CHARACTERISTICS OF FILM NOIR

NARRATIVE STRUCTURE & EDITING          

Retrieved from Sunset Boulevard ( Billy Wilder,1950)

A basic structure for Film noir editing is like a maze with the hero as the thread running through it. Film noir editing follows most of the traditional crime film’s characteristics but they are generally known as non-linear editing. It usually starts out on a quest, and then tells the story in flashback to solve a mystery or else to find work, after that settle down it and commit murder. For instance, in the Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder, 1950) film, starts up with a dead body of a young man, Joe Gillis floating in the swimming pool. When the policeman starts to investigate the murdered case, Joe’s voice narration is leading the situation by telling the story of his own murder for audiences.

Film noir’s dramatic feeling are occur due to the use of flashback. The film usually presents this as a very brief story telling then to the flashback just like the example above. Flashbacks and voice narration structures may be the means of suggesting that the progress through the maze is the working out of a fatal pattern. The reason of using flashback for most of the film noir is because the use of flashback can bring more depth, suspense and excitement for telling a story. And it is also like a bridge of time, place and action to reveal the truth about the character. Other than flashback, continuity editing is used to most of the footage and montage which falls on storytelling. The use of continuity editing is guiding the audiences to know the flow and sequences of the story. After reveal the truth of the murdered case, it backs to Joe’s dead body floating in the swimming pool where policeman were investigating.

COSTUME

Retrieved from Sunset Boulevard ( Billy Wilder,1950)

The costume for the character in Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder, 1950) is in the old-fashion of America attire, which appears in the 1940's and 1950's. There will be antique car owned by Norma, together with suits and hats that bring out the attire of people from that era. Usually women will have curly hair with long dresses which is exactly what the old-fashion image portrays. Women in film noir usually wear white, smart, and silk dress. For example, the dress wear by Norma in the film show that she is a rich person and yes, her attire and living place show that she was a big star before. With the glamorous dresses on, the level of class will usually presence and being express through the clothing. For instance, with the money that Norma had, she able to give a luxurious cigarette case as a gift to Joe who shows she is from an upper class community people.

For men, normally they are wearing smart, tidy suits with ties. The dress code for men is always being black, grey and brown in colour.  Clothing is really a personal issue in the film. There is a saying that character who wears their clothes on their bodies, they are literally attached into their wardrobe (Maria Pramaggiore, Tom Walls 2005). As seen in Sunset Boulevard (Bill Wilder 1950), Joe has a big transformation after he met Norma, who was a former Hollywood star. Norma bought a lot of expensive clothes for him as she wants him to be her partner. Joe's status had arisen by wearing what Norma bought for him. However, there is another meaning for Joe's new clothing in the film. It show that Joe is starting depending on Norma on the expenses. There is a part whereby the cloth seller persuades Joe to choose the more expensive or luxurious cloth since Norma is paying for it, it challenge Joe masculinity as he treated Joe like a gigolo. Joe gains a higher class of status by his clothing but he lost his freedom after gaining all his benefits (Maria Pramaggiore, Tom Walls 2005).

By watching film in film noir, the recognition of the character is done by looking at what the character wearing. For instance, the male character wears hat and suit and the female character lingering gaze and sensuality. In Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder, 1950), Norma is likely to live in her own world, the house which is full of photo of her, she only watch those old films which acted by herself. Besides, she is happily receiving the entire fake fans letter which is prepared by her guardian. She is a femme fatale who sustain her fantasy by draining the lives of those who surround her (Gerd Gemunden,2008). This will be more persuasive with the presence of the empty swimming pool with lots of rats crawling across, this emphasis the past and decaying era that Norma being going through. Norma is a typical woman who wants to control others to live in her own imaginary world.

LIGHTING

Retrieved from Sunset Boulevard ( Billy Wilder,1950)

Lighting is one of the important aspects of mise-en-scene in film noir. As we know film noir are much on dark nature therefore the lighting uses on low key lighting and shadow to create moody atmosphere and the sense of danger that will occur. In the Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder, 1950) film, it is full of shadows in a very figurative way. It shows the shadowy world deception, greed, lust and jealousy. These 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 they are watching her old movies and she stands in front of the projection light, arm held high with very strong light contrast on her face. 

CAMERA ANGLE

Retrieved from Sunset Boulevard ( Billy Wilder,1950)

Film noir is known for the use or establishing shot, low-angle and wide shot to create dramatic effect. Other common found in film noir include shots of people in mirrors, shots through a glass and multiple exposures. The establishing shot mostly used in film noir movies start off with symbolic features of trouble. The establishing shot in Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder, 1950) films portray to the audience what the male protagonists are going to go through. The film starts with a high angle shot of a black concrete street. Very rapidly the camera tilts up and reveals a medium angle long shot of Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder, 1950). Then, Joe Gillis is shown dead floating at the top of a pool. The camera performs a slow backwards tracking indicating something is coming. 

