film noir

Oh no way. HOWARD HAWKS! It would have been fantastic whoever was in it.

I didn't assume there was any sex with the bookseller, either. Maybe I missed something. :-/ I thought she kind of offered herself, but he was too preoccupied to take her up -- albeit with some regret? Oh no, I didn't miss an obvious visual metaphor anywhere, did I?!

Anyway, the film is lots of fun, don't get me wrong. But to me, not quite up there with Double Indemnity, Maltese Falcon, even Lady from Shanghai. (NTS: must watch that one again soon.)

What I'm looking forward to massively is this fab box-set of Mr. Arkadin from Criterion. (Um, Euro-noir?)

Jeez, he's not even credited with directing that, and the degree to which he did is uncertain.

btw the high school noir, Brick, is being released next month. Richard Roundtree is in it.

i'm borrowing the lady in the lake from the library to remind myself if I feel like championing it or not

anyway, in high school, when my friend kip and i used to hang out at his brother's condo and watch movies all night, dark victory came on; kip was bored and went to sleep, but i stayed up and watched the whole thing, because it was AWESOME

I just read on ILM that the picture in the newspaper of Lauren Bacall's dad is of the director, Delmer Daves.

I recently saw John Boorman's Point Blank. I'm assuming maybe it doesn't exactly fit into the "noir" category, maybe neo-noir, "hollywood rennaissance"? I love how lots of people die in it and the main character's motivation is violence and revenge, but nobody gets killed by him. Such a fantastic movie with some very funny/brutal parts.

http://www.austinchronicle.com/issues/vol17/issue09/screens.windsor.3.gif

"I bet your the kind of man that does push-ups every morning just to keep his belly hard."
"..You got something against good health?"

Just saw something about Richard Fleischer by Dave Kehr in the Times- a few films showing at the Walter Reade and Film Comment in the coming weeks.

Oh man just saw Night and the City starring Richard Widmark. One of the bleakest noir films I've ever seen. Widmark is amazing in it.

Richard Fleischer thing starts on Friday at FF. It's in color- in Cinemascope!

Wow this 1948 UK film Daughter of Darkness was just given dvd reissue by Redemption films. It's both British noir and femme fatale wrapped in one with plenty of chiaroscuro and gothic vibe. Definitely recommended.

http://www.thelmagazine.com/images/blogimages/2009/09/30/1254335093-daughterofdarkness.jpg

I think I'm noir illiterate. Watching the big sleep - drunk, granted - and I can't make a lick of sense out of it.

iirc an actor approached hawks before filming the scene for his death. "i know my lines, howard," he said, "but who kills me?" and hawks thinks for a second and says "well hell, i'm not sure. hang on." so he rings faulkner, who wrote the screenplay, and he asks him "hey bill, who kills this guy?" and faulkner says "damn howard, I'm not sure. hang on." and he telegrams chandler "who killed butler STOP hawks wants to know STOP"

next day hawks gets a telegram: "hell if i know--ray"

iyigd

why chandler had to telegram hawks when they were in the same city is beyond me, but i fuckin love that story

I thought Chandler's line was actually "who cares?" which I think is funnier.

Isn't there some companion story of Hawks saying something to the effect that making that movie taught him that the plot didn't really have to make sense?

the studio thought the original was boring and made him do reshoots. the result capitalized on the bogart-bacall relationship but made less sense.

hawks continued to make films whose scripts were well-crafted by conventional standards.

later people began to interview this great maestro, this incomparable innovator of cinematic form, and he made up some stories that made him sound cool but don't really accord with the facts.

I'll buy that.

the original cut is on the US DVD and it gives an explanation for the chauffeur's death.

Anyone seen Nightmare Alley? I have seen most of the classics save, Detour and this. Think I like Kiss Me Deadly or Gun Crazy best.

Spent last week at the Noir City festival - always tremendous, especially with Eddie Muller's commentary.

nightmare alley is good, tyrone power trying to ditch the pretty boy rep

AFI Silver has just announced its 2019 Noir City DC lineup: https://silver.afi.com/Browsing/EventsAndExperiences/EventDetails/0000000010

Not sure yet which screenings I plan to attend, but a couple of them will be free co-presentations with the National Gallery of Art. And last year I liked Muller's intro to both versions of The Killers.