The Gold Coast Section

     The story I found most difficult to classify as noir was "The Hour When The Ship Comes In". One reason that it was difficult to classify as noir was the fact there was no clear femme fatale.  It was more like a crime show from the criminals point of view. It just told about the crimes they did. I could not find a motive behind what they did other than drugs.
     The one I found easiest to classify as noir was "The Girl Who Kissed Barnaby Jones".  It had the ambiguous protagonist, Barnaby Jones. It had the femme fatale, Cherie. It also had the victim, Gary. It starts off similar to most noir style writings. It has the ambiguous protagonist at work describing what he does for a living. Then he gets the call from the femme fatale to come over. When he gets there one of the first things the writer does it describes the femme fatale. He describes her like this, "Cherie is the ur-cocktail waitress, tall and leggy with hair dyed blond, hanging straight with an inward flip just below her jawline, and looking at her face and body you wouldn't take her for more than forty." (Hamilton 288). It focuses on her looks and nothing else. Another thing that makes it like noir is that Barnaby Jones gets that gut instinct that something is wrong when she ask him to help her, just like Walter Huff did. He describes it like this, "I have the uneasy presentiment that what she wants me to do is something horrible ..." (Hamilton 293).  Then instead of leaving he stays to find out what it is. The final thing that makes it like noir is that in the end the femme fatale gets away with it.

What is a Protagonist?

The two main characters in “The Kidnapper Bell” and “City of Commerce” are very similar. They are both married men and lead double lives. So what is a protagonist in neo-noir? To me a protagonist in neo-noir is someone who is married. If they are not married, they are in a committed relationship. They lead a secret life that they keep hidden from their significant other. What they have waiting for them when they get home is not enough for them so they go out and form another life to get their fix. They tend to be into drugs, alcohol, sex, or a combination of those three. They do not like staying in one place for to long. Because of this they tend to leave when things get serious and abandon of way of life to start another. They lie to the person they are with. They tell them they are going to one place when in reality they are going to do something completely different. They answer to no one. They keep the things they did why they were away from there partner a secret from everybody else. They have moments of regret but they do not last for long. They have to stay focused on the task at hand. They can not dwell on what they did because they have to stay calm so that they do not get caught. Finally, they lie to themselves so they do not have to admit the truth of what they have done.

Female Protagonist and Narrator

Having a female as both the protagonist and the first-person narrator gave you a different motive for the reason she killed. In Double Indemnity where we see a man kill we know what it is for. We expect it. Walter Huff kills the husband so that he can have his wife. In “The Method” she has a different reason for murder. One that kept me guessing to the very end. She did it because he used her. She did it for revenge. Other than having a different motive for the killing it also does not have the same sexual tension that Double Indemnity had between Walter Huff and Phyllis Nirdlinger. In “The Method” there was a sexual relationship between Holly and Richard, but they did not have to keep it a secret in the same way that Walter Huff and Phyllis Nirdlinger did. In fact you did not even know it had to be a secret until almost the end. Then you find out that Richard and the lady that Holly was renting a room from used to be a couple. I would still consider this to be noir. It still has the protagonist and still is telling is from their perspective. One thing that is different in “The Method” though is that Holly changes from what she originally planned to do. She originally planned on taking things from the former actress that she rented from. That planned changed as she got to know her and found out that her and Richard used to be a couple. When she found out that Richard was just using her. Then she decided to kill Richard for revenge.

Blog 7

One way the genre has been updated is that in”Dangerous Days” by Emory Holmes II is that we a mix of different races instead of just whites. In Double Indemnity it was very censored. They did not cuss. They did not openly talk about drinking. We see the complete opposite in “Dangerous Days”. They openly talk about drinking. In “Dangerous Days” one example of this is, “The two men drank in Cravitz’s conference room overlooking 43rd. The potent cactus brew was thick and cool and sweet, and Cravitz was genuinely thrilled to have a taste of the fabled Mexican moonshine.” (Hamilton, 55). We see that they not only bring up the fact that they are drinking, but also they go on to describe it. Another thing about Double Indemnity is that they never come out and say that Phyllis Nirdlinger and Walter Huff are doing anything more than kissing, but it is implied. In “Dangerous Days” I already mentioned that they cussed but they also talk about sex openly. An example were you can see this clearly in “Dangerous Days” is, “ “Oh, he fuckin’ somebody’s boyfriend then. Somethin’ up,” Cash said, then dropped the subject.” (Hamilton, 61). These are some ways the the genre has been updated. One thing we learn about neo-noir in “The Dark Past Returns: Gender Themes in Neo-Noir” by Heather Fireman is the the femme fatale is not punished. We see this in “Midnight in Silicon Alley”. His wife Leila was behind of everything that happened to him and at the end she drove away into the sunset. 

Neo-Noir VS Film Noir

Film Noir and Neo-Noir seem very much alike. They deal with the ambiguous protagonist, the detective and the femme fatale. In “The Dark Past Keeps Returning: Gender Themes in Neo-Noir” they tell the difference really good. They say, “Neo-noirs of the late twentieth century exist in a postmodern frame of mind. Most noir is modernist and tries to find truth and make sense of a warped world. In postmodernism, the world is too warped and incomprehensible, and our access to it is so flawed that we cannot make sense of it.” In Neo-Nor we see a change in gender rules. We used to see the man go to work and the woman stay home and take of the kids. In Neo-Nor we see the women take charge and make a living for there family while the men stay home and look after the kids. Neo-Noir deals with a lot of post-modernism. Post modernism is best described in “The Dark Past Keeps Returning: Gender Themes” as, “Postmodernism confuses and compresses space and time. In the postmodern era, satellites, cable TV, and the internet create a global village, in which we can instantaneously be anywhere or anytime.” There is no linearity in Neo-Noir. While Neo-Noir stays with the basic concept of Film Noir, it also makes a name for itself. It goes on its own timeline. Not everything happens in sequence like we see in Film Noir. One last thing that really changes in Neo-Noir is the femme fatale. She gets off scott free. No justice for what she has done. Instead a get out of jail free card to go and do it again.

Film Analysis of Double Indemnity

The article I chose you use was Masculine Impairment in Double Indemnity and The Last Seduction by Kerry E. Bogert. One of the things I noticed in the film and that Kerry E. Bogert brought up was how when Phyllis came down the stairs the camera first only pictured her feet and then when she got to the bottom it finally showed us her face. Kerry E. Bogert says, “She is immediately sexualized, and we know she will be the cause of Walter’s demise. Her slow descent down the stairs foreshadows her own demise as well.” When I saw this part of the film it stuck out to me because of the anklet on her ankle, because that is one of the first things Walter pointed out when he met her. I see how she says that it sexualized her because instead of focusing on what she had to say, it focused on her looks. I like how she compared her coming down the stairs slowly to the way she will eventually meet her own ending. Kerry E. Bogert also mentions the man in the beginning of the film on crutches coming towards the camera. Kerry E. Bogert says, “When we are first introduced to Walter, he is nothing more than a shadowy figure on crutches. Hobbling slowly towards the screen, he is a physical manifestation of his own internal weakness.” I think this describes Walter very well. He is physically capable, as we see when he kills Phyllis’s husband and eventually Phyllis. Emotionally though he is a mess. Going back between good and evil. Eventually falling completely to the evil side.