Critical Bibliography: Women in Film Noir - Essay Example

Critical Bibliography: Women in Film Noir Film Noir, or black film, is a term used to describe Hollywood crime dramas, made during 1940 – 1950s. Its French name denotes the black evil of the film. Film Noir have dark characters whose moral ambiguity, sexual orientation and evil desires have motivated them to commit crime. It was amazing how cinematographers used black and white images effectively to create the thrillers. This essay is a critical source review of a selection of the bibliography on the theme of the women in film noir. Biesen’s book discussed the elements used in film noir, how wartime film noir had slightly differing content, the essence of postwar film noir, censorship in Hollywood and other issues. She used the term ‘Blackout’ in her book’s title because it denoted the significant limitations and challenges that Hollywood worked under during the war and these have affected film noir. Films were shot in the dark because of the lack of lights, power supply and compulsory power blackouts at night. She mentioned the common plots, cinematography and narrative techniques used in film noir. She named a list of movies as examples of film noir. These movies also presented the wartime American culture. She defined the “red meat crime cycle” trend being prevalent in film noir. (Biesen, 2005, p. 2). There were conflicting motives used to propagate ‘allied propaganda aboard and promote patriotism at home’. There is a list of wartime productions of film noir. She said that although male directors and producers defined the stereotype roles of women in film noir, women started to change and this evolution influenced the roles for women in film noir. Biesen chose ‘Rosie the Riverter’ as her benchmark to denote the changes in film noir thereafter She mentioned the rationale behind this transformation as being due to the circumstances of wartime military enlistment of the men, which led to the shortage of males in Hollywood’s screen and off screen force. As women took over the helm, becoming producers and directors, they redefined the new image of women in film noir. Female characters were stronger, more evil, and sometimes even the better of their male counterparts. Biesen’s theoretical orientation was to prove that World War II helped in the evolution of film noir. The book explored women in film noir through the different milestones in history. More than half her book discussed the evolution of the role of women in film noir during and after the war. The trend of using less glamorous male characters was explained as being necessary to offset the shortage of eligible men as all able bodied ones were drafted to serve in the Army. This was an important accommodation as the new types of roles were written to pair the beautiful actresses with older men, young boys and foreign looking immigrants from Europe. This book is good for a study into the specific era of war and its consequences in film noir industry. Biesen has done a thorough research and analysis on the films, rationale behind their productions, film censorships, public response, film critics' reviews, and the overall film noir genre analysis. Some of her better insightful arguments were about the linkage between the noir and espionage genre, and noir and realism. Biesen’s book is a comprehensive, easy read. The shortcomings were that some facts were presented in a didactic manner. Some information about how wartime filming locations were limited and restricted was repetitively stressed to emphasize to excuse or justify the monotonous backgrounds and settings. Muller’s book is about the history of film noir and six of its women actresses; Jane Greer, Coleen Gray, Evelyn Keyes, Ann Savage, Audrey Totter and Marie Windsor. Each actress’ strengths and weaknesses is analyzed. It traced their personal lives from the time they made their debut in Hollywood’s film noir until their greatest triumphs in black film. Then, the narration lapsed, only to resume fifty years later. Muller offered the interesting theory that the dark women of crime did not suffer from gender role conflict. They were equals to men in criminal motivation and just as guilty. (Muller, 2001, p.1). This book is especially good for writing on the aftermath of actresses who had roles in film noir. We can trace their career development in their personal histories and determine whether their careers were aided by their legendary portrayals of women in film noir. Muller’s argument was that film noir owed its success to the talented women actresses. He justified his book by saying that it was a documentation to pay belated tribute to the famous women in film noir since they were not privileged to hog the limelight of the press media during their heydays. The disadvantage is that his personal interviews with the actresses have no other independent sources to verify the facts. The shortcomings were the limited information that could be gleamed from each interviewee. The Silver and Ursini book had a collection of essays, case studies and articles on the evolution of film noir. Some essays were accompanied by the famous black and white photographs from the films. This anthology should suffice for the average college level film studies. Part One had eight essays on crime and how it had been exploited on film. The evolution of crime in dramas was traced. There was an essay examining in detail on how bad fictional women characters were worshipped as part of the strategy of film noir. The essays maybe outdated as they were written in the 1970s. Part Two had eight case studies of the popular genres of film noir. Part Three showed the evolution the film noir and how it has modernised. There were essays on the new types of noir films that included