Brick Outline

I. In the movie Brick by Rian Johnson, Brendan a  teenage high school student is in search for who killed his ex-girlfriend. So he gets himself involved in a whirlwind of crime in order to solve the mystery. 

II. Clasic Noir Elements
     1. Low budget film
          a. cost $450,00 to make
          b. took only 20 days to film
          c.for the pins house, which was the drug lord, they used an old run down house that was set to be
            demolished
     2.Very little special effects
          a. they filmed a car driving slowly in reverse then played the footage backwards at a higher speed
             which gives the illusion of a car quickly approaching
     3. Classic characters
         a. detective/protagonist, femme fatale, murder, and crimes being committed
             According to Jerold Abrams in Space,Time, and Subjectivity in Neo-Noir Cinema "While
             neo-noir is certainly new, somethings never change. Obvious among these are the maze, the
             detective, the femme fatale and so many other things" (19).

III. Neo-Noir Elements
     1.detective/protagonist is a young high school student. Doesn't wear fadora or trench coat.
        According to Notes on Film Noir,Humphrey Bogart describes the protagonist as"often
        more mature, almost too old and not too handsome".
     2. shot in San Clemente, CA instead of a big city
     3.shot in wide open flat surfaces
     4. has 3 femme fatales

    

Blog 7 The Girl Who Kissed Barnaby Jones

I chose to read the four short stories from The Gold Coast section in the book Los Angeles Noir. The Girl Who Kissed Barnaby Jones, Kinship, The Hour When the Ship Comes In and What You See. The story I felt best described noir was "The Girl Who Kissed Barnaby Jones" by Scott Phillips. It definitely wasn't my favorite story  in fact it was the story that I liked the least out of the 4.

The reason why it fits film noir is because you have this beautiful, seductive, femme fatale in the story named Cherie. She calls her co-worker Tate to come over for a favor. At first he thinks she has a conflict with the schedule but when he picks up she ask him to come to Pacific Palisades and since he is highly attracted to her or as he stated "I have a great boner with Cherie's name on it, and if she asked me to shovel shit I'd ask her how fast she needed it shoveled" (287) so there he goes.

When he gets to this beautiful home he gets seduced by her. They end up having sex for 3 minutes but it works out for the both of them. He gets to have sex with her and she has evidence that they were having sex while the owner of the house Gary Hinshaw a famous producer lay dying on the kitchen floor. It isn't till she leads Tate to the kitchen that he smells the horrible aroma and sees Gary's body. He wants to call 911 but Cherie wants him to help her get rid of the body. She's deadly and wont take no for an answer. She points a gun at Tate's head and wont put it down until he pulls the body. As she goes to turn on a  light Tate kicks her and she stumbles and shoots at him. He gets to his car and finds the nearest  payphone where he calls 911. Then the next thing you know he see's Cherie driving toward him he says " the face behind the wheel bearing down on mine, jaws clenched so tight they're bulging, and all I can think is how pretty she still looks. (298)"

So this story out of the 4 best described noir, you have the crime, the femme fatale, which is the murderer with lies and deceit but I didn't like it at all.

Blog 6 “Space, Time, and Subjectivity in Neo-Noir Cinema” by Jerold Abrams

 From what I understand from what I've just read is that the different between film noir and neo noir is the settings, time, place and who detective is searching for or how he tells the story. Film- noir came first with the black and white films, cynical attitudes, and sexual motivations. Neo- noir is the modern film noir. It has updated style, color and ideas. In both film noir and neo noir you still have your detective figure, a femme fatale and some kind of crime taking place.
 
The detective figure changes from everything taking place in relation to self to the detective himself telling  who is telling the story about his own search for the other as the villain to a detective who ultimately is searching for himself as an other.
 In Space, Time, and Subjectivity in Neo-Noir Cinema,by Jerold Abrams it states
"Two things, however, were different and really make neo-noir what it
is today. First is setting: what used to be the contemporary “space” of the
Los Angeles city now becomes the “time” of the distant future and the distant
past. Second is character: rather than looking for a criminal in the city
that surrounds him, now the detective’s search is for himself, for his own
identity and how he may have lost it. Or, to put the same point another way,
the classic noir detective is a hardened stoic—not a flat character (mind
you), but hardly “conflicted” in Shakespeare’s sense. With neo-noir, however,
that is precisely the point. The character is “divided” against himself,
although not so much emotionally, as in Shakespeare, as epistemologically:
divided in time as two selves, and one is looking for the other.”
 
