FILM NOIR AND THE AUTEUR IN DOUBLE INDEMNITY
As a cinematic genre dating back to the mid 1930's, film noir isgenerally defined as a dark, suspenseful thriller with a plotline revolvingaround crime or mystery. Following World War II, film noir gained muchrecognition when Hollywood thrillers, such as The Maltese Falcon (1941)with Humphrey Bogart and Sidney Greenstreet, could be seen in the Frenchcinemas. The term itself is derived from the roman noir, used in the 19thcentury to describe the English romantic horror novel, better known asGothic Romanticism and linked to such authors as Horace Walpole, Ann In the genre of film noir, a particular blackness of physique, such asdark, wet city streets or the use of shadowing, tended to be an importantelement as well as the depiction of a dark world of corruption, violenceand crime. In France during World War II, the genre provided a vehicle forfilms of a high caliber that were not objectionable to the occupyingauthorities, in this case the Nazis. Soon after the war, film noir becamepopular with the French post-war generation of filmgoers and wasenthusiastically adopted by some filmmakers, especially Melville Godard in
Exactly how this is done is quitecomplicated, but it could be viewed much like a novel in which the authoris the prime imaginative and literary force behind the characters, theplot, the dialogue, the settings and the plot. Both are attracted not so much by the crime as bythe thrill of committing a crime with the other person, knowing all toowell that their chances of being caught by the law are pretty high. com, 2004) whichmeans that a film like Double Indemnity is literally stamped with BillyWilder's personal style and vision. distinctive, recognizable style" (AllRefer. The murder plot isone of simple substitution--the husband, on crutches with a broken leg, ischoked to death just before boarding the train; Neff takes his place, getson the train and then jumps off. In addition, film noir is often incorporated into anatmosphere of hard urban reality, such as city streets, back alleys,rundown hotels, dark, smoke-filled barrooms and dimly-lit cafes. Unfortunately, toward the end of the1950's, film noir was being quickly replaced by other crime "thrillers"which inevitably doomed the genre to cinematic obscurity. As Foster Hirsch relates, Billy Wilder, a Hollywood icon,"always went for stories of this type and always avoided the usual storyarc. Thus, as the "auteur" of Double Indemnity, Wilder produced anddirected one of the great Hollywood film noirs that stands today as thequintessential example of the genre. Another example of how film noir draws the audience into the story isthrough emotion and tension, especially those connected with Neff's fear ofdiscovery and his personal feelings for Keyes (Edward G. One of themost familiar themes associated withfilm noir contains a hero who is not a criminal but a weak, ineffective manwho is tempted by a beautiful and mysterious woman, a motif that can betraced back to Homer's Odyssey. Inessence, according to film theory, the "auteur" (or author) is "the primaryperson responsible for the creation of a motion picture (who) imbues itwith his. But Wilder decided that this sequence was anti-climatic, for hepoints out that with Neff shot and bleeding as he lies near an elevator,the film was "already over.
Common topics in this essay:
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Fred MacMurray,
Godard Alphaville,
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Billy Wilder's,
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Acceptance Essays
