Want to buy or sell something? Check the classifieds
  • The Fedora Lounge is supported in part by commission earning affiliate links sitewide. Please support us by using them. You may learn more here.

Film Noir...in Color?

Seb Lucas

I'll Lock Up
Messages
7,562
Location
Australia
I'm personally opposed to colorizing classic film noir movies... However, I have been amazed by modern colored noir movies. One of my favorite films in recent years was Brick by Rian Johnson (director of Star Wars: The Last Jedi). Trailer below:


I highly recommend checking this movie out.
It's a cute film but it's not so much noir as a parody of noir, complete with "hard boiled " dialogue all set in a high school. Highly watchable.
 

blueAZNmonkey

One Too Many
Messages
1,446
Location
San Diego, CA
It's a cute film but it's not so much noir as a parody of noir, complete with "hard boiled " dialogue all set in a high school. Highly watchable.

I'm not sure I would classify Brick as a parody, per se. It takes itself too seriously overall. Perhaps insofar as it is a commentary on noir, it's a parody. But I would certainly still consider it a noir film. It's taken the elements and in a very serious way, applied them to modern cinema.
 

Seb Lucas

I'll Lock Up
Messages
7,562
Location
Australia
A parody doesn't have to be played for laughs. Doing it seriously is really the only good way to play satire. The po-faced, laconic seriousness of Brick is part of the film's satirical approach, giving us all a complete set of hard boiled, noir attributes (characters, tropes, cinematography, 1940's dialogue) set ultra-incongruously in a modern, semi-rural high school. That's pretty funny right there. I must say my friends and I laughed all the way through Brick, in appreciation of the amusing contradictions and juxtapositions. It's not a broad spoof, it's a deeply ironic parody that plays it straight and is all the more infectious because of this.
 
Last edited:

blueAZNmonkey

One Too Many
Messages
1,446
Location
San Diego, CA
A parody doesn't have to be played for laughs. Doing it seriously is really the only good way to play satire. The po-faced, laconic seriousness of Brick is part of the film's satirical approach, giving us all a complete set of hard boiled, noir attributes (characters, tropes, cinematography, 1940's dialogue) set ultra-incongruously in a modern, semi-rural high school. That's pretty funny right there. I must say my friends and I laughed all the way through Brick, in appreciation of the amusing contradictions and juxtapositions. It's not a broad spoof, it's a deeply ironic parody that plays it straight and is all the more infectious because of this.

True that -- placing the archetypes of a genre into an unusual setting is certainly a parody move. Glad you enjoyed it -- I love this movie.
 

Forum statistics

Threads
107,031
Messages
3,026,753
Members
52,533
Latest member
RacerJ
Top