Noir Movie

Film Noir Archetypes- The Voice-Over Flashback

World-Weary Voice of Noir

Most film noir movies don't use the flashback/voice-over technique of storytelling, but this technique has become closely associated with film noir for two main reasons.

One is that a few of the most iconic noirs do make use of it, so people who have only seen a handful of the true classics are more likely to associate this technique with noir. The other, and I've never seen this commented on elsewhere, is that the use of a voice-over closely replicates the tone and feeling of the novels on which a lot of noir movies were based.

The Killers 1946 - Noir Classic

The movie that has it all

It’s been quite a while since I’ve had the chance to watch The Killers. I actually forgot how much I enjoyed this movie. It’s filled with urgency from start to finish, a definite must see classic.

Film Noir Archetypes- The Good Woman

Symbol of Everything The Noir Hero Can Never Have

The femme fatale is more glamorous, but she's not the only feminine archetype in the world of film noir. The other side of the femme fatale is her opposite number, the “good woman” who just can't help but love the doomed protagonist.

Film Noir Archetypes- The Grifter

Sleazy Small-Time Con-Men of Noir

The hardboiled private eye is not quite noir enough for the more cynical critics, who like their noir Jim Thompson style, or blacker than black. The idea of having some Shopworn Galahad walking down the mean streets of Noir City strikes this type of critic as rank idealism if not moronic optimism. For this kind of critic, the defining noir protagonist is the grifter, the weasel and con artist who tries to worm his way to the top by hook or by crook.

Film Noir Archetypes- The Femme Fatale

"The moment she walked in the door, I knew she was trouble..."

The femme fatale is second only to the hardboiled private eye as a noir archetype. The origins of the private eye archetype are in the pulp magazines from which film noir drew a lot of stories, but the femme fatale goes all the way back to Helen of Troy.

A femme fatale is a dangerous woman, a woman who uses her charm and her beauty to get what she wants- often by manipulating and duping a private eye. This is the theme of the very first noir of all, “The Maltese Falcon,” but Bogart as Sam Spade turns the tables on femme fatale Brigid O'Shaughnesy in the end. This is a typical development for a lot of noir movies, although sometimes it ends very badly for the detective as well, as in “Out Of The Past.”

Noir Styled Zombie Movies

The two loves of my life

We all love our dark noir, we love the surrealism, the chase and the intrigue. We also love zombies, we love their one track minds, their gore and their general disgustingness. Zombie noir isn’t a new idea, it’s actually rather popular in many circles.

Noir Movie Archetypes: The Hardboiled Private Eye

"Down These Mean Streets A Man Must Go..."

The hardboiled private detective appears in the very first film noir movie, as Humphrey Bogart's Sam Spade in “The Maltese Falcon.” Sam Spade was one of the most popular of the pulp magazine private eyes, and he still exemplifies the archetype.

Blade Runner

Noir Cyberpunk

There haven't really been that many sci-fi noirs. “Dark City” and “Blade Runner” are the only two that spring to mind, and “Dark City” is hampered somewhat by its nostalgia for the 1940s. Back in the 1940s and 50s, when the original noirs were made, people didn't dress in trenchcoats and fedoras to be cool and retro. If you had gone out on the streets of any American city, you would have seen a sea of trenchcoats and fedoras. That's just how people dressed back then.

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The Women of Noir

They were strong calculating beautiful women of seduction, and yes they knew exactly how to use their traits.

The women of noir were vital to the film and I like to think in some degree to the women of that time and even still today. They inn their own way made those films, in fact, in all honestly where would the plot have gone without them. These women of film noir brought a new vision into public light, a vision I’ll always remember and be thankful for.

Film Noir gave women strength. They left behind their damsel in distress personality and took what they wanted, usually with any means necessary. This film genre showed women everywhere that strength was in each woman if only she would reach down and harness it. Read more about The Women of Noir

Dark City

Sci-Fi Neo-Noir

“Dark City” is a sci-fi noir from 1998, featuring stunningly impressive visuals of an almost comic-book 1940s-style city that is not even remotely what it seems. One of the basic tropes of film noir is the “wrong man accused” story, in which the hero must solve the mystery to clear his own name. A common twist on this is the “amnesia” story, in which the hero can't remember what really happened and therefore doesn't actually know for a fact whether he's guilty or not.

Read more about Dark City