The Noir Style [Hardcover]

Alain Silver (Author), James Ursini (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 6, 1999

The first illustrated book to capture the inimitable look and style of film noir

In The Noir Style, Alain Silver and James Ursini return to the subject for which they are famous, analyzing the look of film noir from the classic period (The Maltese Falcon in 1941 through Touch of Evil in 1958) through to the present day. Replete with sinister and scintillating black and white photos--both interior design shots that define the look of noir, and production stills from such noir gems as Out of the Past and The Killers--this book handsomely and uniquely illustrates the graphic impact of film noir, in images that practically speak for themselves.

The accompanying text explores noir's origins while devoting individual chapters to explorations of such classic noir motifs as Night and the City and the Deadly Female. A lavishly elegant book--10 x 11 format, four-color jacket, and duotone prints throughout--The Noir Style is the most engaging and informative addition to the literature of film in years.

Praise for Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference to the American Style:

"It's what you always want in a film reference book, but rarely find: comprehensive, intelligently organized, voluminously illustrated, and possessed of its own distinctive voice."

--Lawrence Kasdan

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Standard histories of film noir commence the coining of the term (which means "black film") by French writers in the years after the war when they saw a new mingling of grit, wit, and swooning Thanatos in movies like The Maltese Falcon and Double Indemnity. Alain Silver's and James Ursini's nearly libidinous collection of "duo-tone" (i.e., black and white) movie stills reaches far afield, finding noir's style radiating from the Brucke painters in the 1920s, Edward Hopper's wee-small-hours townscapes of the 1940s, and Weegee's bloody, beautiful photos. In page after oversized page, the authors park perceptive readings beside images of classic rainy streets (Underworld, USA, The Money Trap), doomy women in lipstick (Laura, Gilda), disturbed interiors (Sunset Boulevard), and wrenching ironies (DOA). The commentary reveals how light, frame, composition, body language, and a few other irreducibles charge individual scenes and contribute to the look of noir as a whole, beginning with gangster and horror films in the 1930s and closing with Silence of the Lambs in 1992. The texts lapse occasionally into heavy breathing about Meaning, but the authors invite us to get what we want from this most stylish of American movie genres by just flipping the pages. With hardly a cliché image in the bunch, we can eagerly fall afresh into Jane Russell's outstretched arms (in Macao), zoom down the black sidewalk stretching behind a dying John Garfield (in He Ran All the Way), and contemplate once more the tissue of lies between Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor in The Maltese Falcon. --Lyall Bush

Review

"A comprehensive definition of the noir look and its values . . . the commentary is wonderfully set off by 172 gorgeous black-and-white stills." (Elle)

"Smart text and great stills from the classic period . . . through the neo-noir films of the nineties. Perfect for a rainy night." (Helen Frangoulis, Playboy) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 248 pages
• Publisher: Overlook Hardcover; 1 edition (December 6, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0879517220
• ISBN-13: 978-0879517229
• Product Dimensions: 11.5 x 11 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #500,252 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Coffee Table Noir, May 3, 2003

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Noir Style (Hardcover)

A large, handsome book, suitably published in black and white. If you are a fan of the Noir genre, this belongs on your coffee table. The pictures, from the collections of the authors, are evocative of their milieu, illustrating the classic noir films of the 40's and 50's. There isn't quite as much information about each picture as I would like, and for a couple, such as the cover and frontspiece, no information at all. This book is a supplement to the Noir Readers of the authors, and as such, serves it's purpose well. Do not buy this as a text, but for illustrative purposes. Enjoy looking at the chilling dark dangerous ladies, the crooked cops, the doomed characters. Great pictures.

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Much More Than a Picture Book, March 11, 2000

By 

James Paris "Tarnmoor" (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Noir Style (Hardcover)

Aside from the knock-'em-dead beauty of the photographs from the great days of Film Noir, this is a book about the dark currents that run beneath the mainstream of urban life in America. Think of it as a spelunker's guide to the caverns of the American unconscious.

No, America cannot be explained by IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE or THE SONG OF MUSIC. To me, first you have to account for the pain of Orson Welles's corrupt sheriff in TOUCH OF EVIL; the ambiguity of Bogart's character from IN A LONELY PLACE; the darkness of Dana Andrews's detective in Preminger's WHERE THE SIDEWALK ENDS; the terrible descent of Tyrone Power in NIGHTMARE ALLEY.

These and other memories come welling up as I turn the pages of this wonderful book. Alain Silver and James Ursini have covered this same ground in other books, but with the aid of these images from the spiritus mundi of our misspent youths, it is like being hit in the head with a hammer. Good work, guys!

13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Poor production values sink the project, January 15, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: The Noir Style (Hardcover)

While the idea of having two of the most knowledgeable scholars of the noir film host a coffee-table art book on the topic sounds promising, the resulting product is heinously flawed. Despite the brevity of the text, a blocky font makes it difficult to read. The 'duotone' reproduction is achieved by imposing blue plate on the black plate--making vintage photographs resemble a poorly adjusted television screen. Further, the large reproductions merely expose the grain, scratches, and dust spots that any skilled retoucher could have removed. Pick up Mark Viera's SIN IN SOFT FOCUS: PRE-CODE HOLLYWOOD and see how this book should have looked.