Neo-Noir

Review: Atlantic City

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Atlantic City is a film from 1980 starring Burt Lancaster and Susan Sarandon, both nominated for Academy Awards, the film was nominated for 5 total including Best Picture and Best Writing and Best Director for Louis Malle.

This story starts out with Sarandon making lemons sexy, Lancaster looks in on her through their opposing windows.

We then see a man watching a phone booth, he takes a package of drugs from the booth before the rightful owners can grab it.  This man is played by Robert Joy and is Sarandon’s estranged husband who has run off with Sarandon’s sister, who he has gotten pregnant.  Joy soon recruits Lancaster to help him sell the drugs and our odd love triangle, more like a love square? begins.  We also have the original owner of the drugs looking for their goods and those who have them.  Lancaster’s character is the most interesting of the film.  He starts out as a broken old man who runs numbers for one of the local mobsters.  He ends the film in a flash of old glory and you are happy for him, even as you see he is losing it mentally.

Another factor of this film is the city itself plays in this film.  This caught a time in Atlantic City, where the city was in disrepair, a shadow of its former glory.  Soon after this film, more old casinos would be demolished to make room for new casinos.  In many ways the city parallels Lancaster’s character.

Lancaster is one of my all time favorite actors and this film did not disappoint.   Sarandon was very good in this as well as maybe not a femme fatale in the classic noir sense, but she was definitely Lancaster’s femme fatale in this film.  This is a very good film for neo noir fans and if you are fans of the two main stars it is a must see.

Favorite Tidbit:  Lancaster mentions a number of mobsters and historic people his character supposedly knew in his past.  These included Dutch Schultz, Meyer Lansky, Bugsy Siegel and Al Capone.  He also mentions Nucky Johnson the inspiration for the Nucky Thompson character in Boardwalk Empire.

Review: Night Moves

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“Who’s wining?”

“Nobody, one side is just losing slower than the other.”

This movie is a neo noir staring Gene Hackman in all his 1970’s glory.  It has it all, the 16-year-old Lolita, the young rebel mechanic boyfriend, the aging starlet, the Hollywood stuntman, the unhappy wife and of course the ex-football player turned hardboiled private detective.  We also have some classic film noir dialog, updated for a 1970’s audience.  How about this zinger?

“What happened to your face?”

“I won second place in a fight.”

Or this great line from one of our female leads.

“Your are kind of edgy, aren’t you?”

“It’s the heat and the low wages.”

The settings are classic film noir locations, we start out in Los Angles and then go head to the Florida Keys.  We have a young James Woods just getting his career started and a 16 year oldish Melanie Griffith making her film debut.  All directed by Arthur Penn.

So with all of this, why isn’t this picture better known?  TCM’s Ben Markowitz said “This is the best movie you have never seen.”  I’m not sure why, this film just came on my radar earlier this year, and I’m glad I got to view it.

Our story starts with our private detective played by Hackman getting hired by our aging starlet to find her step-daughter(Griffin).  He is also having problems with his marriage, his wife is played by Susan Clark.  His investigation takes him into the world of Hollywood movies and stuntmen.  The case eventually takes him to the Florida Keys and he meets our real femme fatale of the film played by Jennifer Warren.  We also find the step daughter here, us as the audience and our hero believe she is our femme fatale, but she is still just in training and doesn’t fool our hero. The three see the scary remnants of a boat wreck which scares our step-daughter and she willingly goes back to California with our hero.  Our hero thinks the case is closed, but it is only getting started.

Gene Hackman was one of the biggest stars in the 1970’s, starting the decade out with The French Connection and ending it with Superman.  Check out my review of The French Connection here:

https://everythingnoir.com/2015/04/11/re-watching-the-classics-the-french-connection-2/

He also was in a handful of other box office successes and classic films from the decade.  This is right up there with some of his best, but seems to have gotten lost in the shuffle.  I thoroughly enjoyed it, and I think classic film noir buffs and noir fans in general will too.  If you’re fans of Hackman, it’s a must see and if you want to see a young Melanie Griffith or James Wood it’s worth a viewing.

