Year: 2015

Ken Bruen’s Inspector Brant series

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Ken Bruen is better known for his Jack Taylor books and I have not read any of them yet(again on my to read list).  I picked up the first three of this series up in a Black Friday Sale for my Nook.  The first three books are packaged together and called the White Trilogy.

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This is from the Mystery Press, who has a lot of great noir and hardboiled books in there collection.  I read the first 3 books in no time and right away got the next 4 books and read those even faster.  This collection has a total of 7 short books that follow Inspector Brant, but also follows his co-workers in just as much detail.    This 7 books in the series are:

A White Arrest

Taming the Alien

The McDead

Blitz

Vixen

Calibre

Ammunition

The fourth book, Blitz was also made into a movie.  The movie follows the book fairly well except for the ending, which I think made a better movie.

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The movie has Jason Statham as Brant and he does a great job, it is an entertaining movie worth checking out whether you read the books or not.

The book series has not been read much according to goodreads with Blitz having the most reads at a mere 427, but the series has strong reviews and high ratings.  Ken Bruen has quickly become one of my favorite noir authors and I look forward to reading The Guards soon!

Purple Noon

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Purple Noon(Plein soleil) is a film that caught my eye because it is based on the Noir novel The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith.

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 You may know this work from the adaption made in 1999 with Matt Damon (as Ripley), Jude Law (as Greenleaf), and Gwyneth Paltrow (as Marge).  This is a French Production and though in 1960 the classic Film-Noir style was still in favor, this is not one of them.  This is in color with lots of scenes on beautiful blue seas and fashionable city centers rather then dark alleys and grimy bars.   Of course this being based on the classic novel, the themes are very dark, with an early form of identity theft, a strange love triangle, a few murders and lots of con jobs.  This must have been a refreshing look at the classic crime thriller in 1960 when most films of this nature where still in black and white and had a dark tone, this movie didn’t hide in the shadows.  The crimes are committed under the noon sun to those of privilege and of means, but most of the characters are not like-able and you find yourself hoping Ripley gets out of this OK.  I have yet to read the source novel(again on my to read list) but after looking at some of the history of this film both the author Patricia Highsmith and the film critic Roger Ebert did not like the ending.  I will not go into details about the ending(no spoilers if possible on this site) but would love to hear from those that have read the book and seen this film on what they think.Film_637w_PurpleNoon_original 

This film has a current rating of 7.8 on IMDb and 100% on Rotten Tomatoes so it is well liked by those that have seen it.  This is also the first appearance from the character Tom Ripley in the movies, I’m sure we will be looking at some of the other films he appears in on this site.

New Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is coming!??!

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According to Time Magazine  and the Guardian, a new book in the Millennium Trilogy is coming, I guess it isn’t a Trilogy anymore.  Here is the link to the Guardian article:

http://http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jan/27/sequel-stieg-larsson-girl-with-the-dragon-tattoo-trilogy-out-august

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Do you like this idea?  Do you think a new book with Lisbeth not written by Stieg Larsson is something you would check out?  Let me know in the comments below.

Cry Father by Benjamin Whitmer

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51lO0F+37GL._SY344_BO1,204,203,200_Cry Father from Benjamin Whitmer is a great new book, I had no idea where it was going but loved the ride.  We have Meth heads, a Motorbike Gang, Kidnapping, Accidental? Murder, recluses living in the Colorado wild, a couple combinations of Fathers and Sons(hence the title) and a wild ride into the west.  I really enjoyed Whitmer’s writing, this is his second book of fiction and I look forward to checking out his first book, Pike.  This is getting great reviews all over the net and deserves to be discovered by more people.  Have you read anything by Whitmer?  If you have let me know what you thought in the comments.

Bad Turn Worse

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Bad Turn Worse is a great modern Noir.  I really enjoyed this film and it looks like the few people that have watched it so far seem to agree.  Currently it has 82% Rotten Tomatoes rating but only a 5.9 on IMDb with less then 1000 ratings.  The biggest star in this small film is Jeremy Allen White, who is known for playing Lip on Shameless.  This takes place in Texas and revolves around 3 young friends that get caught up in a bad idea that turns worse, ah now I understand that title.  I loved seeing William Devane in this, this guy just knows how to play the rich evil, doesn’t he? This is the first movie written by Dutch Southern(Great name!) and look forward to seeing what else he contributes to.  Easter Egg of Noir note:  Jim Thompson’s book South of Heaven (haven’t read this one yet, but it’s on my to read list now).

If this trailer doesn’t get you excited I don’t know what will!

Review of Black Widow

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Black Widow is the first classic film-noir that I have seen that is in color.  Usually film-noir from this era is in black and white and lends to the over all atmosphere of the movie.  Color worked for me in this movie, the New York skyline looked amazing and felt like one of the characters.  Ginger Rodgers plays a successful actress and shows why she really was a great actress in this part.  Really liked Van Heflin as our main man and George Raft is always cool with his amazing voice and dialog.  This currently only has a 6.8 rating on IMDb, but has only a little over 1000 ratings.  I think if your a fan of the genre you will really enjoy it.  If you’ve seen it comment below with what you thought of this film.

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Hello world!

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My goal with this blog is to review, discuss and show news that pertains to all things Noir!  That means we will be looking at movies, T.V. and books that deal with the Noir genre. Noir can be kind of vague as a genre and you can find lots of different definitions and meanings for the term out there. I mean if you see a Western or SciFi movie you know it instantly, but it seems Noir can be a little harder to classify.  In fact a Western or SciFi movie could also be classified as Noir by some.  I will post on what I feel falls into this genre, some may agree and some may not. The sites I’ve seen have been very informative but seem to only deal with classic Film-Noir or only with new books in the genre or another minor part of the big picture.  I think if you love one part of this genre you probably still like some of the others fields as well.  I really want this to be a site where we can discuss old and new and everything in-between as well as keep up on news of new projects and pass on recommendations to each other.

Thanks for checking out my blog and would love to hear feedback from you.