In past Neo-Noir you have films like Angel Heart by Alan Parker or the Ninth Gate by Roman Polanski. Both movies have to do with a detective type figure who ends up dealing with the devil in some way or another. Abrams describes Past Neo-Noir as " usually low-tech, contrasting it with the very high tech future noir, and almost always theological." Both of those movies are definitely theological.


In future Neo- Noir you have detective science fiction and alien noir.

You have movies like Minority Report by Steven Spielberg. It’s the ultimate form of crime prevention: catch the killer before he can even get to his victim. A specialized police department apprehends criminals based on their foreknowledge. It examines whether free will can exist if the future is set and known in advance.

Another Future Neo-Noir movie would be Blade Runner by Ridley Scott is about a detective and an ex-cop who gets called to finish their last job. A company has manufactured these robots that are hard to distinguish from humans and they have escaped and are now hiding in Los Angeles. So these detectives that are called Blade Runners are on the hunt to find them. Both movies are of the future and technology.

 

Present Neo-Noir as Abrams describes it “these films take place neither in the distant past nor in the distant future. Of course, that’s hardly to say that time is not “of the essence”—far from it. In fact, present neo-noir, in my opinion, offers the best of neo-noir—and particularly for its use of time.” Some movies would be Memento by Christopher Nolan or Bourne Identity by Doug Libman. Memento is shown in black and white with the story in chronological order and then in color in reverse order.Its about a man who is searching for the man who killed his wife and then somehow suffers from a certain type of amnesia who reminds himself of events by writing on himself . In Bourne Identity Jason Bourne also suffers from amnesia. His has to do with the CIA and also has to use his body to figure out what has gone on, where he’s going , who’s after him and why.

 

So what I’ve learned is that Neo-Noir is the newer version of Film-Noir. You still have your detective figure in search of figuring out some type of mystery. I see the crime but in the newer films though I don’t see the femme fatale as I would in Film-Noir.

 

Entry 4 Zero Draft Questions

4. Discuss the appropriateness of the actors Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck for their roles as Walter Neff and Phyllis Dietrichson. How do these actors compare with the images you formed of these characters while reading the novel? Do these actors exemplify qualities that are consistent with descriptions of the protagonist and femme fatale in film noir?

 Let me start with Phyllis. In the book I pictured her as an evil heartless person with no emotion who loved death. It seemed to me she killed her husband for no reason other than the money. He seemed to be a nice hard working man. In the movie though he was kind of a jerk to Phyllis giving her reason to want to kill him. In the book she actually carried her husbands dead body which made her seem more tough and in the movie she didn't. At the end of the movie she kind of shows some love towards Walter after she shoots him. In the book I took the ending as, well lets just meet with death our self. So in the book she seemed more evil and tough and in the movie just a little more sweeter. As far as what I pictured her image wise I imagined her the same as she looked in the movie.
 I like how Walter was tougher in the movie compared to in the book. He was dangerous and a little more heartless in the movie. Instead of chasing around Phyllis like in the book he had more balls, he knew he had to kill her and he did so. Both of these actors exemplify qualities that are consistent with the descriptions of the protagonist and femme fatale in film noir.

1. Discuss the contrasts between the endings of the novel and the film. Which ending seems more appropriate for film noir? Why?

Like we discussed in class the ending to the book leaves it up to your imagination on what really happens to Walter and Phyllis. In the movie its straight to the point!
I like the ending in the book but I think the ending in the movie is more appropriate because it gives you a real ending on what happened instead of wondering and waiting for part 2 to come out.

BLOG ENTRY 3

I'm going to go with question 1 regarding who in the novel assumes the role of the detective figure and what qualities does he possess that make him suitable for the role of the hard-boiled detective?
     In this story Walter Huff is your detective type character but as you get more into the story you realize that Keyes assumes the role of the detective.  Walter Huff initially is lawful and is trying to find clients who are trying to commit fraud. On the other hand when he meets Phyllis Nirdlinger he learns that she is the perfect person to help him commit a crime that he has only dreamed about. After the 2 commit the murder in order to get the insurance money Keyes plays a big role in being the detective. He knows that something isn't right and is digging to try and find out what is really going on. When Phyllis first files the claim Keyes denies it on grounds that an accident hasn't been proved. He wanted her to be investigated and interrogated. He knew that it couldn't be an accident and there wasn't something fishy going on. He kept on with his investigation until Walter Huff breaks down and confesses the murder.
     I also think that Lola played a little role in the detective character when she would follow Sachetti and after the murder she was keeping tabs on Phyllis. She found out that Phyllis was shopping for a black dress a week before her fathers murder.When Walter Huff was shot she had been following him thinking it was her boyfriend. Sachetti also played a small role in playing detective he was trying to figure out who Phyllis really was and knew she was no good after the children died and Lola's mother had died.
     So in Double Indemnity I think each character played detective to different situations.