Review: A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night

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This movie is a spaghetti western, horror, romance, fairy tale, neo-noir, Iranian vampire movie filmed in California!?!?!  This film is a stew of classic film ingredients by first time director and writer Ana Lily Amirpour.  I really look forward to seeing more from her, what a great eye in filming and what an original intriguing story.

I seen this just based on the buzz and did not know much about this going in.  I really thought it was just a well done horror movie worth seeing.  Then I put the Blu-Ray in and was totally surprised.  I did not plan to review this for this site, until I watched it and seen more than a few simple nods to the classic film noir era.  This film has a timeless feel to it, there is a 1950’s Thunderbird, classic oil wells and factories, and timeless clothing that could fit into almost any time frame. We do have fake posters of 1980’s pop stars on the wall and our soundtrack has music from the 2000’s. If you didn’t know better you could think this was filmed in the 1950’s as easily as filmed in the 2010’s.

Sheila Vand plays The Girl and Arash Marandi gives us his best James Dean playing Arash for our two leads.  We don’t have to many characters confusing the plot here.  Marshall Manesh plays Arash’s junkie father, Mozhan Marnò plays the local prostitute, Dominic Rains as a drug dealer, and Rome Shadanloo as the little rich girl.

This movie has a lot of symbolism and references to other films, this may be all subjective and you will find things I may not and you may not agree with what I felt I seen.  That is what makes this such a great film.

Our story starts with Arash getting in to his car and drives home.  We see his Dad shooting up with drugs.  Our drug dealer enters the house and wants paid.  He takes Arash’s car for the debt.  Our drug dealer soon picks up our prostitute in his new ride and later picks up The Girl.  He takes her back to his house and soon The Girl reveals she is a vampire and kills the drug dealer.  On her way out of the house she pass Arash, going in to try to get his car back.  Arash finds the body and takes the drug suppl and gets his keys to his car back.  Our romance starts as well as we go deeper into our story from here.

For noir fans, the plot is deep in the crime world of Bad City and has some great noir nods, like a femme fatale, she just happens to be a vampire.  If your a film noir fan and don’t like vampires, you will still love the cinematography!  A couple stills from the film that shows a taste of this:

So this film is for anybody who wants to see something new and fresh and original no matter what kind of movies you like.  This basically covers every genre out there and has something for everybody.  Go enjoy this film as soon as you can!

Review: The Gambler

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The Gambler is a neo noir film from last year and I was finally able to see it on Blu-Ray.  The reviews are a mixed bag for this film.  I got to say I really enjoyed it.  I loved the noirish cinematography, the story and the performances. Reading some of the headlines for the negative reviews for this film, mention how it don’t stand up to the original.  I’m the first to jump on the” re-make is unnecessary” camp and understand where these people are coming from.  I, unfortunately have never seen the original(though I hope to someday) so I went into this film with no preconceived idea of what to expect.  Maybe this is why I enjoyed it so much.

This film is based on the original screenplay by James Toback and tweaked for a new generation by William Monahan who has done some great neo-noir and crime films.  The film is directed by Rupert Wyatt.

This film stars Mark Wahlberg as our anti-hero main character.   He is a writer and a professor, but that is second to being a gambler.  We also have Jessica Lange as his mother.  Brie Larson as his brilliant student and his romantic interest as well as perhaps his saver.  We have Michael Kenneth Williams and John Goodman as opposing gangsters. We also have Williams’ co-star from The Wire,Domenick Lombardozzi, showing up as Goodman’s top henchman.

Our story starts with Wahlberg gambling in a Korean gambling den.  He is playing blackjack and doing very well at first, he then loses.  The Korean’s want their money, Williams offers Wahlberg $50,000 to try to get even, he doesn’t.  He then goes to Goodman for a loan.  Goodman reminds him that Williams will kill him if he doesn’t pay back his debt.  We then find Wahlberg at his day job as a professor.  We take off from there as he juggles his debt, his family, and his class of students.

