Film Noir: Intellectual Origins

2. Film Noir: Intellectual Origins • “God is Dead” -- Frederich Nietzsche • The philosophy of noir has been linked to the European literary and philosophical movement known as Existentialism, though frequently when commentators use that term, it's less with the writings of Sartre and Camus in mind than as a stand-in for ideas like “absurdity” and “alienation.” The overarching theme of film noir is that life is meaningless.

3. Film Noir Noir visual style comes from the jagged geometries of German Expressionism as exemplified by Edgar G. Ulmer, the émigré director of the stark low-budget 1945 classic “Detour,” and F. W. Murnau director of the classic 1921 Dracula film “Nosferatu” who said in 1928, “I think films of the future will use more and more of these 'camera angles', or, as I prefer to call them, these 'dramatic angles.' They help photograph thought.” F.W. Murnau (1888-1931) F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu (1921).

4. American Film Noir • Other key directors in the genre include Billy Wilder, Fritz Lang, Otto Preminger, Jacques Tourneur, and Alfred Hitchcock. • They brought to their work a familiarity with European art and culture and a skeptical view of the American ideals of pluralism, egalitarianism, and self-improvement. Wilder, for example, treats middle-class aspirations and lust with mordant wit in Double Indemnity (1944) and Sunset Boulevard (1950), and Hitchcock brings scathing irony to his portraits of small-town families in Shadow of a Doubt (1943), Manhattan sophisticates in the Leopold and Loeb variation Rope (1948), and patriotic intelligence agents in Notorious (1946). Joseph Cotton and Teresa Wright in Shadow of a Doubt (1943). Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman in Notorious (1946).

5. Film Noir: Common Elements • Hostility to the established order. • Portrayal of vice: drugs and alcohol, violence, sex, pornography, etc. • Narratives and characters are contradictory and complex. • Morally ambiguous protagonist. • There are no families as women are femme fatales—duplicitous destroyers and redeemers. • Anguish and insecurity portrayed by characters and felt by audience. • Voice-over narration by a male character seeks to counterbalance and make sense of these forces through order and hierarchy. At age 20, Lauren Bacall met Humphrey Bogart on the set of Howard Hawks’ 1944 screen version of Ernest Hemmingway’s To Have and Have Not (1944). Bogey and Bacall were married for 12 years until his death at age 57.

6. Law Noir • A subset of Film Noir are films dealing with attorneys, courts, policing institutions, and ultimately “the law.” • In general, film noir and law noir is reflective of WWII and post-WWII tensions. However, its origins can be seen in earlier films from the 1930s.

7. The Setting: City of the Angels • The labyrinth of the post-WWII southland came to reflect the psychic wounds of its inhabitants. • LA is portrayed as a de-centered world of crime as opposed to New York/Chicago gangster films with bosses, structures, and centralized organizations. • Vice: Nymphomania, drug-use, pornography, gambling, etc. are all rampant in the sprawling southland. • Why? LA is the city of myths and therefore necessarily failed dreams.

8. The Characters • Marlowe: Morally ambiguous private detective. • General Sternwood: military-war veteran, oil rich, privileged, powerful, old and dying after years of substance abuse. • Carmen Sternwood: rich, spoiled, drug-addicted, nymphomaniac, psycho-killer, coerced into pornography. • Vivian Sternwood Rutledge: alcoholic, gambler, divorced, strong, practical. • Arthur Geiger: one-eyed, frumpy, gay, dealer in pornography and blackmail, owns a bookstore as a front. • Carol Lundgren: Geiger’s adolescent gay lover, who kills for his man. • Eddie Mars: well-dressed crime boss who deals mainly in gambling and blackmail. • Mona Mars: Though Marlowe wants her, she sentimentalizes her husband and tries to convince herself that he's not a killer. • Lash Canino: short, squat, professional thug and killer. • Harry Jones: small, former bootlegger and minor chiseler on the fringes of organized crime. • Sean Regan: handsome and vigorous Irish soldier-turned-bootlegger. Lauren Bacall “Vivian Sternwood Rutledge”

