Film Noir

Themes

Indecision (تردید، دو دلی)

Repressed sexual impulsion

Plots

Noir plots are easily identified because most revolve around a hardboiled detective with a questionable moral compass that must solve a crime driven by jealousy, passion, alienation or false suspicions. The detective, though a series of flashbacks and interactions with unsavory characters and plenty of femme fatales, must conquer their moral complexities

Cinematography

Black-and-white

Wide lenses

Low angles

Lighting

Always low key

Dramatic juxtapositions between dark and light become the film’s key, shadowy visual component (even in Noirs that are in full color, lighting often emphasizes the play between dark and light in a scene).

Editing

Devices such as wipes/washes

Mise en scène

Interesting is the use of mirrors and reflections; characters are frequently reflected in mirrors, or through windows/glasses.

An important part of telling a deeper story in Noir films is the visual

Femme Fatale

Each type of film noir woman functions in a way that undermines society's image of the traditional family.

1. The femme fatale, an independent, ambitious woman who feels confined within a marriage or a close male-female relationship and attempts to break free, usually with violent results;

2. The nurturing woman, who is often depicted as dull, featureless, and, in the end, unattainable a chance at conventional marriage that is denied to the hero;

3. Marrying type, a woman who threatens the hero by insisting that he marry her and accept his conventional role as husband and father.