I really liked the neo noir filming style in this film.  One of the things you will notice while watching this is each person our protagonist owes money has their own color,the Korean’s color is green, Michael Kenneth Williams’ gang has the color black and John Goodman’s color is red. I first picked upon this in the scene where Wahlberg is waiting to be picked up by Lombardozzi.  I noticed all the cars are white, grey and black in a wash of Land Rovers and BMW’s we see Lombardozzi pull up in a bright red Porsche Cayenne.  There are a lot of beautiful noir like scenes in this from the smokey gambling halls, to a grayed out class room, to the neon lights of a casino.  I also loved the soundtrack for this film and how it was used.  Also pay attention to Wahlberg’s suit throughout the film and how it changes.

Like I said, I really liked this film, but I have not seen the original.  I think if you go into this with fresh eyes and do not compare it to the original you may enjoy it too.  I would love to hear from those lucky enough to see both of these films and what your thought on both are.

Favorite tidbit: Mark Wahlberg dropped 61lbs for his role going from 198lbs to 137lbs, to show the characters lack of caring about his health and well-being.

Review: Copycat

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This is the first time I’m seeing this film, even though it was released 20 years ago.  When I would go to the video store, I would pick it up and then put it down for something else.  I saw it playing on cable television, but something else was always on which I wanted to see more.  I finally watched it, after all these years.

This film is directed by Jon Amiel and written by David Madsen and Ann Biderman.  Biderman has gone on to write some great neo-noir and crime stuff for both movies and television.  This has a star-studded cast with Sigourney Weaver, Holly Hunter, Dermot Mulroney and Harry Connick Jr. being the big names in this film.

This film starts out with Weaver giving a lecture on serial killers, establishing her as our expert on the subject for this film.  She is attacked by Connick in the bathroom after her lecture and our opening credits role.  We then meet Mulroney and Hunter as homicide detectives doing some training.  They find a murder victim and feel they have a serial killer on their hands.  They soon recruit Weaver to help them.  She discovers our killer is emulating famous serial killers throughout history.  The investigation takes off from there.

This film feels average among a rush of neo-noir films coming out in the 1990’s, you can feel The Silence of The Lambs influences on this as well as having the bad luck to come out the same year as Se7en.  It seems to be rehashing these ground breaking films of the time but not bringing anything really new to the table.  Weaver said she was most proud of this film, but also said that the film was lost in the shuffle of all the thrillers coming out at this time.  It’s a good film, I think it maybe a bit to long at over 2 hours to tell this story.  I think they could have edited out a murder or two and cranked up the intensity for a more taut feeling film.  It is a must see for Weaver fans and Hunter fans won’t be disappointed.  If you love your serial killer thrillers from the 1990’s this should be on your “to watch list” if you have not seen it yet.

Re-watching Angel Heart

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large_zVABs77t8P6flUShTnnTHjeTc3w  Angel Heart is a neo noir horror film from 1987.  Though this film was made with two of the biggest movie stars from the 1980’s, Robert De Niro(one of the biggest stars ever) and Micky Rourke it was not a big hit in theaters.  This was also directed by Alan Parker who had 3 or 4 hits under his belt when he made this movie. William Hjortsberg wrote the book this film is based on and has written a few other noir books.  I must say I’ve never read any of Hjortsberg’s books but hope to in the future.

With all this talent on the film, this film was more known at the time of its release for having Lisa Bonet in it.  At the time Lisa Bonet was the second biggest star of the hit television series The Cosby Show, so big she had her own spin-off series A Different World.  Both T.V. series had the biggest television star of The Cosby Show and all of television at the time,  Bill Cosby, behind them, he created both series.  Cosby had a lot riding on Lisa Bonet’s star power.  In this film Bonet plays a southern girl who is into voodoo and maybe even worse appears nude on-screen having sex with the main character while being splashed in blood.  This did not make Mr. Cosby happy, putting a black eye on two of his family oriented and biggest shows in one fell swoop.  I don’t  know if the controversy helped or hurt the film, but either way this was a flop at the box office.  Did Bill Cosby’s pull, hinder the distribution of this film?  I don’t know, but flashing forward almost 30 years we are learning more about the pull Cosby had and how he used it.  I would be interested in knowing if this being released at only 800 some odd theaters had something to do more with Cosby’s influence, then a failure on the distributors.  Even at the time of its release, it got very good reviews and was well received, but did not find an audience in theaters.  I think most people, like myself, had to wait for its VHS release to watch this film.

