num_pages: 240
description: Foster Hirsch's Dark Side of the Screen is by far the most thorough and entertaining study of the themes visual motifs character types actors directors and films in this genre ever published. From Billy Wilder Douglas Sirk Robert Aldrich and Howard Hawkes to Martin Scorsese Roman Polanski and Paul Schrader the noir themes of dread paranoia steamy sex double-crossing women and menacing cityscapes have held a fascination. The features that make Burt Lancaster Joan Crawford Robert Mitchum and Humphrey Bogart into noir heroes and heroines are carefully detailed here as well as those camera angles lighting effects and story lines that characterize Fritz Lang Samuel Fuller and Orson Welles as noir directors.For the current rediscovery of film noir this comprehensive history with its list of credits to 112 outstanding films and its many illustrations will be a valuable reference and a source of inspiration for further research.
language: English
title: The Dark Side Of The Screen: Film Noir
publisher: Da Capo Press