The Noir Style
Category: Books,Humor & Entertainment,Movies
The Noir Style Details
Amazon.com Review Standard histories of film noir commence the coining of the term (which means "black film") by French writers in the years after the war when they saw a new mingling of grit, wit, and swooning Thanatos in movies like The Maltese Falcon and Double Indemnity. Alain Silver's and James Ursini's nearly libidinous collection of "duo-tone" (i.e., black and white) movie stills reaches far afield, finding noir's style radiating from the Brucke painters in the 1920s, Edward Hopper's wee-small-hours townscapes of the 1940s, and Weegee's bloody, beautiful photos. In page after oversized page, the authors park perceptive readings beside images of classic rainy streets (Underworld, USA, The Money Trap), doomy women in lipstick (Laura, Gilda), disturbed interiors (Sunset Boulevard), and wrenching ironies (DOA). The commentary reveals how light, frame, composition, body language, and a few other irreducibles charge individual scenes and contribute to the look of noir as a whole, beginning with gangster and horror films in the 1930s and closing with Silence of the Lambs in 1992. The texts lapse occasionally into heavy breathing about Meaning, but the authors invite us to get what we want from this most stylish of American movie genres by just flipping the pages. With hardly a cliché image in the bunch, we can eagerly fall afresh into Jane Russell's outstretched arms (in Macao), zoom down the black sidewalk stretching behind a dying John Garfield (in He Ran All the Way), and contemplate once more the tissue of lies between Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor in The Maltese Falcon. --Lyall Bush Read more Review "A comprehensive definition of the noir look and its values . . . the commentary is wonderfully set off by 172 gorgeous black-and-white stills." (Elle)"Smart text and great stills from the classic period . . . through the neo-noir films of the nineties. Perfect for a rainy night." (Helen Frangoulis, Playboy) Read more See all Editorial Reviews
Reviews
I enjoyed looking through this book which is basically a coffee table book. Most coffee table books are hard cover this one is paperback. I really like the subject of film noir And I have the book standing up on my bookshelf where I can enjoy seeing Rita Hayworth . It is not an in-depth book on photography or cinematography on film noir