Dave Zeltserman wrote:
Do you have any examples [of noir endings where the
protagonist is not totally screwed]?
********** Bucky gets away with the babe and all his
appendages in Ellroy's The Black Dahlia. Charles Williams's
Dead Calm, Scorpion Reef, and Sailcloth Shroud. McGivern's
The Big Heat. The Big Clock. I have not mentioned any of the
leading hardboiled detective novels because I don't see them
as being noir. As MrT has noted, most of those guys are
simply too tough for noir.
It could be argued that those books aren't noir because the
lead character slips away with some hope, and I wouldn't
object too highly to that. There are other genres that are
predominantly defined by the ending. My only reservation is
that before you ever get to the ending there are several
characteristics that can give a noir feel. Jim's "dark and
sinister" atmosphere weighs in here. A weak and immoral
character enslaved to his own criminal compulsions is
another.
One of our main problems in defining noir has been the method
of definition, requiring firm fixed characteristics shared by
all in the category. A fellow by the name of Wittgenstein
came up with an alternate method involving a group of
characteristics for a category, of which a particular element
would reflect one or more. At first, this method of
definition might appear unacceptably arbitrary, but try and
define something like a "game" without it.
miker
__________________________________________________ Do You
Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam
protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 21 Dec 2006 EST