abstract expressionism, forensic science and feminist female characters. The disadvantage is that the editors exercised a heavy hand criticizing others in the introduction without presenting a balanced and fair case for critique. The French film critic Marc Vernet was highlighted and heavily criticised. Some essays depict only the negative aspects of their respective arguments. If this book were the sole reference, then it would severely prejudice the reader. Some of the choices examined in the section on the evolution of film noir is controversial. For example, police crime dramas, like the Miami Vice, were included even though they lack the traditional film noir women characters. This volume can be the first word on film noir but should not be taken as the last word on it. There were also minor glitches like the omissions of dates for some of the material in Parts Two and Three used in the book. The photographs used were common reprints from popular galleries on film noir. Some of the essays contained technical vocabulary. Blaser’s article, Film Noir's Progressive Portrayal of Women, gave a good analysis of the common plot and characterisation of a typical woman in a film noir; Out of the Past. He argued that the female character was bad because of her circumstances. She would resort to killing to fight her adverse situations. Blaser argued that the new woman challenged the traditional woman’s stereotype of the submissive wife and family person. Her gender role conflict was partly due to the men who were the real bad guys in the movie. Her last endearing trait that set her apart from the rest of the women in the other genres of film was that she never surrendered; not even on the threat of her own death. Blaser wrote that the woman in film noir ‘remains true to her destructive nature and refuses to be converted or captured, even if it means that she must die.’ This is a useful article to examine some of the male and female relationships in film noir. Blaser wrote that the film noir attacked the family and home image since it represented the fundamental safe structure that everyone relied on. The family was the saver of the dark forces and this was depicted in many films in the 1940s. The war years united the Americans and strengthened the image of the family unit. So film noir’s evolution during wartime was dependent upon the prevalent social values trumpeted by the family unit. Women were the homemakers and caregivers in society and they were attacked in film noir to shake the foundations of the secure family environment. The women then experience gender role conflict as they faced the dilemma of whether to sacrifice and suffer in silence or to fight back. Film noir would make the circumstances so adverse that the woman had no choice but to fight back. Blaser had conveniently categorized the three classes of film noir women; the femme fatale, the nurturing woman and the marriage seeker. Each of these categories of film noir women have ‘dark’ traits that contrast with the ideal image of the traditional family. Blaser had analyzed the film noir and family combination so well that he came up with his basic formula - the bad women are punished and the good women are rewarded with a happy fairy tale ending. Doane discussed about the female spectator and the genre of film specially made for the women. This was called the ‘woman’s film’. This was popular during the 1930s –1960s. The protagonist was female. Her problems were female and related to her gender role expectations. The ‘woman’s film’ had four subgroups. The medical discourse subgroup had plots with male doctors treating female patients. The love stories subgroup had sentimental plots. The maternal melodramas subgroup used family in plots. The paranoid sub-genre had horror in them. Doane said that feminism, psychoanalysis and film theory were responsible for the film to promote or deny female desire. She said women had the gaze but were powerless to use her gaze because of the presence of paternalism in Hollywood and the film industry. She analyzed The Purple Rose for her theoretical orientation on the ‘woman’s film’. She said that; ‘in the classical Hollywood cinema, the woman is deprived of a gaze, deprived of subjectivity and repeatedly transformed into the object of a masculine scopophiliac desire.' (Doane, 1987, p.2). The common images of women were the single mother, frustrated housewife, suffering mistress and other negative female stereotypes. She wrote that female spectatorship, female actresses and the 'woman film' became important during the war. There were ideological changes brought about by the shortage of men. Women's roles were redefined to fill this gap in many ways. This discussion had been mentioned in the other writers too. The family became more important as they took the center stage of attention on how to carry on living in the absence of their men folk. During the 1940s, the 'woman's film' was combined with other genres like film noir, musical, gothic and horror. This book is full of facts and contains heavy reading material. This is the preferred selection for the critical resource review essay. The End. Works Cited. Biesen, Sheri Chinen. (2005). Blackout: World War II And The Origins Of Film Noir. USA: Johns Hopkins University Press. Blaser, John. (1999). Film Noir's Progressive Portrayal of Women. In No Place for a Woman: The Family in Film Noir and Other Essays. April, 1999 from http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/noir/pp-all.html DOANE, Mary Ann. (1987). Desire to Desire: The Woman's Film in the 1940's. USA: Amazon.com. Muller, Eddie. (2001). Dark City Dames: The Wicked Women of Film Noir. USA: Regan Books. Silver, Alain and Ursini, James. Film Noir Reader 2 (Film Noir Reader). USA: Amazon.com. Read More