This film takes place in the mid 1950’s in New York as our protagonist Harry Angel goes to meet the mysterious Louis Cyphre played by Robert De Niro.  Cyphre hires Angel to find an old associate he helped with his music career before the war, called Johnny Favorite.  Johnny Favorite did not pay back his debt and has disappeared after the war and can not be found.  This leads Angel on a trail which leads to varies characters, most of which end up murdered soon after Angel interviews them.  The case leads him to the south, where he soon comes across voodoo worshipers and more craziness.

This film does have a horror element and has a great noir style in story and cinematography.  De Niro is great as Cyphre, not a big surprise, and Rourke is very good as our main character.  This is for both of the main stars fan base as well as those of Bonet.  It is also worth checking out for neo noir fans as well as horror fans alike.

Review: Zift

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Zift is a film from Bulgaria, made in 2008.  It is filmed in black and white and takes place in the 1940’s and 1960’s.Vladislav Todorov wrote both the book in which the movie is based as well as the script. Javor Gardev directed and it looks to be his only film to date.

Zift is a great combination of modern neo noir with nods to movies like Pulp Fiction as well as classic noir style with nods to films like Gilda.  There are plot points which remind me of D.O.A. and Shawshank Redemption as well as scenes which reminded me of Sin City and the bar scene is an obvious nod to Gilda, but reminded me of a number of other classic noirs.  So is this just a rehash of great noir films of the past?  Yes and no, it is, but it adds a lot of originality as well.

The story starts with our hero in prison for a murder he did not commit.  Zahary Baharov plays our hero and has appeared in a few American productions.  We use flashbacks to tell his story of how he got in prison and some of his adventures while in prison.  The main story takes place over one day, the day he gets out of prison for good behavior.  He is meet at the gate by two men who give him a ride.  Along the way we meet our hero’s first love, a classic femme fatale in every sense, played by Tanya Ilieva.  She starts out as his sweetheart in school, after prison she is singing in a night club and far more jaded about life.  We also come across an old partner named Slug.

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This story is really dark and puts a lot of grim noir scenarios in an hour and a half.  There are also some comedic moments, most of them I did not find funny, maybe it was lost in translation.   Overall an enjoyable neo noir film. I didn’t know a bunch about this one but glad I was able to see it.  This is going to be for foreign noir fans and people who enjoy avant-garde foreign films.

Review: Killers

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Killers is a neo noir film from the The Mo Brothers(Kimo Stamboel, Timo Tjahjanto).  This takes place as much on the internet as in its two physical locations of Tokyo and Jakarta.  This is two stories of two men who interact on the internet and their stories intertwine throughout.

The movie starts with our first story centering around Nomura, played by Kazuki Kitamura.  We find him torturing and murdering a girl, then he posts it on the internet.  Normura has mother and sister issues and reminds you of Norman Bates in a lot of ways.  He is a very disturbing man and is very frightening, Kitamura plays this role very well.

Our second story revolves around Bayu played by Oka Antara.  Bayu is a reporter who is not happy with a certain powerful man in his country who has gotten away with abusing his wife.  This is just the latest in a string a crimes this man has gotten away with.  Bayu is obsessed with this man and bringing him to justice. Bayu soon finds Nomura’s video of his murder online and is strangely fascinated.   Bayu and his wife are separated and after one evening bring his daughter to his wife’s house and trying to win his wife back, Bayu falls asleep in a cab on his way home.  He wakes up in an empty lot with the cab driver wanting to mug him and the cab drivers big friend trying to rape him.  There is a struggle and Bayu comes out on top, he films the cab driver as he dies.  He soon uploads his own murder video to the internet and Bayu and Normura start a relationship.

Bayu continues his murder spree, killing bad men as a vigilante as Normura continues his psycho killings.  Their stories run parallel as well as intertwine throughout the film with many twists and turns.

This is a very good neo noir foreign film worth a look if you are a fan of Asian cinema.  If you like serial killers and vigilantes you will also enjoy this film.  These two stories, each on their own would still make a good film but not overly original, twisted up into one movie makes this film very fresh and enjoyable.

