Film Noir (Bibliotheca Universalis)
Category: Books,Humor & Entertainment,Movies
Film Noir (Bibliotheca Universalis) Details
Review “Crime has never looked so good.” Read more About the Author Film producer, critic and historian Alain Silver is the author of 20 books on cinematic topics, including The Noir Style, LA Noir, the Film Noir Reader series, and Steve McQueen, Frank Sinatra, and Katharine Hepburn for TASCHEN's Icon Series. His audio commentaries on classic film noir DVDs include Call Northside 777 and Double Indemnity. A member of the Directors Guild of America, the Screen Actors Guild, and the Writers Guild of America, he graduated from UCLA with degrees in film production and critical studies.James Ursini has co-written eleven books with Alain Silver, including their Film Noir Reader series, which established them as two of the foremost authorities on film noir. Ursini has also written for various film magazines and supplied the commentary for numerous classic film noir DVDs. He has a doctorate in motion pictures studies and lectures on filmmaking in the Los Angeles area.Paul Duncan is a film historian whose TASCHEN books include The James Bond Archives, The Charlie Chaplin Archives, The Godfather Family Album, Taxi Driver, Film Noir, and Horror Cinema, as well as publications on film directors, film genres, movie stars, and film posters.Jürgen Müller holds the chair of Early Modern and Modern Art History at the Technical University of Dresden. He studied art history at the universities of Bochum, Münster, Pisa, Paris and Amsterdam, and has worked as an art critic and curated numerous exhibitions. He is also the editor of TASCHEN’s movies by decade series. Read more
Reviews
This book is a delight. It's absolutely crammed with pictures, details, observations, information, trivia, facts, and theories and... yeah, it is completely wonderful.The only real problem with this book is that now I have dozens more noir films on my to-be-watched list. Such a problem to have, huh?Basically, the whole book is essay after essay devoted to the visual aspects of film noir. The essays have titles like "Rooms like Reveries: Interiors and Interiority in Film Noir" (Imogen Sara Smith), "The Gangster and Film Noir" (Alain Silver), "Fragments of the Mirror: Hitchcock's Noir Landscape" (Alain Silver), and "Women's Song and Dance Performances in Film Noir" (Christophe Gelly and Delphine Letort) -- you can see how enticing they are to someone who enjoys this film style!By far, my favorite essay was "Nothingness and Purpose: Light and shadow in It's a Wonderful Life" by Todd Erickson. I've always felt that Wonderful Life was a much darker movie that it gets credit for, and so much darker than most Christmas movies -- I heartily agree with Erickson that it has noir in its heart.If you're a fan of film noir and love learning about how movies are made, love delving into what's going on below the surface of a story, or just generally love reading about movies, you will probably enjoy this book.