Apart of that, we can see a low-angle shot pictures of Joe. When he looks down at the burial, we see Norma in a high-angle shot from Joe's point-of-view. Later, low-angle shots of Norma at the top of the stairs contrast this position. In the first scene, Joe feels in a position of power having just found a solution to his money problems but by the end of the second act, Norma holds a life-threatening amount of power over Joe. This to show that Norma is not manipulating or evil but instead showing she is insane and insecure woman that has the power of dominating over man and the femme fatale. A femme fatales character is frequently shot from low angles top show there power and threatening nature.

CONCLUSION

            In a nutshell, based on our understanding, film noir is the great achievement of film studies as the power of film noir able to mobilize the imagination in a film and it is undeniable in enhancing the plot. Meanwhile, the shared aspects of film noir which the plot involving crime and violence and the fatalistic narrative that filled with bitter plot turns and bad endings, for instance in the film of Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder, 1950) where the main male character has bad ending in the structured story plot of the film, it shown the dark fatality which touches on one of the element in film noir. Apart of that, film noir is emphasizing on the deliberate style of performance together with the cinematography of it by using low key lightings and strong use of shadows which easily to develop the emotion of the character that metaphorically on the dark fatality of the characters in the film.

REFERENCES

Bordwell, David & Thompson, Kristin. (2010). Film Art An Introduction, 9^th ed, USA: McGraw-Hill

Gemunden, G. (2008). A Foreign Affair: Billy Wilder's American Films (Vol. 5). Berghahn Books.

Schrader, P. (1996). Notes on film noir. Film Noir Reader. New York: Limelight Editions, 53-65.

Street, S. (2001). Costume and cinema: Dress codes in popular film (Vol. 9). Wallflower Press.

Telotte, J. P. (1989). Voices in the dark: The narrative patterns of film noir. University of Illinois Press.

Winston, J. (1998). Drama, narrative and moral education: Exploring traditional tales in the primary years. Routledge.

 

HISTORY AND DEVELOPMENT OF FILM NOIR

HISTORY

The history of film noir can be dated back all the way from 1940s to 1950s. But before we get into the history of it, we have to understand what film noir is. According to Paul Schrader’s Notes on Film Noir (1972), film noir is not a defined genre which are usually being characterised by conflict and settings, but rather it is being characterised by its mood and tone. He also mentions that film noirs refers to films which portrayed the world of dark, slick city streets, crime and corruption (Schrader, 1972, p. 8). 

Now let us take a look at the history of film noir. Film Noir was first applied into Hollywood film by French critic Nino Frank in the year 1946. Back then it was unrecognized by most American film industry professionals and cinema historians. Before the notion was widely adopted in the year 1970s, many of the films noirs were referred to as melodrama. As mention earlier, film noir begins from the year 1940s to the late 1950s and thus, there are many low key black and white visual styles that came from German Expressionist cinematography. Between the years 1941 to 1948, about 20% of film noir was adapted from hard-boiled detective novels written by American authors such as Raymond Chandler, James M.Cain, Dashiell Hammett, and many others. 

As the period of film noir mainly takes place during World War II, there were some changes on the perspectives of people on how to judge a woman after the war. As they have changed their roles by having economic independence and they are no longer being position at home without having any education's opportunities. Thus by having equal knowledge as a male, they have the chance to move into the traditionally male workplace to work. Therefore, we can observe there is the existence of power of femme fatale unleashed over the alienated hero in Noir films (Jack Boozer, 1999, p. 20). Film Noir is easily identified by its dark, pessimistic and paranoiac mood in order to generate the emotion to the people. It always shows the characters in a dark side that reflect the bad cultural of the society and violence, it tends to make it as a reflection which people could actually see from the society and from there understand more on the cultural side for that particular time.

DEVELOPMENT

Like time, film noirs have changed. Known as Neo-noirs, it often maintains certain characteristic from film noirs but with a few new elements. One of the few additional elements was that Neo-noirs was more violent than film noir ever was. A good example would be Martin Scorsese’s GoodFellas (1990). Throughout the movie, there are two scenes where audiences can observe how the director straddles with the classical film noirs and neo-noirs. Other films include David Fincher’s Seven (1995), whereby it was like an updated version of film noirs with more violent and in colour. Even neo-noirs films like Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner (1982) was one of the films to claim the title “future noir”. 

Other noticeable development was the way filmmakers portray the sexual content. Similar to violent, the bar of sexual content was raise from classical film noirs. Take Stephen Frear’s The Grifters (1990) for example, the film features a relationship between a son and his mother, a film characteristic which audiences would normally not get to watch in a classical film noir. This proves that as time passes, filmmakers will always take things into a new level, in this case, the evolution of film noirs to neo-noirs.

         Generally, as time passes, film must be modified to fit that specific time period. Filmmakers of neo-noirs were faced with challenges to keep their audiences disorient to maintain the key characteristic of film noirs, while at the same time they have to come up with a brand new subject matter. This is because audiences in film noirs and neo-noirs live in a two completely different society. What may seem shocking in the past is no longer shocking to the present day audiences. Although both of it shares the same similarity, that is trying to reflect society, but each type has their differences. Film noirs does what it supposed to do in the classical era, while neo-noirs manage to disorient the audiences in the modern era. All of the characteristic remains, the difference is that they have been developed and modified for the audiences pleasure.