Re-Watching the Best of 2014: True Detective Season 1

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LjGKxgQP I started this site in January of this year, and there are a handful of great neo-noirs that came out last year I didn’t get to cover.  I know everybody has already seen these and probably wrote their own review.  I still wanted to re-watch these films and television series again and put my own review out there on the world-wide web.  Here is the first of those reviews. True Detective is an original series from noir author Nic Pizzolatto.  I have read Pizzolatto’s novel Galveston before watching this series and found it a very good book.  Something fans of the show may want to read. This anthology series stars Matthew McConaughey as Rust and Woody Harrelson as Marty.  I would classify both as hardboiled,  Rust being the more so of the two. k14lysr4msp2q5887mjy This story starts out with our duo getting interviewed by two detectives played by Michael Potts and Tory Kittles.  Both are being interviewed individually about a case that happened 17 years ago.  In typical noir fashion we get our story with a series of flashbacks.  We quickly see our detectives are worse for wear 17 years after the story started and through 8 episodes we find out why. Our case from 17 years ago is a murder where the body has been staged in a ritualistic way.  This case has no suspects or witnesses and very few clues to go on.  The clues also leads to some missing children cases that may be related to the murder.  Our story takes us to dive bars, whore houses, meth labs, stripper bars, burned down churches and lots of Louisiana backwoods locations. We have a bunch of great characters in this, some are small parts and some are much bigger.  Our lead female, is Marty’s wife played by Michelle Monaghan.  Marty, and Rust for that matter, keep her away from the darkness of the case.  I would consider her Rust’s femme fatale.  We also get two more interesting femme fatales, though they are not part of the murders they do trip up Marty in his private life.  Alexandra Daddario appears in the first half and Lili Simmons in the second half. The show plays more like an 8 hour movie then a television show.  You will want to watch the next episode as soon as you finish one.  The story is intricate, intriguing, and addictive.  The music is dark and fits the southern Gothic feel, T Bone Burnett did a great job with the score. We will be getting a season 2 of True Detective this summer.  It has a high standard to live up to and I hope it can.  The new cast looks outstanding and the trailer looks great.  We go from our country noir setting to one of the most famous of noir locales in Los Angeles.  Can Pizzolatto keep the dark, intensity with the city landscape, a new story, and a new cast?  I look forward to seeing it and if it’s as good as the first season we are in for a treat.

Re-watching: Kalifonia

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Kalifornia is a road trip noir directed by Dominic Sena and written by Stephen Levy and Tim Metcalfe.  This also has an amazing cast of four.  Brad Pitt plays the psychopath Early Grayce and steals the show with his performance.  This is fairly early in his career, just after his break through role in A River Runs Through It.  We will see Pitt in quite a few neo-noir films through the decade of the 1990’s.  Juliette Lewis plays Early’s girlfriend and is no stranger to playing characters who are a little off the wall.  David Duchovny plays our hero, a writer who gets in over his head, and his girlfriend is played by Michelle Forbes.

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Our story starts with Duchovny getting a gig writing a book about serial killers and plans a trip across the country to visit sites of famous murders.  His girlfriend is excited, because as a photographer she wants to go to California and this is their chance.  The don’t have enough money to make it on their own so they advertise to find somebody that will share the ride.  Pitt and Lewis live in a trailer and are down on their luck.  They owe back rent and don’t have a job.  They soon decide to start over in California.  Before they leave Pitt kills the landlord and torches the trailer and his car.  The four all meet at a bus depot and start our adventure across the country.

This film is shot in a very noir style and the story is very dark.  We visit a lot of strange and disturbing locations as the crew traverse the country.  The performances from our four main actors are spot on.

This may not be a classic, but maybe it should be.  Maybe it gets over shadowed by Pitt’s other movies to come like Seven and Fight Club.  If you haven’t seen this in a while you should go back and re-watch it too.  If you haven’t seen it yet, seek it out, you will enjoy it.

Favorite Tidbit:  The four famous murder scene locations all are named after our four main characters in some way.