The 5 Essential Rules of Film Noir — openculture.com

“That’s life. Whichever way you turn, Fate sticks out a foot to trip you.” – Al Robert (Tom Neal), Detour Film Noir. When you think that phrase, the mind is immediately drawn to images of leggy ice queens, rumbled losers in fedoras, guns, neon and certain deadpan cynicism. Film Noir wasn’t a self conscious movement in the way the French New Wave was. It wasn’t a brand name like a Marvel superhero epic. But it did tap into something dark in the American postwar zeitgeist and became for a spell hugely popular. It also created some of the most unforgettable images in film history.

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