credit to format from other students 🙂
Question: How close can we actually define noir and/or neo-noir, and is it more a genre or a style of media? In the end, what is the true essence or energy of what noir is/means?
Subjects: I want to take a stab at defining noir in some sense. Personally, I view noir, at first in a literal sense: that being the French word for black. The “fun” part then is what I interpret what black means in a media sense. My personal conclusion is that it represents the dark, gritty, grim reality that life can be. When we view it under this perspective, it starts to open a lot of avenues of how we saw noir and how we now see neo-noir, especially in the sense of what media we can then now view as noir/neo-noir (and if things can have portions of the noir energy whilst not overall being regarded as a “noir film”.)
Readings: TBD. Maybe Borde-Chaumenton, Christopher, Place-Peterson, and one of the later readings, Naremore. (as per advice from Brett).
Films: TBD, I need films that both exemplify the dark grittiness of life in the most obvious sense, such a Pulp Fiction, to films that only have subtle hints or different portrayals of said grim life, but id have to perhaps look outside of the class.
Likely would do a podcast segmented into 3 parts:
1- Defining the Noir Soul. Further expanding from what my VE starts to cover, probably some recap and reconfiguring.
2- Examples/Applications of the Noir Soul. This segment would focus on the raw presentations of where I atleast find the Noir Soul present. This is where I might shake things up and present arguments for where the Noir Soul is possibly present despite general social consensus otherwise.
3-Associations of the Noir Soul. If I dont do the latter mentioned part of the 2nd segment, it’ll happen here. In addition, I’d take this segment as a means of possibly explaining my theories on how and why we associate things with Noir, what and why we associate certain things with Noir, and overall taking a stab at figuring what Noir means to us as a society.
This seems interesting as it’s a big question. I think an interesting thing to look at in contradiction to the word “noir” would be to look at neo-noir films like Pulp Fiction or the newest Batman. From what I’ve seen lots of neo-noir films seem to have a ton of visual vibrancy and color. Because this is such a big question, I would be tempted to make it a little more specific like looking at a specific area of noir.
This project proposal is very interesting to me because I have also questioned how similar noir and Neo Noir could be, but also what makes them different. I am interested to hear your take on this subject with the use of examples to extinguish between neo noir and noir. I also believe adding in core readings such as Borde-Chaumenton, Place-Peterson, and Chirstiopher would be beneficial to the foundation of the video essay in terms of clearly defining the core of noir genre, These authors have written extensively on noir and neo-noir, and their perspectives should provide useful insights to the argument. I also believe adding in maybe one or two contemporary films, as well as personal additions to which you could classify as noir / neo – noir that may be controversial or not. example: i watched Joker for the first time recently and really felt like it had lots of noir elements but I was not sure whether to actually classify it as a noir film.
Interesting question, considering how there’s disagreement on the topic. It’ll definitely produce a good video essay, and I’m excited to see your main argument versus counter-argument! For films. I’d maybe include Kiss Me Deadly, since the introduction (literally) is dark, taking place at night. Might be a nice segue into the definition of ‘noir.’ Are you going to be diving into the context of the time period, or the Haye’s codes? Very interesting topic.
Noir representing the dark, gritty and grim reality that life can be is the perfect way to describe the atmosphere. Movies that take me to that place that I would recommend are The Dark Night, Blade Runner, and Taxi Driver. Maybe you could also expand on how or if the characters are influenced by the setting or if the setting influences the characters.
I love your take on noir portraying the grim reality of life as this is something I also use to identify noir. I know it sounds silly but you might want to look at the “dark knight” batman movie. I think the main point to be made with it is the difference of grim and dark themes used in contrast to other super hero movies who have little resemblance to noir. Fits well as something that ” can have portions of the noir energy whilst not overall being regarded as a noir film “. because many would dispute batman being a noir. One thing you might have not thought of is how neo-noirs differ in the portrayal of the themes you mentioned because the umbrella is so big for what qualifies as neo-noir you might want to take a closer look at what qualifies as neo-noir for you.
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