American film noir is an American crimegangster and detectivemystery genre or moodstyle mostly from the 1940s and 1950s. This type of movie is in black and white, as the
mood will lose its effect if it is in color. For that reason, this kind of film is generally not colorized. This style of film has particular characteristics and attributes. Next, there are
various debates about whether noir is best classified as a genre or as a moodstyle. In examining the difficulties of classifying film noir according to certain standards
and traits, a comparison can be made with Michel Foucault, who wrote about the complexity of classifying biological organisms. “The biological classification systems attempt to tame
the wild profusion of existing things. The classical field of natural history is nothing more than the nomination of the visible. Everything that presents itself to our gaze is not
utilizable.”
3
He elaborates further by stating, “The very category of natural life is relative, like all the other categories, to the criteria one adopts. And also, like them, subject to certain
imprecisions as soon as the question of deciding its frontiers arises.”
4
Foucault’s points about grouping biological organisms, then, can be applied to noir as well, as noir changes and shifts
over time depending on the social and cultural factors that it interacts with. This quandary with classifying is evident in films like High Noon, Casablanca, Citizen Kane, among others,
which have varying noir characteristics but cannot be definitively put into a noir category by many film scholars and critics. Therefore, it is important to examine the generic categories
that are used to classify films as being noir or part of another mood, style, or genre, and realize that there may not be a perfect classification that can be applied to all noir films.
1.2 Noir as a Genre
3
Foucault, Michael. The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences. New York: Vintage Books, 1970, p.133.
4
Ibid. p.161.
There are various debates about whether noir is a genre or a moodstyle. According to Foster Hirsch, it is a genre because of various reasons. “A genre is determined by
conventions of narrative structure, characterization, theme, and visual design.”
5
Since noir meets the criteria of this definition, Hirsch considers it a genre. Hirsh elaborates further by
stating, Noir deals with criminal activity, from a variety of perspectives, in a general mood of
dislocation and bleakness which earned the style its name. Unified by a dominant tone and sensibility, the noir canon constitutes a distinct style of filmmaking; but it also
conforms to genre requirements since it operates within a set of narrative and visual conventions. Noir tells its stories in a particular way, and in a particular visual style.
The repeated use of narrative and visual structures certainly qualifies noir as a genre, one that is in fact as heavily coded as the Western.
6
Next, Aeon J. Skoble defines film noir as a genre with various stylistic conventions like “unsettling or otherwise odd camera angles, the dramatic use of shadow and light, hard-
boiled dialog, and settings that emphasize isolation and loneliness. Thematically, film noir is typically said to be characterized by moral ambiguity: murky distinctions between good guys
and bad guys, ambivalence about right and wrong, conflicts between law and morality, unsettling inversion of values, and so on.”
7
Additionally, Robert B. Pippin classifies film noir as “a group of films, called by some a genre, produced roughly between 1941 and sometime around the mid to late 1950s.
Many of what we now, still somewhat controversially call the ‘authors’ of these films, the directors, were European and some of the most important were very influenced by German
expressionist filmmaking.”
8
5
Conard, Mark. The Philosophy of Film Noir. Lexington: The University of Kentucky Press, 2006, p.9.
6
Hirsch, Foster. “The Dark Side of the Screen: Film Noir”, qtd in Conard, Mark. The Philosophy of Film Noir. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2006, p.10.
7
Skoble, Aeon J. “Moral Clarity and Practical Reason in Film Noir”, from Conard, Mark, The Philosophy of Film Noir. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2006, p.41.
8
Pippin, Robert B. Fatalism in American Film Noir: Some Cinematic Philosophy. Virginia: The University of Virginia Press, 2012, p.4.
Similarly, Read Mercer Schuchardt also considers noir to be a genre by commenting on the essential ingredients of noir themes as “a spiritual medium that moves and talks; the
discovery of a murder without the discovery of a corpse; power and dominance; a bleak, melancholic atmosphere; anxiety; dark lighting; action taking place in the city at night; foul
play; and moral ambivalence.”
9
Another perspective considers noir as being not a genre per se, but more between a genre and a mood or style. Kaplan considers noir films as a genre in terms of thematic
concern, narrative structure, iconography, etc., because there are a number of recognizable conventions in them.
10
However, Janey Place argues that, “Because of the highly specific visual style and narrative concerns of film noir, its relatively short period, and its appearance
at a historical moment of crisis post WWII, these films – rather than constituting a genre, which is rarely defined in terms of a recognizable visual style and whose conventions very
much bend with societal changes – instead represent a movement.”
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In countering Place’s argument, Christine Gledhill illustrates how traditional aspects of noir films have been
applied in conjunction with European films to match with modern topics. This particular trend within the thriller genre can be seen in other 70s films and can be
distinguished from the different permutations of the genre, of which Clint Eastwood’s police thrillers are an example. In other words, film noir can perhaps better be seen as
a sub-genre or a generic development emerging from the earlier gangster genre than is a genre by itself.
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1.3 Noir as a MoodStyle
