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FILM NOIR

There are many arguments and contradictions when it comes to the subject of film noir. Is it really a film genre, or a title assigned to and created by writers and critics striving to pigeonhole a vast and very differential range of films. Although volumes have been written on the subject, defining film noir essential traits is another matter.

It is impossible to simplify film noir by assigning it basic qualities as nightmarish, weird, sexual, ambiguous and cruel. While these characteristics are present in many classic noirs it cannot be confined to these alone. To fully understand and evaluate film noir you must look at the many contributing factors: writers, directors, actors, settings, story lines, studios and censoring.

"We'd be oversimplifying things in calling film noir oneiric, strange, erotic, ambivalent, and cruel...." This is the first of many attempts to define film noir made by the French critics Raymond Borde and Etienne Chaumeton in their 1955......

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