Every Sunday at 10AM and every Saturday at midnight on Turner Classic Movies Eddie Muller dishes up a movie from the film noir genre, which is hard to define per se, but I'll try. Some people say it is a style of cinematography, some call them "gangster films", some say it is isolated to between 1940 and 1960. But none of those descriptions do the genre justice. Film noir was basically a reaction to the production code era films that, beginning in 1934, served up a very sterile view of life. You get some great epics and musicals from this era, but largely the viewpoint of life is naive, and that was done on purpose not by accident, enforced by rigid purist and head censor Joe Breen. But then came World War II, and with all of man's inhumanity to man that war revealed, Hollywood decided to go back and take a walk on the dark side of life in some films, thus film noir. To me that is what the genre is about - investigating the dark side of the personalities of not just career criminals, but what you'd call "respectable citizens" maybe just because one temptation was thrown their way. This is the kind of film highlighted in this program, hosted by Eddie Muller, president of the Film Noir Society.
When I was sick over Christmas I spent much of my bedridden time watching Eddie Muller's exit and intro comments on Noir Alley. They are about five minutes each and very informative and entertaining. Some of the films, if shown without Eddie's comments, I would have reacted with -"meh". But Eddie had me looking for certain details and makes the viewing experience memorable because of what was wrong with the film as much as because of what was right with it.
Let me give you a sample of what he said about the 1954 film "Pushover" and Fred MacMurray's role in it - "If Chip and Ernie could have seen dad's fuse lit by sex bomb Kim Novak, I think those boys would have grown up a whole lot faster." Or something to that effect. To paraphrase General Patton, a man this eloquent must be savored.
This is must see viewing for me.
