Near Noirs
Near Noir
Those somewhat darker, sometimes sleazier, Black & White Films mostly of the Fifties and Sixties and beyond, that didn't necessarily have a crime angle involved, but were shot entirely or partly in a seemingly very Noir-ish style, characteristics that separate them from the majority of Dramas, Romances, and Comedies of the late1950's-1960's. Films that I get a gut feeling for that seem to be sui generis. Its as if at the end of the true Classic Noir cycle these films continued on dark tendrils of smoke and fog. Spencer Selby lists a few of these in Appendix A in "Dark City" as Off Genre & Black & White Post Noirs
The three Key Properties, they always seem to be:
1.) Almost always filmed in Black & White and usually contemporary to their times.
2.) Use various degrees of Noir-ish lighting and Dutch angles.
3.) Not considered true Noirs or sometimes questioned as being Noir.
The Rest:
4.) May or may not have a crime angle but subject matter is usually Dark and Post Code, can have adult content, overly sexual, ominous, even mildly purient, and they can be a sour, and bitingly satiric parable on the corruption of the American Dream or Myth.
5.)Are as likely to have a Homme Fatale as a Femme Fatale and/or both. The main conflict can sometimes be internal within the main character (the result of stress, insanity, addiction) rather than with outside world.
6.) Can be hybrid in Genre having elements of Drama, Horror, Mystery, Thriller, Western, Exploitation, and even Biography Films.
A trial Balloon List of Near Noirs ((I know they are all Black & White, but don't remember if they all had Noir Lighing or Dutch angles) some may only have Near Noir segments but again enough of a segment to separate them from the mainstream. Also there may be more Foreign titles out there that may fit it.
"Mr. Buddwing"
"Requiem For a Heavyweight"
"A Streetcar Named Desire"
"The Fugitive Kind"
"On The Waterfront"
"The Hustler"
"Baby Doll"
"Walk on the Wild Side"
"Anatomy of a Murder"
"Le salaire de la peur"
"La Strada"
"The Pawnbroker"
"Night Of The Iguana"
"Cape Fear"
"The Manchurian Candidate"
" Days of Wine And Roses"
"Shock Corridor"
"The Naked Kiss"
"Hud"
"Your Cheatin' Heart"
"I Want to Live!"
"A Face in the Crowd "
"Psycho"
"Lonely Are The Brave"
"The Misfits"
"Carnival Of Souls"
"Raging Bull"
"Lenny"
Possible Color Candidates ?
"Peeping Tom"
"The Rat Race"
"BUtterfield 8"
"Sweet Bird Of Youth"
"Splendor in The Grass"
"Elmer Gantry"
"Cat On A Hot Tin Roof"
"Picnic"
Since I've been contemplating this for a while I've done some research and compiled a list of Directors of those films that gave me the initial gut feeling and found that they personally either had a background in Classic Noir or a background in early Live Television Theater, or that their Directors of Photography did. Questionable entrants marked with a (?)
Director Films & TV
Delbert Mann Near Noir - Mr. Budwing (1966), The Outsider (1961), Marty (1955)
- Playhouse 90, Goodyear Playhouse, Omnibus,
Producers Showcase, Playwrights ‘56, Philco-Goodyear
Television Playhouse, Schlitz Playhouse, Masterpiece Playhouse
Robert Wise Noirs - Born To Kill (1947), The Set-Up (1949), The House on
Telegraph Hill (1951), The Captive City (1952), Odds Against
Tomorrow (1958) Near Noir - Somebody Up There Likes Me
(1956), I want to Live (1958), Two For the Seesaw (1962)
Ralph Nelson Near Noir - Requiem For a Heavyweight (1962) Playhouse 90,
Medallion Playhouse, G.E. True Theater, The Plymouth
Playhouse
Elia Kazan Noir - Panic In The Streets (1950) Near Noir - A Streetcar
Named Desire (1951), On The Waterfront (1954),
Baby Doll (1956), A Face In The Crowd (1957)
Sidney Lumet Near Noir - The Fugitive Kind (1960), The Pawnbroker (1964)
Kraft Theater, Hallmark Hall Of Fame, Playhouse 90
Robert Rosen Noirs - (writer - Out Of The Fog (1941),Blues in The Night
(1941),The Strange Loves of Martha Ivers (1946) director -
Johnny O’clock (1947), Body And Soul (1947) Near Noir - The
Hustler (1961)
Edward Dmytryk Noirs- Murder My Sweet (1944), Cornered (1945), Crossfire
(1947), The Hidden Room (1949), The Sniper (1952)
Near Noir - Walk On The Wild Side (1962)
Otto Preminger Noirs - Laura (1944), Fallen Angel (1945), Whirlpool (1949),
Where The Sidewalk Ends (1950), The 13th Letter (1951),
Angel Face (1952), Near Noir - The Man with the Golden Arm
(1955), Anatomy of A Murder (1959)
Henri Georges Clouzot Noir- Diabolique (1955) Near Noir - Le salaire de la peur
(Wages of Fear) (1953)
Martin Ritt Noir- Edge of the City (1957) Near Noir - Hud (1963) Plymouth
Playhouse Somerset Maugham Theater
Alfred Hitchcock Noirs- Suspicion (1941), Saboteur (1942), Shadow of a Doubt
(1943), Spellbound (1945), Notorious (1946), Strangers On A
Train (1951), I Confess (1953), The Wrong Man (1956) Near
Noir- Psycho (1960) Vertigo (1958) ?
J. Lee Thompson Near Noirs- Cape Fear (1961) * (director of photography Sam
Leavitt Noirs - The Thief (1952), Crime in the Streets (1956)
Near Noirs - Man with the Golden Arm (1955), The Defiant Ones
(1958), The Crimson Kimono (1959), Johnny Cool (1963)?)
John Frankenheimer Near Noir - The Manchurian Candidate (1962) Playhouse 90 *
(director of photography Lionel Lindon Noirs - The Blue Dahlia
(1946), Quicksand (1950), The Sun Sets At Dawn (1950), The
Turning Point (1952), Hell’s Island (1955) Near Noir - I Want to
live (1958) )
Blake Edwards Noir - Experiment in Terror (1962) Near Noir- Days Of Wine &
Roses (1962)? Peter Gunn, Richard Diamond, Private Eye, Mr.
Lucky, Ford Television Theater, Four Star Playhouse
Samuel Fuller Noirs - Pickup on South Street (1953), House of Bamboo
(1955) The Crimson Kimono (1959), Near Noirs- Shock Corridor
(1963), The Naked Kiss (1964)
John Huston Noirs - The Maltese Falcon (1941) Key Largo (1948), The
Asphalt Jungle (1950) Near Noirs - The Misfits
(1961), Night Of the Iguana (1964)
Roman Polanski Near Noirs - Knife in the Water (1962), Repulsion (1965) Neo
Noir - Chinatown (1974) Frantic (1988) ?,Bitter Moon (1992) ?
Michael Powell Near Noir - Peeping Tom (1960)?
Sydney Pollack Near Noir- They Shoot Horses Don’t They (1969)? Bob Hope
Presents Chrysler Theater, Kraft Suspense Theater
Leonard Kastel Near Noir - The Honeymoon Killers (1969)
Herk Harvey Near Noir - Carnival Of Souls (1962)
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