The right fan comes to mind with Los Angeles, a play of shadows, seductive manipulators, and tough men in long coats with a cigarette between their lips and very bad weather. Titles such as Death Lock, Touch of Evil, Chinatown, Taxi Driver or Drive will also mean the right movie fan. You can get the best of the lot from 123Movies.

But can all these cult films be packed into the film noir box? It depends. Film noir is a phenomenon that is difficult to define. Critics still dispute whether it is a genre or just a style. You can find these films in the databases under the thriller or crime column. It would probably not matter. But film noir is so popular that new publications, blogs, and even festivals are being created about it since last year one of them has been running in our country, under the name Noir Film Festival.

Death fuse

If you are also fascinated by these originally fallen movies, you should know that film noir is actually passé and since 1958. Here it is necessary to brush up the terms. You will come in handy with other cinefils. Or they can impress your hipster friends.

Film noir in its original form was created during World War II in response to depression and anxiety. That’s why these films are so cynical and pessimistic and also misogynist because women during the war and after it did better financially than men. This is how the femme fatale was born so that men could take revenge on women at least on screen. The classic plot was that the main character, most often an anti-hero, had the femme fatale, beautiful and calculating, seduced by crime. The antihero could be a detective, a war veteran, or a gangster and a crook. The criminal plot belonged to almost every noir. Likewise, corruption, depression, disillusionment or paranoia and also violence and sex, though greatly subdued by censorship, which was really strict in the USA in the 1940s and 1950s.

Still, the noir films were harsh for the audience. John Huston, director of the famous Maltese Falcon said: “I do not think God was dead, rather drunk.” Perhaps it seems even the declaration of noir films. Or it is simply possible that Los Angeles where they most often take place is simply ignored by God.

It is believed that the first true film noir was the Maltese Falcon (1941) and the last Touch of Evil (1958) by Orson Welles. Anything then falls into the post noir box. This term can be divided into several others. Retro-noir tries to imitate as closely as possible the noir of the forties and fifties. They also take place at that time. This industry only proves how loved and popular the film noir is today.

Taxi driver

In contrast, neo-noir often mistaken for post noir pays tribute to this style as its inspiration. Stories and stylization are strongly inspired by the noir, but set in the present. Perhaps the most rewarding example is Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver (1976). Post noir retains the tradition of political overtones and the depiction of the corrupt “mysterious” society. There is always someone or something that needs to be pointed. The advantage of post noir is that censorship no longer has as much power as before. So it is not necessary to save money on sex and violence on the contrary.