The analysis of the film "noir"

The Mise-en-scene Of Film Noirlocations

As film noir’s are notoriously based on crime novels from the 40s to the 50s, locations and setting would have to reflect all aspect of grittiness in crime itself. Locations are usually in low-rent apartment buildings—they are low rent because film makers couldn’t afford to score high profit housing with their small budget. They were also staged in warehouses, a place people associate with crime and gangsters. The main theme in film noir is the ultimate urban ‘ down-town’ setting that reflects the sombre and violent mood of the film itself; if it were filmed in a rural area with the sun out, it would ruin the tone. Using locations such as warehouses and dingy apartments can reflect a characters status, position and overall character subjectively.

Lighting

Film noir has become famous for its single lighting sources and uses of shadows and silhouettes; this is used to represent the mood of the film. The use of a single source of light can represent the pessimism, cynicism and hopelessness that radiates throughout the movie. From this, viewers can start to feel as isolated and unhappy as the characters are as they are thrown into darkness. But while using a single lighting source, directors can play around with shadows—this means they can create a sense of eeriness into their films as shadows can be absolutely anything. For lighting, directors may also use single-slatted blinds to represent secrecy and hiddenness as these films are about crime, something that must be kept a secret, but also to highlight the main character as he may be a secretive man with skeletons in his closet.

Characters

In every film noir movie, there are always two distinctive characters: the protagonist and the femme fatale. The protagonist, as the word implies, is hardly ever the good guy and it would be more so fitting to call him an anti-hero. An anti-hero is someone who lacks traditional heroic qualities and achieves their goals without following authority or law; this is exactly what a ‘ hero’ of a film noir is. He is sleazy, violent, alcoholic a schmuck and sometimes a murderer, film noir tends to stray away from the conventional hero in favour of a more dirty and slimy one with convoluted morals.

The protagonist could be called a hopeless man who is destined to die or will inevitably fall to greed, lust or self-destruction; all in all he is never represent as the well and known ‘ hero’. Then there is the femme fatale or the black widow as it’s more commonly known. The femme fatale is always a gorgeous woman who is usually the antagonist and causes the protagonist to fall to his doom. The femme fatale has gone passed societal norms and is more independent and smart, a woman who knows what she wants and how to get it. She is never a good person and holds a lot of power through sex and sensuality, something she uses to lure the protagonist in. She manipulates causes the disillusioned hero to commit murder or some other crime of passion as they are coupled in twisted love for one another. If the femme fatale and the hero join into a partnership, corruption would soon follow.

Costumes

Clothing will usually represent characters subjectively. For example, the hero may wear lots of clothing that covers his entire body to represent secrecy, while the femme fatale would wear more revealing clothing to show her deviance and sex appeal. Other characters, especially if they are rich or part of some gang, would wear pinstripe suits and hold cigars in their hands to highlight their status and wealth.

Style

Film noir is based off of German expressionism; strange camera angles, stark, single lighting and odd shadows. Germans who were fleeing nazi Germany brought with them the unnerving and dark feel to these films and used them as a way to present their lives as targets of the war. On the other hand, there are multitudes of corruption and brutality in these films; this was to present America’s corruption at the time.

Film noir is used to bluntly show the viewer things that were not discussed in society at the time. For example, women attaining power through beauty and sex and murder and corruption, these were some themes that were not openly spoken about and film noir successfully showed these aspects, albeit sometimes quite dramatically. Furthermore, film noir specialised in low angles, giving the viewer to see the characters more closely and to watch their reactions, it feeds off the idea that the characters are being watched metaphorically.

Storylines

Film noir storylines was an entire cluster of convolution. They could be non-linear and the simple: “ you’ve probably been wondering how I ended up in this position”. The narrative is usually told with a foreboding background, suspenseful music and regular flashbacks. Common plot device’s were protagonist suffering or had suffered with amnesia, the downfall of the innocent and the everyman falling to temptation or is framed amongst many others. A common plot point was using revelations about the hero to justify/explain their own cynical perspective on life. Similar to this would be to use the hero’s weaknesses to get them to repeat former mistakes, causing trouble for everyone involved.