying true to the original source material of the stories he introduces to the big screen. One fails to realize the fact that, “Luhrmann’s films are not so much adaptations as re-imaginings” (Vogue Magazine) and through analysis of his various techniques, as well as his overall cinematic language in his films, “Strictly Ballroom” (1992), “Romeo + Juliet” (1996) and “The Great Gatsby”, one can see this clearly, through Luhrmann’s evolution as a director. Luhrmann makes his films his own from the start, the opening scenes of all three of these films implement post-modern techniques which instantly informs the audience that they are entering into Luhrmann’s
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