9. The Plot(s)…We Think! • The Big Sleep follows the investigation of hard-boiled shamus Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) into the gambling debts of rich socialite Carmen Sternwood (Martha Vickers) and her eventual blackmailing by small-time crook Joe Brody (Louis Jean Heydt). Carmen's older sister Vivian Sternwood Rutledge (Lauren Bacall) also likes to gamble and is indebted to vice king Eddie Mars (John Ridgeley). Also vying for a piece of the action are Brody's partners Agnes (Sonia Darrin) and Carol Lundgren (Thomas Rafferty) and Agnes' boyfriend Harry Jones (Elisha Cook Jr.). • There is also a subplot quest for General Sternwood's (Charles Waldron) confidant Sean Regan (who we never see), the disappearance and discovery of Mona Mars (Peggy Knudsen or Patricia Clark, depending on the version), and the fate of chauffeur Owen Taylor (Dan Wallace). Legend has it that this plot point drove both Director Howard Hawks and Bogart to ask novelist Raymond Chandler how Owen Taylor had died. Chandler replied that he didn't know either! • Marlowe suspects that the old General is merely testing his caliber before trusting him with a bigger job, the one the Sternwood daughters engage him in anyway. The elder daughter, vampish Vivian, asks Marlowe to find out who is blackmailing her. Determined to learn the truth and to maintain loyalty to the General, Marlowe descends into a milieu of thugs, gamblers, pornography, and crime bosses, meeting criminals too powerful to be brought to justice, being shot at and beaten, helplessly witnessing murders, and resisting the seductive blandishments of both the Sternwood women and the others that he simply has no time for. Ultimately Marlowe discovers secrets so dark he dare not reveal them to his employer, preferring that the General spend the short remainder of his life in peace. John Ridgely vice king “Eddie Mars”

10. The Morally Ambiguous Protagonist and his Relationship to Law Enforcement • What is Marlowe’s relationship with Chief Inspector Bernie Ohls, the District Attorney’s office, and law enforcement? • They cooperate with Marlowe because they know he’s an ally. • Though the District Attorney’s office and the local police forces are presented as competent, they are powerless against General Sternwood and his daughters because they are rich. They are also powerless to deal with organized crime—decentralized as it is in the southland.

11. Film Noir’s Morality • The sordid material (sex, drugs, violence, etc.) is dealt with implicitly. • Sex and pornography: At the house were Geiger has been murdered, Marlowe finds: a stoned Carmen, a hidden camera in an oriental bust, an oddly shaped cup with some type of liquid, an old photographer’s lightbulb unit, a dead body… • Vivian after she kisses Marlowe: “I liked that. I'd like more.” • Vivian: “You've forgotten one thing. Me.” Marlowe: “What's wrong with you?” Vivian: “Nothing you can't fix.” • Marlowe’s relationships with women are always unstated: flirtatious at least and flat-out offers at most.

12. Sex and the Morally Ambiguous Protagonist: The Big Sleep’s “Little Bitches” Women can’t help but instantly fall for Marlowe: • Marlowe refuses to have sex with the spoiled, stoned, nymphomaniac Carmen Sternwood because she blatantly throws herself at him. • Marlowe doesn’t have time to have sex with Carole Douglas, the librarian, though she seems to have all the time in the world. • Marlowe is too busy to have sex at Eddie Mars’ gambling joint even though hatcheck girl Lorraine Miller and cigarette girl Shelby Payne step all over each other’s lines to be first in line. • Marlowe plans to have sex later with the butch taxi-cab driver Joy Barlow because he knows it “wouldn’t be bad.” • Marlowe finally has time to have sex with the school-marmish, ACME bookstore clerk played by Dorothy Malone. When it rains it pours. • Marlowe wants very much to have sex with Mona Mars (Peggy Knudson) but cannot because she is married to a crime boss. • Of course Marlowe never tries to have sex with Vivian Sternwood Rutledge and she therefore falls in love with him in the end. Funny how art imitates life… Carmen Sternwood (Martha Vickers) “falls” too easily for Phillip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart). Director Howard Hawkes told Vickers to act like a “little bitch” and encouraged the other actresses to play variants on the “little bitch” them in order to drown Bogart in a sea of sexual opportunity.

13. Film Noir Morality: Sex & Pornography • The oriental sculpture in Geiger’s house contains the hidden camera that is used to make pornography involving Carmen. • Female Taxi Driver: “If you can use me again sometime, call this number.”Philip Marlowe: “Day and night?”Female Taxi Driver: “Uh, night's better. I work during the day.” • Both Vivian and Mona Mars sit above Marlowe as he is tied up on the floor – they foreplay and sexual tension are obvious as this is Marlowe’s ultimate manage-a-trois fantasy.

