This day in history The Big Sleep from Raymond Chandler was released. Read all about it at Today in Literature.
http://www.todayinliterature.com/today.asp?Search_Date=02%2F06%2F2015
Some day we will take a look at this amazing book and the movies that are made from it.
John Wick is a neo-noir with a lot of action! This has a simple plot and not a very original one. We’ve seen this in various versions throughout the years. An innocent man, well maybe not totally innocent man is wronged by some bad guys. Things that come to mind are Point Blank and Payback(we will look at these two movies based on the Parker books later), as well as maybe a little Death Wish. The list can go on and on….but is that a bad thing? This isn’t some mind twisting plot with a commentary on society that will make you re-think your life. Revenge and vengeance are common themes in film and it makes for a fun movie. I loved John Wick, yeah we know how it’s going to end almost before it begins, in fact the opening scene also happens to be a scene from the end of the movie. Chad Stahelski and David Leitch made a great film on their first attempt. The action is amazing, but I really love the way it was shot. You can tell they have been around the movie industry and know how to make interesting scenes and sets. A lot of the scenes reminded me of classic noir films in bright color instead of black and white. I purposely didn’t look into this movie much before I watched it. All I knew is people liked it and it has Keanu Reeves in it. I’m glad that’s all I knew, there are some great cameos in this film I didn’t know where coming and liked them. My three favorites are Willem Dafoe, Kevin Nash and Lance Reddick. I will not give you anymore so you can be surprised and enjoy the film like I did. If you want a fun movie with some great scenes and an amazing look, look no further, check out John Wick.
Christa Faust is not only a great noir author, she loves noir. If you’re not following her on Facebook you are missing out. She posts lots of great pin ups from the past, news about old film-noir movies playing in theaters, and tons of other information on books and films. You should check out her Blog as well at:
http://christafaust.net/?cat=1
Now on to the books. This series is modern pulp gold. If you think you can’t judge a book by its cover, your wrong. These covers are pulp art and if you like them, you will love the stories inside. Christa takes some classic noir themes and modernizes them. Our main character is not your average noir type character, no private detective or mafia member here, she’s a female porn star! Sure we have had femme fatales we fall in love with that are shady, but beautiful, and it always helps when they are a successful business women of some kind, but how about a porn star that owns their own adult entertainment company?!?! Why has nobody thought of this before? I admit it, I love Angel Dare, she is a strong female that has worked her way up the food chain in the porn industry. A business that is a grey area, it is legal but has some shady people working in it. She looks out for her girls because she has been there and knows what it’s like. She gets in a jam with some bad dudes and does what she needs to, to get herself out. It’s a fun ride that is more original then you would think. So how does she stand up in the second novel? The second book takes a common theme in noir, professional fighting and modernizes it. Instead of using Boxing like many noir stories have in the past, lets use Mixed Martial Arts? Why not, it really works and Angel gets into more crazy trouble but in the world of MMA instead of Porn this time, not that we don’t revisit that world a little in this tale too. If you’re looking for something dark and gritty you should check out Angel Dare. Now the question is, Christa, are we getting a new Angel Dare book? If so, when?
I still have not seen John Wick and hope to see it tomorrow night. I’m looking forward to this movie that just came out on Blu-Ray yesterday, and it sounds like fans are already getting some good news.
http://www.movies.com/movie-news/john-wick-sequel/17849
Any fans of this movie out there? Are you excited for a sequel or should this be a one and done?
Mulholland Falls has one of the greatest casts from the 90’s, and all neo-noir favorites. We got Nick Nolte at the height of his cool, Melanie Griffith as the clueless wife, Jennifer Connelly who just looks like she was made to play the femme fatale in the 1950’s, Chazz Palminteri who fits in the 1950’s just as well as anybody, and what kind of neo-noir film made in the 1990’s would be complete without Michael Madsen. The stars go on and on including John Malkovich playing the focus of our heroes investigation and Andrew McCarthy as the openly gay photographer that may have more on his film then he wanted. The story comes from Peter Dexter who has written some well received crime novels and has one the National Book Award. This movie goes back to one of the greatest noir stomping grounds ever,1950’s Los Angles. We get gangsters, a murder mystery, adult movies(back when they where highly illegal) and powerful men that think they can get away with anything. This movie definitely got it’s inspiration from the “Hat Squad,” a team of detectives that were given free rein to do what they needed to keep the Mafia out of L.A.. We see the “Hat Squad” again, in 2013’s Gangster Squad and TNT’s Mob City. Maybe it was a little bit of a let down, with a cast like this we were expecting something similar to what we got the next year with L.A. Confidential(we will definitely be looking at this amazing film in a future post) but it’s not fair to compare these two films. Roger Ebert gave it a 3.5 stars out of 4, so he saw this as a good film that could have been great. This is a fun neo-noir to watch if you haven’t seen it yet or would like to give it another chance I would like to here your opinion.
Night Film is a book that falls into a bunch of different categories, some may call it a horror book, some a mystery book others may put it on their contemporary fiction or literature shelf. I think because of all these elements it makes for a great noir read. I’ll tell you right now, this is one of my favorite books. It’s a very unique book with an interactive internet element, I read it as a straight novel and didn’t check out any of the extras on the web. I may re-read this and check out the web extra as I go.