Double Indemnity-Film Noir Blog 2

      There are many aspects of film noir in the book Double Indemnity. Film noir as you know always has that detective type character that's on the fine line between lawful and unlawful.Then you have the "femme fatale" character who is the seductive, mysterious woman who charms her way into her lovers heart and then leads him into deadly and dangerous situations. Not only does the book Double Indemnity have those characters but it also has murder, mystery, deceit, fraud and twist to spice it up.

     In the first half of the book James M. Cain introduces Walter Huff  who is an experienced insurance agent and very good at his job. While trying to sell insurance to Mr. Nirdlinger he ends up coming in contact with the beautiful blonde Mrs.Phyllis Nirdlinger. She would soon prove to be the femme fatale character and lead him in to murder with her beauty and charm. According to Raymond Borde and Etienne Chaumeton “The private detective is midway between lawful society and the underworld, walking on the brink, sometimes unscrupulous, but only putting himself at risk, fulfilling the requirements of his own code and of the figure as well. As if to counterbalance all this, the actual lawbreakers are more or less sympathetic figures.”

That quote describes the Walter Huff in this book all too well. Walter Huff not a private detective but was that law abiding citizen who could almost always tell when there was a suspicious client and would bring them down. On the other hand when Phyllis Nirdlinger pretty much seduced him and convinced him into killing her husband he couldn’t resist her. He was all for it!  From years of experience he knew all too well how to plan the murder without raising any suspicions or getting caught. After they both went thru with the murder Walter Huff went about his life trying to act as normal as possible. His boss was suspicious about it and knew there was something not right. It all made Walter Huff a bit sick. So he was playing the lawful and unlawful side at this point. He was put himself at risk by first committing a murder and secondly possibly not ends well at all.

     From the website Filmsite it states that “ the females in film noir are either of two types- dutiful, reliable, trustworthy and loving women; or femme fatales- mysterious, duplicitous, double-crossing, gorgeous, unloving, predatory, tough-sweet, unreliable, irresponsible, manipulative and desperate women.” In Cain’s book Double Indemnity Phyllis Nirdlinger would be described as the femme fatale character. She is a beautiful blonde with light blue eyes who seduces Mr. Huff into killing her husband for the life insurance money. She is sweet, tough and knows what she wants and knows how to get it. During the murder she seems unaffected by it. She shows no emotion or sadness of her husband being dead. She goes on about her life as if it’s just another day.

     In conclusion the book Double Indemnity has many aspects of film noir in it. From the insurance agent, to the femme fatale and all the lies, deceit, fraud and murder it has to follow. This book is a clasic example of film noir and its characteristics.

   

Classic Film Noir

     During the classic period of film noir I believe that the content and visual elements were pretty much consistent through out that period. They all had the same story line but the events, actions, and corruption were played out different. Some film noir movies started from the end of the story first and then played out the events leading up to that point.

     The films were all black and white, with dark and gloomy settings, low budget, with  some sort of crime and suspense with a twist at the end. Clasisic film noir movies had corruption, gun fights, murder and an innocent person was almost always lured  into a crime.Men were seduced by women and the women could almost always get a man to do whatever  she wanted and that's what you would call "femme fatale". The men always got caught up with this dangerous deadly woman.

     The  men were dressed up in suits, fedoras and pretty much carried guns. There were always some sort of private eye or detective type character. The women in film noir movies were also always dressed well with their hair and makeup done. They were sexy, mysterious and always had a dangerous side.

     I think that people enjoyed film noir during the classic period because it was during an era of peace and calm. It gave the audience a sense of excitement and suspense. I believe it's always the same type of story line but with different characteristics and a different type of corruption. I like how there's always some type of twist during the end and you don't really know what to expect.