Double Indemitity In The Film Noir Film

The Maltese Falcon is a successful noir detective film from 1941. The success of the film is due to the internal actions that are accurately portrayed with cinematic composition. It consists of four goals that good directors keep in mind when filming. The techniques of keeping the image in motion, directing attention to the most important object, and the illusion of depth help the audience to focus on the important aspects of the film that overall create a suspenseful and emotional noir film experience. Directing attention to the object of greatest significance is essential in a film in order to show the audience what to focus on or pay attention to.

However, in the 1920s, a new era of crime fiction arose: American hard-boiled crime fiction. In this type of crime fiction, a sense of “graphic sex and violence, vivid but often sordid urban backgrounds, and fast-paced, slangy dialogue” is added to the environment (“Hard-boiled dectective…” Ralph Willet). In the Maltese Falcon, a film adaptation of Dashiell Hammett’s the Maltese Falcon, Sam Spade is presented with a case to find Ruth Wonderly (who later turns

“Double Indemnity” is a film noir by Billy Wilder. He directed this movie in 1944, during World War II. This movie’s main sound was a extra-diegetic sound. A voiceover was used for Walter Neff to show his point of view and thoughts of the actions he committed. Wilder, also, did the voiceover to show that Walter wanted to tell the story to his good friend, Barton Keyes.

Film noir is a style of filmmaking that began after World War 2, and it focused on darker themes and settings. Most commonly, this style of film is set in a city with rampant crime and corruption, with the characters and protagonist being morally ambiguous. Where the sidewalk ends was created in this style with its stylistic choices and its focus on settings with police corruption, an anti-hero protagonist, and a femme fatale. The film Where the Sidewalk Ends directed by Otto Preminger is a film noir that was praised for its even grittier take on this style of filmmaking.

This investigation will answer the question to what extent did the Cold War influence pop culture during the 1950’s and 1960’s in the United States? This question is important because it’s based during the Cold War which was a time in history that was characterized by extreme hostilities between the U.S and USSR for over forty years. Amidst this time of superpowers vying for nuclear supremacy, pop culture was a major factor that emerged during this time that impacted both societies. Pop culture, particularly, American films, had an impact on Russian society. The scope of this investigation will focus only on U.S films shown in the Soviet Union.

All of these conflicts created white suburbanization with the help of film noir and places like Disneyland. In his essay “Popular Culture in the age of white flight”, Eric Avila states that film noir and Disneyland caused a cultural transformation after World War II (3). Film noir showed the social disorder of the city and Disneyland created the suburban order that promised to remove people from the chaos of the city. This of course only catered to the white middle and upper class families. Film noir used the techniques of shadows and lighting to show the dark dismal world of crime and violence that the early to mid-twentieth century represented.

The two films, Double Indemnity (1944) and Body Heat (1981), are both very similar even with the thirty-seven year gap between them. In Double Indemnity, Walter Neff, an experienced salesman for his local insurance company, meets the seductive wife of one of his clients, Phyllis Dietrichson. They have an affair and quickly decide to kill Mrs. Dietrichson’s husband so she can collect the proceeds of the accident insurance policy and be with Walter Neff. Neff comes up with a plan to kill her husband and to also receive twice the amount based on a double indemnity clause. The police believe it was an accidental death, but the insurance analyst and Neff’s best friend, Barton Keyes, believe there is more to the story.

Over the fifteen weeks of the first semester of film school, we were taught many interesting types and styles of early world cinema which were extremely informative and influenced the filmmaking style of the whole class and made us better filmmakers instantly. One such ‘ism’ which inspired me the most was German Expressionism which is a unique characteristic of Weimar Cinema. In this essay I am going to talk about the history of this ‘ism’, its impact on cinema, some significant works and how it inspired me and influenced my filmmaking style. German Expressionism is one of the earliest artistic genres to influence filmmaking, and one that ostensibly prepared for some other cutting edge artistic styles and techniques. It is an artistic genre

The movie "On the Waterfront" is an example of Film Noir which literally means black or dark film. Movies like this were more serious and explored more realistic and depressing subject matters. The movie was mainly about the struggle of the working longshoremen in Hoboken, New Jersey against the gangsters who bullied and extorted money from them. The protagonist of the movie is Terry Malloy.

The Godfather potrays the aftermath of World War II in a dark and cynical way. Depressing alleys, jazz music and long

As opposed to older crime genres there is a significantly more sceptical look at human values and the outcomes in conflicts. As happened with a lot of film in the 1970’s Coppolas’ godfather movies were created in an almost nostalgic way, hinting back to the earlier days of Hollywood cinema. The films also have five acts rather than the three used stereotypical Hollywood films. He uses underexposed imagery rendered darker than the norm, which was considered old style and uncultured of the time.

INTRODUCTION “We conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place.” -Chief Justice Earl Warren Separate But Equal, directed by George Stevens Jr, is an American made-for-television movie that is based on the landmark Brown v. Board of Directors case of the U.S. Supreme court which established that segregation of primary schools based on race, as dictated by the ‘Separate but Equal’ doctrine, was unconstitutional based on the reinterpretation of the 14th amendment and thus, put an end to state-sponsored segregation in the US. Aims and Objectives:

The Godfather (1972) is said to be one of the greatest films ever made. When this movie was released in 1972, it was nominated for Ten Academy Awards and it won three: Best Picture, Best Actor and Best Adapted Screenplay. The film was adapted from the book with the same name written by award winning author of mafia fiction, Mario Puzo. This film takes place in a span of ten years following the life of Don Corleone, the head of the Corleone Crime Family. It was a film that changed the history of cinema, introducing a very talented filmmaker and several acting legends in the telling of a story of a Sicilian Crime Family.

German Expressionism has influenced thousands of films and filmmakers since the art movement began in the 1920’s. It is known for its dismissal of the standard conventions of Western filmmaking for a more off-kilter style of storytelling. Some film historians consider Metropolis (1927) to be one of the most groundbreaking German Expressionist films ever made. However, there are many instances throughout Metropolis in which it deviates from the eccentric Expressionist style. There are many obvious occurrences of expressionism during Metropolis, for example the opening machine sequence, but conventional Western techniques are also common in the film.

American detective fiction is no longer the mirror being discussed, and instead, it is a backdrop. The purpose of the article is to prove American detective fiction’s worth, as well as how and why it should be analyzed; the claim is that taking the genre seriously and studying it reveals cultural and societal views of the eras to which each work belongs. If proving the qualities of American detective fiction is the focus, then the spy fiction tangent is a side note at