This book’s main character is Scott McGrath, an investigative journalist that has his career ruined by a mysterious director by the name of Stanislas Cordova. When a new investigation starts involving Cordova, Scott has to find out what is going on, no matter what the consequences. Cordova is the interesting character that drives the plot, we just get snippets of him as the story progresses and we as readers and our hero Scott has to find what is real and what is legend or myth. Cordova is a fictional character that seems real and real interesting. Cordova is part Stanley Kubrick, half Roman Polanski, a bit of David Lynch and maybe a dash of Alfred Hitchcock thrown in for good measure.
Here is a great trailer for the book, and it definitely gives you a feel for what you’re in for:
This isn’t a short book at over 600 pages it takes a bit of time and effort to read, but it’s worth every minute and every page. When you get done you are wowed and wish it had another 100 to 200 pages. The writing is great and keeps you up late at night reading “just one more chapter.” Let’s face it this hits all my hotspots, it’s a great written book, it’s dark and it’s about movies to boot.
I would love to see this turned into a mini series for HBO, Showtime or even an FX or AMC. I think this would be the best way to give credit to the lengthy story. Marisha Pessl has a movie deal already for this book and Rupert Wyatt is set to direct. Let’s hope this is as good as this book deserves and I will be at the theater opening night when it comes out!
This is a short book written by Daniel Woodrell, someone I’ve been wanting to read for a while. I learned of Woodrell because of the movie Winter’s Bone a great southern noir staring Jennifer Lawrence and John Hawkes(I will re watch this and review it at a later time). I really enjoyed this gritty real looking movie and was very interested in reading the book(still am). I picked this book up on my Nook because it was on sale for $2.99. Though this is a short book it was really dense with great language. The story was good, flashing to different times in the characters lives, made for a puzzle that all came together in the end. This is one of those books that may be even better on a second read so you can pick up on all the little clues through out. I hope to check out more of Woodrell’s books, especially Winter’s Bone, Tomato Red and the Bayou Trilogy.
Grand Central Murder is a film-noir from 1942. This movie is based on a Sue MacVeigh book and though I’ve never read it, I think this story has more in common with Sherlock Holmes then Phillip Marlowe. Though this seems to not be a true noir in story the filming is very noir. The opening scenes visual is one of the coolest in noir. The rest of the movie uses shadows in a very artistic way. S. Sylvan Simon is the director and looked to me like he showed some promise in the genre but he directed 34 films and it looks like almost all of them except for this one, was comedy and family films. To bad I would love to see his style in more dark films like this.
Our P.I. detective is played by Van Heflin and is pretty entertaining in this part. Patricia Dane is the beautiful gold digger that is in the center of the investigation. There is a long cast of characters that at times are a little hard to keep track of. This movie has not been rated much in IMDb and is currently at a 6.6, with only 453 people rating it. I caught this on Turner Classic Movies and it may be hard to find on DVD, but it is available. It may be worth the effort to find if you are a hard-core noir fan.
Ok I admit it, I’m a Marshmallow, and if you’re a noir fan and have not become a Marshmallow, you should give Veronica Mars a try. Veronica Mars is a unique character with a unique media formula. Veronica started as a TV show starring Kristen Bell on the UPN and eventually on the CW and soon grow a cult following. It was critically well received and had a rabid fan base. It’s following has award it many accolades through the next ten years including Empire Magazine’s 48th best TV show of all time. Though all of this helped, its low ratings got it cancelled after 3 seasons. 10 years after it all started came a kickstart campaign to make a movie and they raised more money then they ever hoped to. Honestly this is where I became interested. I started watching the TV series with Netflix DVD service and was hooked, watching as mainly episodes as I could as fast as I could. Then I was able to check out the movie and was excited for the first book. This review is for the first two books and I hope to come back and re-watch the TV series and movie for a deeper review later. If your new to Mars investigation I highly recommend that you start at the beginning and watch the TV series first.
These books are both written by Rob Thomas the creator of Veronica and co written by Jennifer Graham and they seem to be a great duo, keeping the Mars story going.
The first book: The Thousand Dollar Tan Line starts right after the movie and continues with all our favorite characters. It’s Spring Break in Neptune and a couple of girls are kidnaped, Veronica is on the case, and we are reintroduced to a character we haven’t seen in a while. This reads like your watching Veronica, you can hear the voices of the characters, you can hear the tone and deflection, their sarcasm and their emotions. It flows very well and you can see the locations from the previous work in your head when they pop up in the book.
The second book: Mr. Kiss and Tell starts us out in Neptune but we travel to a new college campus, Seattle and Las Vegas, this is more travelling then we normal see. We get to know another character from the past that we may have forgotten about, but soon remember her sad story that turns into a nightmare in this book. Though Veronica is hired by the Neptune Grand to clear there wrong doing in a violent attack,Veronica can’t work just for the big company with the money but soon sides with the victim to find her attacker.
Veronica Mars is a unique series, since it has crossed 3 media sources and has stayed true to the characters and one of the reasons this is, is Rob Thomas has had control of his creation from the start. So with Rob’s new show iZombie coming, is this the end of Mars Investigation? Well we may have a to wait a bit but it doesn’t sound like it:
http://www.keyetv.com/lifestyle/features/austin-lifestyle/stories/rob-thomas-veronica-mars-886.shtml
I don’t know about you, but I’m excited for some new books, but a TV mini series would be awesome!
If your like me and thought 10 years ago Veronica Mars looks like Nancy Drew in a Beverly Hills 90210 setting, your wrong! Veronica definitely explores some of the darkest themes I’ve ever seen on network TV and waited 10 years to long to discover this.
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