What The Hell Is Neo-Noir?

Drive: Image From IMDB

Introduction To Neo-Noir

The deep dark shadows and symbolic prison blinds have been replaced by graphic violence and vibrant colour. The hard boiled detective can remain, but more often than not now he’s gone through a metamorphosis. Still a loner against the world, but often without a badge. An ordinary citizen with an extraordinary will.

He’s aware of his isolation and lone wolf status, how the odds are always stacked against him, and how it’s still of his own doing. His quest will always be shrouded in moral ambiguity. But, the outcome is no longer a certainty. His actions and misgivings don’t necessarily have to be punished, although there won’t be a happy ending. He may no longer potentially have to pay for his crimes, but someone always has to.

As for the beautiful and dangerous femme fatale, she to has undergone change. Her job remains the same, to manipulate or corrupt the anti-hero. To ruin him, or claim him as her own. But her toolbox is bigger now. Sex is still a weapon, but it’s been upgraded and goes beyond a few seconds of kissing. The bedroom is as dangerous as the dockyards and the streets at night. She can even instigate the violence herself, although she still more often than not has more fun playing the men against each other. She will forever be their downfall.

The streets are bathed in neon or lit by sunshine, but they’re still not safe. Trouble lurks around every corner, in every shadow, somethings will never change. However, the assaults and murders are no longer brief or merely implied. Instead, they can be explicit bursts of ultra-violence, drowning the scene in crimson when once only a startled hand against the chest would suggest the outcome of  such a brutal encounter. The danger escalated by the vibrant atmosphere. The stylised colours. Black and white no longer protects the viewer from the graphic details and darkness.

Chinatown: Image From IMDB

Noir Without The Hays Code

Neo-Noir is Film Noir without the Hays Code. With the restrictions lifted. With sex and violence committed to film rather than left on the editing room floor. Bad guys can now get away with murder, but things are still never simple. Everyone still digs a bigger hole for themselves. Back stabbing and double crossing are rife. The rules have changed, yet the immoral motives remain.

Social decay and isolation remain at the forefront of the themes but are often presented differently. For every Walter Neff we now have a Travis Bickle. Their crimes may still be for a woman, but their violence feels decades apart. The graphic nature updated for an audience that exists beyond the reach of the former strict code.

The violence and sex however aren’t the only changes. With the lifted restriction comes a different style of film making. The black and white shadows and motifs replaced by urban landscapes or barren wastelands. Dutch Angles and long shadows swapped for gritty closeups and lingering oners. Overhead shots remain as they will forever feel dangerous.

Anything can be a Noir now, as long as your anti-hero is deeply flawed, lonely, and often doomed to fail. The old crime novels have been replaced. They remain classics, but the seventies, eighties, and beyond no longer needed The Maltese Falcon, if they wanted to look back they could do it with Jack in Chinatown or Russell in L.A Confidential. Updated with grit and colour, and without the criminals necessarily being brought to Justice.

“Forget it Jake, This is Chinatown,” could not exist under the watchful eye of the Hay’s code, but Gittes was fucked from the start in the new dark playground of Neo-Noir.

Fight Club: Image From IMDB

Evolution Of Neo-Noir

From the crime story beginnings of Film Noir a whole new subgenre has emerged, unrestricted and deeply cynical. With it comes new stories of morally compromised heroes. A History of Violence. Fight Club. No Country For Old Man. Drive. Aesthetically each looks different, with their plot’s going in wildly different directions, but they still all have anti-heroes facing tough choices. One’s that will shape their lives. There’s no such thing as a happy ending, the best you can hope for is to survive and try and carry on after the ordeal. But at least they can do that now without ending up dead or imprisoned.

Previously Tom Stall would not have been allowed to reunite with his kids. Nor could Tyler watch the city burn with the girl at his side. And how the fuck could Anton disappear without a trace after his kill crazy rampage? All those people. Llewelyn. Surely he should have been brought to justice by Tommy… but not any more.

And there’s no way Driver could be pronounced as a Real Hero.

Neo Noir is an evolution of Film Noir. An Update. Not necessarily better as Film Noir is an incredible genre containing some of the greatest movies ever made. Double Indemnity and Third Man could stand side-by-side with any Neo Noir. They’re equals. Different rules, but with the same corrupt principles. I’d have loved to have seen Strangers on a Train without the restraints. But equally, how badass would Fight Club have looked in Black and White?

The characteristics of its father genre are still all there. The anti-hero. The Femme Fatale. The atmosphere. The corruption. The moral ambiguity. The lone isolated and often confused characters. The violence and the sex (ramped up to 11) The cynical nihilism. It’s just all been updated for a modern audience with a more aggressive taste. And I’m thankful for both iterations, because Neo Noir has bought about some of the best movies of the last fifty years too.

Stephen