Noir and white

"Great Noir poses the question, 'why me?'", Errol Morris said it right, why me? Just like in The Postman always rings twice Frank is confronted with that question when he first meets Cora and hell starts breaking lose when the failed murder attempt on her husband's life. Same goes with L.A Confidential  where Edmund is stuck in a department were there's dirty cops everywhere and he's the only one looking for true justice. Why me? it's the age old question, when bad things happen everyone thinks why them not someone else.

A women that has here eyes on the big picture, she wants more than what she has, someone who can control men by just looking at them, a black widow of film, the femme fatale. Cora was a woman that wanted to make something out of herself and make something out of their business. Men feared women in power, who can do things for themselves yet still at frail and innocent while possessing those "Bedroom eyes". And once they get what they want they'll turn on your to clear their name and to get rid of you.


I believe that the main aspect to Noir films is the contrast between black and white, and i'm sure many will agree. Because of the time the films were mainly black and white and starting off Noir films were B-movies. Which worked for the films, having to shoot on location, using whatever lighting there was on set and adding a few portable lights. L.A Confidential Gave the Noir style a good shot and pulled it off pretty well, but there's just something about the old black and white films that was more extreme on lighting and even the acting, maybe a bit corny at times but still great. Color films in a way were an end to Noir, the contrast was a bit hard to get those extremes when you're working with more than just two colors. noir kinda reminds me of Japanese comics (Manga), pretty much a black and white comic book that knows how to utilize the two colors.

Diegesis This

In L.A. Confidential a surprise moment was when the police chief shoots Jack after tell him about finding the dead bodyguards body under the old woman's house, where as suspense would be waiting for the gun fight to begin at the end of the movie. Surprise moments are usually loud, to catch the audience and the characters off guard, that is the meaning of surprise after all. Another example is when Cora is trying to kill her husband, in The Postman Always Rings Twice, and a cat jumps onto the electrical wire outside the house blowing the power out. And suspense was being built during the car ride to attempt to kill her husband again, this time driving to a cliff and getting him drunk to make it look like an accident. Often Suspense is when you know something is gonna happen, or have an idea of what's going to happen, and the scene slowly makes it's way to that conclusion putting the audience on the edge of their seat to seat what they thought come true. There are rare occasions where suspense is being built and suddenly a surprise twist will happen and change the films path.

Non-Diegesis is sounds or music that come from Narrioation, or music which doesn't come from the film's world and can not be heard by the characters.  Non-Diegesis examples is when the sappy love music played when Frank Kissed Cora in The Postman Always Rings Twice and also the transition music L.A. Confidential. Diegesis is Sounds or music that comes from the film, like the radio being turned on in the car (The Postman Always Rings Twice) or the Police radio (L.A. Confidential)

My recipe for a great movie

Movies need to impact the viewer, give them something to connect to and even inspire something deep within them. Here's a list of movie ingredients that I notice in movies i find great in my mind.

A Good lead Actor/Actress: Sometimes movies are based on a sole person's performance that brings the story to life and makes a human connections with the viewer. There are always exceptions to this rule, but most the time it's when a supporting Actor/Actress just has a more interesting character (example: Christen Bale in The Fighter) and it's often not the lead's fault, it's just the writing.

Good Story Acing: Movies need to have a good pace to them, or else they audience will start to get bored by the slow pace of the movie. (Examples of good pacing: True Grit, The Karate Kid [2010], Unstoppable, Toy Story 3, The King's Speech, The Social Network)

A Good Director: The Director has to know what shots work for certain situations and which don't. Often i see movies with shaky camera movements when it's just two people sitting and talking (Example: The bar scene in Star Trek where a young Kirk is talking to Pike, after a fight) One of my favorite Directors are Steven Spielberg, Edgar Wright, Clint Eastwood, Quentin Tarantino, Hayao Miyazaki, Guillermo del Toro  .

Good Visuals: Whether it's computer graphics or just the scene the scene is in, it has to be stunning. Visuals that when you see them you think "Wow, that's cool". (Example of Good Computer Graphics: Wall-e, Final Fantasy- The Spirits Within, and most Pixar films) (Examples is live action visuals: The King's Speech, True Grit, Unbreakable, Million Dollar Baby, The Godfather, Hellboy 1/2) (Examples of Drawn Visuals: Anything done my Hayao Miyazaki)

Two Movies I love are The Big Lebowski and Predator. Both Movies are complete opposites, but have some of the ingredients i enjoy in a movie. Both have Good main Actors, Jeff Bridges and Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jeff is more of a laid back slacker as Arnold is a Man's man Commander afraid of nothing. The Visuals in both are stunning, from the Drug induced musical in The Big Lebowski to the jungles of Central America in the Predator. It's strange to compare movie from two different genre and like both equally.