14. Film Noir Morality: Sex & Pornography • Librarian: “You know, you don't look like a man who'd be interested in first editions.”Marlowe: “I collect blondes ‘n bottles too.” • Bookstore clerk: “You begin to interest me—vaguely.” It begins to rain, she closes the store, and they proceed to get drunk and have sex. Dorothy Malone played the ACME bookstore clerk.

15. Film Noir’s Morality: Sex & Pornography • Vivian Sternwood Rutledge: Speaking of horses, I like to play them myself. But I like to see them workout a little first, see if they're front runners or come from behind, find out what their whole card is, what makes them run.Philip Marlowe: Find out mine?Vivian Sternwood Rutledge: I think so.Philip Marlowe: Go ahead.Vivian Sternwood Rutledge: I'd say you don't like to be rated. You like to get out in front, open up a little lead, take a little breather in the backstretch, and then come home free.Philip Marlowe: You don't like to be rated yourself.Vivian Sternwood Rutledge: I haven't met anyone yet that can do it. Any suggestions?Philip Marlowe: Well, I can't tell till I've seen you over a distance of ground. You've got a touch of class, but I don't know how, how far you can go.Vivian Sternwood Rutledge: A lot depends on who's in the saddle.

16. Film Noir’s Morality: Substance Abuse • General Sternwood: “You knew him too?” Marlowe: “Yes, in the old days, when he used to run rum out of Mexico and I was on the other side. We used to swap shots between drinks, or drinks between shots, whichever you like.” Sternwood: “My respects to you, sir. Few men ever swapped more than one shot with Sean Regan.” • Marlowe: “Thanks for the drink, General.” Sternwood: “I enjoyed your drink as much as you did, sir.” • Marlowe: “I don't mind your ritzing me drinking your lunch out of a bottle. But don't waste your time trying to cross-examine me.” • Carmen Sternwood: “You're cute.”Marlowe:“And you're higher than a kite!”

17. Film Noir’s Morality: Substance Abuse • Marlowe: “I’ve got a pretty good bottle.” • Marlowe: “You'll have to send Carmen away from a lot of things. They have places for that. Maybe they can cure her—it's been done before.”

18. Film Noir’s Morality: Gender Roles • Bogart’s turn as a gay rare-book collector is precipitated by his knowledge that Geiger is gay. He goes to the bookstore in hopes of penetrating Geiger’s circle via this act. But instead of dealing with either of the gay couple—Geiger or Lundgren—he runs up against a woman. • Agnes is the only woman in the film who is not taken with Marlowe because he is obviously gay. Agnes therefore rejects his inquiries as she is plainly tired of being Geiger’s female pimp. • Later, Marlowe returns as himself and we find Agnes perplexed, scared, and anxious in his presence. • Both Joe Brody and Harry Jones are in love with Agnes but neither is “big” enough for her. Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) jousts with Agnes Lowzier (Sonia Darrin) in Geiger’s book shop. Audiences were startled to see the most recognizable actor in Hollywood disguise himself simply by putting on shades, turning up the brim of his hat, and changing his voice.

19. Film Noir’s Morality: Violence • There are 7 Murders: • Carmen killed Regan (at the film's end, the murder rap is blamed on Mars) • Owen Taylor killed Geiger • Brody killed Taylor (or Taylor may have committed suicide) • Lundgren killed Brody • Canino killed Jones • Marlowe killed Canino • Mars' own gang accidentally killed Mars Marlowe should have been the eighth: Marlowe: The boys don't take any chances, do they? Where are they - out digging a grave?Vivian: You had to go on with this, didn't you?Marlowe: Where are they?Vivian: They've gone down the road to telephone.Marlowe: To call up Eddie Mars and to find out what to do with me. I could have told them that.Vivian: Why did you have to go on?Marlowe: Too many people told me to stop.

20. Conclusion:The Death of Film Noir Cynicism • The Big Sleep is a transitional film signaling the death of the harsh, cynical, and morally explicit film noir of the 1930s and early 1940s where law enforcement is brutish, bumbling, and generally behind the curve to the 1950s where obscenity is implicit, happy endings are the norm, and post WWII-conservatism manifests itself in competent, strong law enforcement triumphalism.

