Film Noir research

Film Noir is a term used in cinematic to describe a type of Hollywood crime dramas especially ones in which empathise cynical actions or sexual motivations. The period of the most popular film Noir films was from the early 1940's going on 1950's; from this era Film Noir is associated with the famous low-key black and white visual edits that has connections into the German Expressionist cinematography. Many of the stories created within this time era and much of the Film Noir attitude sourced from the school of crime fiction that emerged in the US during the great depression.

The term 'Film Noir' was created from the French as 'black film' as it was first used by a French critic Nino Frank in 1946 to apply to Hollywood films, however was ignored by most American Film professionals of this era.

Film Noir was originally associated with only American productions however films now are produced all over the world. Many pictures were released from the 1960's which share attributes towards Film Noir being the classical period of production and often can be seen as its conventions self referentially. Some people see the later day works as neo-noir. The cliches of film noir have been inspired to parody since the 1940's.

There have been many different plots to film noir such as the main character may be a private detective, a policeman, an ageing boxer, an unfortunate con artist, a naive individual pulled into a life of crime or a victim of circumstance. My plot is going to be leading a character of naivety and drug misuse (crime).

At the start of the year we were all put in groups and had to make our own small clip of a film noir film, this then inspired me as I wanted my film to come across as dramatic and intense as most film noir productions do. I want to also break conventions by linking the film noir style to a psychological thriller, as normally the films that film noir is linked to are femme fatal and crime. The low key lighting that is used in film noir I want to try and adopt with my interior shots to help build suspense and tension for my audience. I may also use a silhouette as a stylistic approach to present my villain to my audience.