Genre Research

Film Noir:

A style or genre of cinematographic film marked by a mood of pessimism, fatalism and menace.
( Concise Oxford Dictionary. Published 2001 by Oxford University Press.Inc, New York )

The classic era of film noir is usually dated to a period between the early 1940s and the late 1950s. Typically American crime dramas or psychological thrillers, films noir had a number of common themes and plot devices, and many distinctive visual elements. Characters were often conflicted antiheroes, trapped in a difficult situation and making choices out of desperation or nihilistic moral systems. Visual elements included low-key lighting, striking use of light and shadow, and unusual camera placement.
( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo_noir )

Existing movies of this genre:

The Maltese Falcon; Double Indemnity; The Big Sleep; Sunset Boulevard; The Third Man.
( http://digitaldreamdoor.nutsie.com/pages/movie-pages/movie_film_noir.php )

Conventions of a film noir movie:

Film noir is not a genre that I am particularly familiar with. To see more of this genre and learn the conventions I watched the movie ‘The Big Sleep’. Downbeat, black themes are generally shown in the form of detective and crime films. The film noir period was generally that between the 1940’s and early 1950’s, following the war. A wide range of films reflected the resultant tensions and insecurities of the time period. Fear, mistrust, bleakness, loss of innocence, despair and paranoia are readily evident in noir films with the endings rarely happy or optimistic.

Very often, a film noir story was developed around a cynical, hard-hearted, disillusioned male character who encountered a beautiful but promiscuous, amoral, double-dealing and seductive ‘femme fatale’. She would use her feminine wiles and alluring sexuality to manipulate him into becoming the fall guy; often following a murder. After a betrayal or double-cross, she was frequently destroyed as well, often at the cost of the hero's life.

Film noir films were marked visually by expressionistic lighting, deep-focus or depth of field camera work, disorienting visual schemes, jarring editing or juxtaposition of elements, ominous shadows, skewed camera angles (usually vertical or diagonal rather than horizontal), circling cigarette smoke, existential sensibilities, and unbalanced or moody compositions.
Settings were often interiors with low-key (or single-source) lighting, venetian-blinded windows and rooms, and dark, claustrophobic, gloomy appearances. Exteriors were often urban night scenes with deep shadows, wet asphalt, dark alleyways, rain-slicked or mean streets, flashing neon lights, and low key lighting. Story locations were often in murky and dark streets, dimly-lit and low-rent apartments and hotel rooms of big cities, or abandoned warehouses.