{"id":34696,"date":"2024-11-20T10:58:28","date_gmt":"2024-11-20T15:58:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/?p=34696"},"modified":"2025-02-19T08:41:05","modified_gmt":"2025-02-19T13:41:05","slug":"celebrate-noirvember-with-bapl-kanopy-and-ron","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/celebrate-noirvember-with-bapl-kanopy-and-ron\/","title":{"rendered":"Celebrate Noirvember with BAPL, Kanopy, and Ron"},"content":{"rendered":"

Happy Noirvember to those who celebrate. We are using this made-up holiday to talk about one of the most fun genres in cinema history: Film Noir. Our guest blogger is Ron Williams, a Bethlehem-based filmmaker who loves to talk about movies (and also food). Check out Ron’s introduction to the topic and his recommendations — all of which you can watch for free on Kanopy with your BAPL library card<\/a>. \"\"<\/p>\n

Ron Williams on Film Noir:<\/h2>\n

What is Film Noir? Is it fedoras, trench coats, and high-contrast black and white film? Is it seedy bars filled with chain smoking private eyes and ex-cons looking for a big score? Is it star-crossed lovers with an inconvenient husband who needs to disappear? Yes, it is. Film Noir is all of that and much more.<\/p>\n

The term “Film Noir” was first used in post-war France by cineastes in Paris who were just catching up on the Hollywood pictures they had missed during the war. The French critic, Nino Frank, is credited with coining the term \u2018film noir\u2019 to describe the bleak crime pictures of the time. Hollywood hadn\u2019t recognized this new genre while they were making these films, but Frank and other critics picked up on the dark themes of insecurity, nihilism, and existentialism at the heart of many of the films, as well as the expressionist inspired, low-key, black and white cinematography which defined most noir films during its classic period in the 1940s and 1950s.<\/p>\n

While the cinematic style of film noir has changed over the years, the term is still used to describe crime films with characters who blur the lines between hero and villain. Here are a handful of Film Noirs which perfectly encapsulate the genre. You can find them on Kanopy!<\/p>\n

The Classic Period:<\/h2>\n
    \n
  • Kansas City Confidential<\/em><\/strong> (1952)
    \nDirected by: Phil Karlson
    \nWritten by: George Bruce and Harry Essex
    \nProduced by: Edward Small
    \nFans of Reservoir Dogs<\/em> (1992), The Thomas Crown Affair<\/em> (1968), and The Taking of Pelham <\/em>One Two Three<\/em> (1974) will see clear inspiration for those films here. This classic caper features an intricately planned heist which is to be pulled off by a crew of cons who are strangers to each other. No one knows each other, so no one can betray each other\u2026but they can\u2019t trust each other, either.<\/li>\n
  • Detour<\/em><\/strong> (1945)
    \nDirected by: Edgar G. Ulmer
    \nWritten by: Martin Goldsmith
    \nProduced by: Leon Fromkess
    \nThings go from bad to worse to catastrophic for a down-on-his-luck piano player hitchhiking from New York to Los Angeles. Detour<\/em> is one of the most widely-known noir films of all time and perfectly embodies the bleak fatalism of the genre.<\/li>\n
  • Too Late For Tears<\/strong> (1949)<\/em>
    \nDirected by: Byron Haskin
    \nWritten by: Roy Huggins
    \nProduced by: Hunt Stromberg
    \nWhat would you do if a big bag of money fell into your lap? Would you keep it or turn it over to the police? That\u2019s the quandary at the heart of Too Late For Tears.<\/em> If you\u2019re not familiar with the works of the actor Dan Duryea, get ready to meet one of cinema\u2019s greatest heels.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    French Noir:<\/h2>\n
      \n
    • Symphony for a Massacre<\/strong> (1963)<\/em>
      \nDirected by: Jacques Deray
      \nWritten by: Alain Reynaud-Fourton, Jos\u00e9 Giovanni, Claude Sautet, Jacques Deray
      \nProduced by: Julien Derode
      \nInspired by The Asphalt Jungle<\/em>, this French noir classic is full of backstabbers, two-timers, schemers, and total degenerates\u2026a perfect noir cocktail, especially in the hands of a skilled filmmaker like Jacques Deray. Deray became so famous for making noirs, thrillers, crime films, and spy movies the Jacques Deray Prize was created in 2006 to honor him. It is awarded annually to the best French crime-thriller film of the year.<\/li>\n
    • Le Samoura\u00ef<\/strong> <\/em>(1967)
      \nDirected by: Jean-Pierre Melville
      \nWritten by: Jean-Pierre Melville and Georges Pellegrin
      \nProduced by: Raymond Borderie and Eug\u00e8ne L\u00e9picier
      \nAlain Delon plays a methodical, perfectionist assassin who hits an unexpected snag on a job and must elude both the authorities and the people who hired him in Jean-Pierre Melville\u2019s stylish neo-noir. This is one of the coolest films of all time. I challenge anyone to watch this and not feel compelled to buy a trenchcoat.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      Neo Noir:<\/h2>\n
        \n
      • The Long Goodbye<\/strong> (1973)<\/em>
        \nDirected by: Robert Altman
        \nWritten by: Leigh Brackett
        \nProduced by: Jerry Bick
        \nElliot Gould made some great films with Robert Altman over the years, and I would put this one towards the top of the list. Here he perfectly embodies Raymond Chandler\u2019s legendary private detective, Phillip Marlowe. Gould made a career playing moral men who are constantly butting heads with a world that seems to be turning more cynical and selfish all the time. In The Long Goodbye, his principles are tested by the weirdos, gangsters, and sleazebags of seventies Los Angeles.<\/li>\n
      • Point Blank<\/strong> (1967)<\/em>
        \nDirected by: John Boorman
        \nWritten by: Alexander Jacobs, David Newhouse, and Rafe Newhouse
        \nProduced by: Judd Bernard and Robert Chartoff
        \nBased on the Robert Stark novel, The Hunter<\/em>, this 1967 neo-noir is your prototypical revenge film. There are no \u201cgood guys\u201d here. Lee Marvin plays a crook who was double-crossed and now he\u2019s looking to bury the people who did him dirty.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

         <\/p>\n

        \"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

        Happy Noirvember to those who celebrate. We are using this made-up holiday to talk about one of the most fun genres in cinema history: Film Noir. Our guest blogger is Ron Williams, a Bethlehem-based filmmaker who loves to talk about movies (and also food). Check out Ron’s introduction to the topic and his recommendations — […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","filesize_raw":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[296],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movies"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paVu5I-91C","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34696"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34829,"href":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34696\/revisions\/34829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bapl.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}