This week we are discussing about a special film technique that was originated by French critics in the 1946 called “Film Noir.” Film Noir is a type of American film that “penetrated” French cinemas after World War II. Some great example of film noirs include The Maltese Falcon by John Huston, Double Indemnity by Billy Wilder, and The Woman in the Window by Fritz Lang. These films often featured an investigator who encounters deceptions and malice during his investigation of a case. In 1940s, film noir was an expression of male concern at women’s growing economic and sexual independence that threatens masculinity. In 1950s, film noir reinforces family values, thus overcoming the femme fatale is intricate to the reassertion to (male) identity.
Film Noir features a world of criminals, of darkness and violence with characters’ central motives are usually greed, lust and ambition, drench in fear.
The visual of film noir includes:
l Dark with lots of shadows
l High-contrast lighting (low key)
l German expressionistic - oblique vertical and horizontal lines
l Scenes are usually lit for night
l Locations such as alleyways, cramped corridors, etc
l Setting is city-bound, comprising of rain-washed roads and dimly-lit interiors
The theme of film noir includes:
l Cynical (negative), Pessimism, and Dark
l Corrupted characters, fatalistic themes, hopeless tones, blurred morals and intellect
l Hard-boiled antihero vs Femme Fatale
l Tales of Criminal Motives
l Narration
The content in film noir usually contains the woman is central to the intrigue, making her the object of the male’s investigation. Ultimately, it is her sexuality that is under investigation which threatens the male quest to resolve mystery. By being a strong, active, sexually expressive female, film noir tends to keep the woman contained. The closures of the film usually determine the containment of the Femme Fatale with sadistic closures such as death, outcast, mental torture or reintegration to the family to conceal her economic and sexual independence.
Film Noir is a type of film that only defined by more subtle qualities of tone and mood. Film Noir is a specific period of film history, comprising of films made during the forties and fifties that possessed particular themes and cinematic styles.
This week’s goal is to achieve the evidence of the Film Noir’s elements from the movie produced in the year 1941, The Maltese Falcon by John Huston.
The theory that being applied in this week’s movie is called the genre and semantic/syntactic approach by Rick Altman. In semantic/syntactic approach, semantic represents the visual aspects and syntactic represents the thematic aspects of the film. The approach uses both semantic and syntactic complementarily to do a proper genre analysis on a movie. The problem that genre in film encounter is films cannot be imposed by a generic definition as genres are not static but evolutionary as the changing times. Genres evolve according to times and many sub genres or minor sub-genres have been spun out which in turn become hybrids of original genres or a mixture of several genres.
There are 3 condition under Genre. The first condition is that the film must possess universal/general semantics and syntaxes that are particularly found in corresponding genres. For an example, a western must possess the specific costumes and settings along with the cowboy that will display an aural of justice with a theme of good vs. evil. The second condition is that the spectator’s expectation and hypothesis must be present. To cite an example, the act of audience guessing the ending of the film. Thus, genres have to audience based, following the expectations of the industry. The third condition is that the genre exists like a paradox for being conservative and innovative at the same time, as long as they repeat “formulas” to display old conventions while modernizing new ones.
Now we got all the important notes down, let’s dive down to the movie and see what evidence we got for our film noir. :)
The Maltese Falcon, a 1940s film noir classic about a detective named Sam Spade gets more than he bargained for when he takes a case brought to him by a beautiful but secretive woman. As soon as Miss Wonderly shows up, trouble follows as Sam’s partner is murdered and Sam is accosted by a man demanding he locate a valuable statuette. Sam, entangled in a dangerous web of crime and intrigue, soon realizes he must find the one thing they all seem to want: the bejeweled Maltese falcon.
There is cynical element found in the movie. An example can be given from the scene where two detectives from the police force interrogates Spade at an apartment. The two detectives questioned Spade with a negative mindset as if he have always been committing crimes. Spade quickly defends himself by justifying his situation with his quick thinking skills to persuade the two detectives off on putting the murder blame on him.
There is darkness element found in the movie. In character portrayal, the characters have motives behind their action. The individuals of such portrayal include greedy people, liars, corrupter, criminals and many more. One scene that perfectly portrays the darkness character is when the man named Joel Cairo, pay a visit to meet Sam Spade to offer him $5000 if he can retrieve a figurine of a black bird that has recently arrived. While Spade has no idea what the man is talking about, he plays along with it. Suddenly, Cairo pulls out a handgun on Spade, and declares his intention to search Spade’s office.
In visual terms, German Expressionism is applied to the lighting part of the movie where oblique horizontal and vertical lines are seen. A chasing scene where Spade is trying to escape from a suspicious guy portrayed a good example. The low key lighting created shadows to dramatize the whole chasing scene and exposes the character’s face with the high contrast lighting.
There is Femme Fatale element in the movie. The Femme Fatale role is a woman who is strong, sexual expressive, manipulative, and ambitious towards money and power. A character portrayed this role well is Miss Wonderly/Brigid O’Shaughnessy. She successfully pull it off the act of a Femme Fatale as she uses Spade to avoid getting into serious trouble. She also knows how to play her cards right by acting the innocent “school girl” act and lie to save her own tail from fire.
There is a scene where Spade interrogates Miss O’Shaughnessy aggressively about why she killed his partner Miles Archer. At first, she acts horrified at this accusation, but seeing that she could not lie anymore, she drops the act. Miss O’Shaughnessy wanted to get Thursby out of the picture so that she could have the Falcon for herself, so she hired Archer to scare him off. When Thursby did not left, she killed Archer and attempted to pin the crime on Thursby. When Thursby was later killed himself, she knew that Gutman was in town and that she needed another “protector”, so she came back to Spade.
In conclusion, this film have definitely portrayed that an ambitious woman, who will stop at nothing to get “what she wants” is a woman that needed to be contained as it is dangerous to mankind. From this movie I have learned that to be a person with intellectual street mind, you need to know your surroundings and the background of your friends well to prevent the charges apply on to yourself.
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