Directed by Christian Petzold Jerichow is a film about three people who are absolutely stuck. They are a middle-aged man, Ali (Hilmi Sözer), his younger wife Laura (Nina Hoss) and their new employee, Thomas (Benno Fürmann). This being a Christian Petzold film there is a baseline of isolation, meaning that a certain degree of loneliness … Continue reading Jerichow (2008)
film noir
Up in the Air (2009)
Directed by Jason Reitman Up in the Air is a feel good movie in part about the recession. One of the first images we see onscreen is of people fired, expressing dismay, fear, anger and the like in regards to being let go. Closing images will revisit many of those same people addressing how they … Continue reading Up in the Air (2009)
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)
Directed by Robert Wiene The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is one of those films that begins every Film School 101 course overview, along with films like Citizen Kane, Rear Window, Nosferatu, an Ingmar Bergman or two, Chinatown, and Battleship Potemkin. It might be easy to dismiss a film like this if only because it's so damn influential, also like Fritz Lang's Metropolis. … Continue reading The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)
Serenity (2019)
Directed by Steven Knight Serenity might just be bad. At least if you take it at face value it's certainly bonkers, however I think there's something under the surface here about the film noir genre as a whole, it's construction, absurdity and the degree to which such worlds and characters are almost parodies of our … Continue reading Serenity (2019)
Under the Silver Lake (2018)
Directed by David Robert Mitchell Myth is a constant theme in the three movies directed by David Robert Mitchell. Those three are The Myth of the American Sleepover, It Follows and now Under the Silver Lake. They are all a bit different, one a slice of life film about teenagers, another a horror film and this one a sort … Continue reading Under the Silver Lake (2018)
Alphaville (1965)
Directed by Jean-Luc Godard Alphaville imagines a grim future dominated by detrimental logic and a computer system with a voice that sounds as though it's been yanked from the death rattle of a long-time smoker. Combine that with the loud beeps, flashing lights and all around lack of personality of noir hero Lemmy Caution (Eddie … Continue reading Alphaville (1965)
The Yakuza (1974)
Directed by Sydney Pollack "A Yakuza pays his debts/A Yakuza does his duty/A man without debt/A man without duty/Is not a man." This is the song sung midway through Sydney Pollack's The Yakuza and which sums up the philosophy which guides the characters of the film. It's an eastern philosophy into which the western character, Harry Kilmer … Continue reading The Yakuza (1974)
Night Moves (1975)
Directed by Arthur Penn A film noir with shades of Robert Altman's The Long Goodbye and Roman Polanski's Chinatown, Night Moves is a Los Angeles-based detective story in which the private eye hero finds himself in over his head in a convoluted plot wherein nothing is as it seems. In contrast with those other two films, with finales … Continue reading Night Moves (1975)
City Heat (1984)
Directed by Richard Benjamin City Heat is a total dad movie. It stars Clint Eastwood and Burt Reynolds, doing very much Eastwood and Reynolds things, as lawmen mowing their way through prohibition era gangsters in studio backlots. Just about the whole thing takes place at night, like many films noir, but there is something decidedly … Continue reading City Heat (1984)
The Game (1997)
Directed by David Fincher In David Fincher's The Game, a lonely, powerful control freak loses control. He is Nicholas Van Orson (Michael Douglas), an investment banker who lives in a large mansion that only accentuates his isolation. When one of his employees wishes him a happy 48th birthday, he implies to his assistant that he should … Continue reading The Game (1997)
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