Film Noir | What is it?

For my work I am very interested in the style of film noir, and using moving image to portray my narrative, I like how these films are very Atmospheric, by doing this it adds something more to the image and gives a stronger idea of what the characters may be experiencing through the film whether it be using this or dialogue.

Film Noir began in the 1940's when inspired by numerous screenplays being written based around crime fiction. The storytelling was highly stylized and very theatrical. Often the imagery used within Film Noir was taken from the earlier era of German expressionist cinema as many of the early noir film directors came from Germany to Hollywood. Film Noir explores various chapters covering many themes such as physiological, lovers planning murders corrupt policemen etc. This style film was admired by many and audiences responded to the more adult orientated type of film certainly by end of the second world war. In 1946 the films were recognised for being visibly darker than your average film and much more cynical for this reason they were given the title of "Film noir" its literal translation being "Black film". It is still heavily debated whether film noir is a film genre in its own right, however a style of film consisting of doomed romanticism, lost innocence, corrupt cops etc is still generalised in this way today.

Despite being popular and being used a lot, This is the sort of theme I would like my story to take, I feel it would fit well with the brief, given that the nature of these style of working are quite mysterious without giving too much away, From this I will continue my research into film noir and the styling of how to place together my narrative.

Some Popular Noir Films:

• Double Indemnity
• Gun Crazy
• Touch of Evil
• Kiss me Deadly
• Blood Simple
• The Big sleep

Part of Double Indemnity, directed by Billy Wilder  in 1944

Initial Idea

Since my first lecture I've had my mind set on doing a short film as my digital part of this unit, As the film industry is something I would like to go into I thought it would fit well for my CV as well as give myself some experience with using a film camera as well as my DSLR.
I am very interested in the film style of Film Noir I like how the films are very atmospheric and dramatic, the monochrome adds a little more to the film which is what I would like to incorporate into my work.

General Idea's from first Lecture:

• Film Noir style film for my digital piece
• Use film stills to create my photographs?
• Images will be in style of film noir
• Black and White shoot
• splashes of colour?
• Sin City - Film style / Graphic Novel
• Short film
• Collaborate with film students

From this point I will use these bullet points to further my research into each area and hopefully come up with a more thorough plan of what I would like to do for both the digital and printed pieces.