21. Appendix: Two Versions • The first difference between the two versions occurs in reel 3 about 25 minutes into the film. After Marlowe discovers the body of Geiger, the 1945 version contains a longer version of Marlowe searching the house. Once he finds the set of keys and the code book, he bundles Carmen up and drives her home. In the 1945 version, there is a shot of both of Marlowe and Carmen in the car (this scene does not appear in the 1946 version). When he arrives at the Sternwood mansion the first major retake was inserted. In the 1945 version, it rains heavily. Marlowe talks to Norris the Butler while standing outside. In the 1946 version, Marlowe speaks to Norris briefly before Vivian appears and they have a scene together. • Reel 7 of the 1945 version of the film contains a scene at the District Attorney's office that provides a recap of the movie's events. The scene occurs just after Marlowe apprehends Lundgren for the shooting of Brody. Marlowe is taken to the DA's office by his pal Chief Inspector Bernie Ohlhs (Regis Toomey). The key events of the movie are perfectly encapsulated in this scene. Deleting this scene from the 1946 film contributes to the narrative confusion.

22. Appendix: Two Versions • What follows is the infamous veil scene. The following day, Marlowe returns to his office and is confronted by Vivian wearing a veil. Their conversation lacks gusto; the chemistry from previous scenes is lost. This was the main scene that prompted Feldman to request the retakes and its deletion doesn't hurt the 1946 version. Both the DA's office and the veil scene were replaced with the famous bar scene between Bogart and Bacall which is one of the highlights of the 1946 version of The Big Sleep. • When Vivian leaves Eddie Mars' gambling house in reel 8, another retake was inserted. The scene where Marlowe rescues Vivian from a robbery exists in both the 1945 and the 1946 versions, but in the 1946 version, both Bogart and Bacall are more relaxed and the scene plays better. Reel 9 of the 1946 version has a scene between Marlowe and Carmen that is priceless; she sucks her thumb and attempts to bite Marlowe. The true manic and childish nature of Carmen is shown. • The final retake happens near the end of the film in reel 11. Marlowe has been captured and tied up by Eddie Mars. He wakes up to find himself in a room with Vivian and Mona Mars (played by Patricia Clark). In the 1945 version, the conversation between Marlowe and Mona is a fairly straightforward reading of lines. Vivian is poorly posed and on her knees beside Marlowe. In the 1946 retake, a different actress plays Mona (Peggy Knudsen) and their dialogue is charged with excitement. Also, Vivian now has better lighting and more close ups as she sits beside Marlowe. This retake is superior to the 1945 version.

23. Credits • Biesen, Sheri Chinen, Blackout: World War II and the Origins of Film Noir (Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005). • Chopra-Grant, Mike, Hollywood Genres and Postwar America: Masculinity, Family, and Nation in Popular Movies and Film Noir (New York, NY: I.B. Tauris, 2005). • Christopher, Nicholas, Somewhere in the Night (, 1997). • Clute, Shannon and Richard Edwards, “Out of the Past: Investigating Film Noir—Episode 11: The Big Sleep and The Big Lebowski.” November 15, 2005. 70 minutes. Podcast from www.noircast.net. • Conrad, Mark T., The Philosophy of Film Noir (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 2005). • Fujiwara, Chris, “Dark Art: What Make a Film ‘Noir’? A New Book Highlights the Surprising European Origins of an Iconic American Genre.” Boston Globe, January 15, 2006. • Hirsch, Foster, Detours and Lost Highways: A Map of Neo-Noir (New York, NY: Limelight Editions, 2004). • Hirsch, Foster, The Dark Side of the Screen: Film Noir (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1998). • Kaplan, E. Ann, Women in Film Noir (British Film Institute, 1999). • Naremore, James, More than Night: Film Noir in its Contexts (). • Schwartz, Ronald, Neo-Noir: The New Film Noir Style from Psycho to Collateral (Lanham, MD: The Scarecrow Press, 2005). • Silver, Alain and James Ursini, L.A. Noir: The City as Character (Santa Monica, CA: Santa Monica Press, 2005). • Spicer, Andrew, Film Noir (New York, NY: Longman Press, 2002). • Wagner, Jans B., Dames in the Driver’s Seat: Rereading Film Noir (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2005).