Film Noir: Films I've Seen

BODY HEAT (1981):

Set in the midst of a Florida heatwave, a lawyer called Ned Racine meets a rich, married woman called Matty Walker. They begin a passionate affair, and both become enticed by greed and long for Matty's husband's fortune. He devises a plan to kill Edmund so that they can both have the money, but a few twists and turns inevitably prevent this from being a smooth encounter. Despite Ned's knowledge of the law, his unawareness of Matty's deep intelligence forces the plan they have developed 'together' to turn out very wrong.

Matty can be seen in a red dress a lot and this I find definitely enhances her danger as a character. I would like to use a red dress in our film for our femme fatale certainly. Of course smoking is also key in the film, especially in the males. Matty is also seen in white, emulating purity, which we can also use in our own films to represent the contrasting sides of our female.Unusual for many Film Noir films, the sexual nature of the affair is revealed intensely on camera. I don't want to recreate this feature as I don't think it is appropriate for our age group, but unlike the other films it actually presents the raw attraction between the protagonist and femme fatale, which I feel certainly drives the story and makes it a more exciting one to watch.

DETOUR (1945):

This story is also set in a flashback. A man called Al used to accompany his girlfriend on piano whilst she sang, so when she left for Hollywood he decided to hitchhike there from New York to join her. The person who gives him a ride however promising a direct route to LA mysteriously dies. After Al has to hide the body due to being disbelieved by the police about the death if he didn't, Al gives a ride to someone called Vera. She knew the driver who was named Charles Haskell Junior, and so she blackmails Al into taking the drivers identity to avoid trouble, but actually lands him deeper into disaster.

The story is fairly simple, but also unusual. It is not one that would perhaps usually persuade me to watch the film but I actually quite enjoyed it. Again, the femme fatale has a great deal of control.

Making the male protagonist weaker than the woman is not that popular in film noir's, but I think it succeeds in putting across the darkness pursued by men in the times after the second world war. I really like the fact it is in black and white; I definitely prefer Noir film's in black and white instead of colour.

BRICK (2005):

The first part of the story is told as a flashback. A high school kid who's ex girlfriend Emily is found dead by a tunnel at the beginning of the story takes us back through to how he followed her, stole her notepad after talking to her, read a note, translated it and found where the meeting place on it was - he then goes to the tunnel and finds her dead, taking us to the present day.

After Brendan (the high school boy and main character) fights with a number of drug dealers over a 'brick' of heroin, he sleeps with Laura, who has been directing him through discovering the process of the drug dealer's antics. We then notice on her beside table a cigarette with an arrow on, which Brendan has previously seen from a car - linking her to Emily's death. She actually plotted all along by messing around with the number of 'Bricks' the dealers had, plotting to have Emily killed by getting her to tell new boyfriend and drug dealer Tug that her baby was his. Laura then tells Brendan at the end that Emily was going to abort the baby that actually belonged to him.

I like the idea of modernizing film noir but because it has only smoking and no other tradition elements of Film Noir in it, it's depressing, twisted storyline is the only thing that makes it so. Personally it is a very complex story and is slightly too difficult to understand when watching, but after talking to other classmates, we began to piece it all together.

The camera shots, editing and transitions used in this film were really good - it helped the whole thing flow and made it really suspenseful and interesting. Liked that part of it a lot!

BLACK DAHLIA (2006):

Based on the most horrific murder in Hollywood in 1947 the story of the Black Dahlia shows two cops who are trying to solve the crime.

One of the cops (Blanchard) is married and the solving of the crime puts a lot of pressure on his relationship, and begins to pull them apart. The other cop (Bleichert) falls for Madeline Linscott who happens to be in connection with the murder they are trying to solve. Both the cop's careers and personal lives are destroyed through dealing with the murder case.

I like the simple idea behind the storyline, and the way the policemen fall apart, because the murder was so horrific and it shows that anyone can be affected, not just families involved. The colour use I felt was good - even though I prefer black and white I actually enjoyed watching this film. The traditional film noir essence isn't that obvious at first appearance but the dark drama of the story turns it into one for sure. Using love and seduction to affect the way a policeman thinks and behaves would be a good idea to have in our own film. Typical noir characteristics such as the hat and smoking are visible, which exerts the genre as film noir.

LA CONFIDENTIAL (1997):

This film is set in 1950's Los Angeles and is based on Police Corruption. Three cops, Detective Wendall White, Detective Jack Vincennes and Sargeant Edmund Exley are central to the story surrounding the LA Police Department. (LAPD)

The reputation of the department is destroyed when the police end up beating up mexican prisoners after being intoxicated with alcohol (for the christmas party) and 'Bloody Christmas' hits headlines.

As Exley stays out of it, he gets a promotion to Lieutenant.

He gets called to a murder at a coffee shop called the 'Night Owl'. Cook is killed and others brutally murdered in the kitchens. One of the people murdered (Stensland) was discovered later to have carried a body and buried it in his girlfriend's garden. She was in the coffee shop and so police linked her to her house and found her mother covering up an unpleasant stench with a towel at the bottom of the door. The body is of Buzz Meeks who is murdered supposedly due to large supply of heroin in possession.

Jack finds the connection between Smith, Buzz and Stensland and goes to talk to Smith, telling him that he has not told any other policemen of the connection he has discovered. Smith shoots Jack in the chest.

White falls for Lynn Bracken who is a prositute - she seduces Exley and someone who is in on the Heroin deal photographs it and therefore winds up White. White nearly kills Exley but they both realise that it has been a set up and share all the information they have gathered from separate case inspections. They go after Dudley Smith who is also in on the heroin deal and he tries to kill both policemen - White is injured but does not die, and Exley gets a medal of Valour.

DOUBLE INDEMNITY (1944):

Set in 1938, an insurance salesman called Walter Neff meets a wife of one of his clients, and they begin to have an affair. She wants the money she could claim through an accident insurance policy called a 'double indemnity clause' if her husband died 'accidentally' and so she decides to kill him, and Walter helps her.

Someone called Keyes suspects Phyllis is in connection with the death of her husband, but does not suspect his best friend, Walter. The connection is seen because Phyllis is suspected to have killed her stepmother too. (The daughter from that marriage is Lola) Phyllis is caught seeing Lola's boyfriend Nino behind Walter's back, and so he goes after her.

Phyllis shoots Walter but does not kill him instantly, and so he then shoots and kills her. He dies before he goes to Mexico to avoid a death sentence however due to the wound.

The story is told as a flashback. I really like this idea and I think it makes the story seem much more of a reality, because someone is reflecting on a time in their past. The audience are drawn in closer to the main character due to the first person narrative, which also makes the story a more appealing one.

The story's femme fatale Phyllis is a very strong one. I would like our story to have the same dominance in her character as this film does.

La Confidential, Body Heat, Brick and Black Dahlia are in colour; Double Indemnity and Detour in black and white. In creating the perfect mood for film noir, in my mind, the films should be in black and white. I felt a lot more like the true time period of the films were reflected in the black and white films, because that's the colour they would have been shown in in those days. LA Confidential and Black Dahlia have an awful lot of the gruesome violence we expect in these films which definitely makes it a 'black film', but I don't think that a bloody story line will be one we can create without perhaps coming across as humorous. I really liked the female figures in Double Indemnity, Body Heat and Detour because they really do make the depressed element of the time period come across in the weakness of the men they seduce. In our own film I think that creating a storyline based around a femme fatale will be much more successful than a gruesome one - I would like to see what ideas we can come up with!