Tuesday, July 2, 2013

Hollywood in 1940's


Haven’t watched much of World Cinema in recent weeks, for some time I turned my attention to the 1940’s Hollywood black-white comedy\filmnoir movies. One thing for sure that everyone ( characters in the film) were cool, even when there is a murder happening just two-feet from them, there is hardly a sweat and most of the lead characters smoked like an old-chimney.



Comedy-
For long time, I was looking for a Marx Brothers film. Had chance to watch- Room Service(1938). I thought it was a decent comedy from Groucho Marx who stars in a nearly-broke Stage producer trying to get his play to stage and the confusion arising with the hotel manager and the sponsor.




Mystery-
This is something a familiar story as it is from Agatha Christie, And Then There Were None (1945). 
Ten people are invited to an island, one-by-one murdered, who is the killer-type film. This was supposed to be a gore-film, but I didn't see any blood. Well-made film.



Film Noir-


This is where the dark crime drama begins, The Reckless Moment (1949), Whirlpool (1949), TheAsphalt Jungle (1950), Out of the Past (1947) and Dead Reckoning (1947).

Although of same genre, each film has a different ways of treating the story, one thing common in all is there is no iota of comedy in all. 




The lead character is always a person who had lost hope in life and who is always looking for it. The hope arrives in love, money or a place, but finally fate places a role and grabs the “hope” making the lead role to either die or perish in his\her lone world.

This is what I refer as a negative ending; I think people didn't have much hope in that period of 1940’s. The reason might be the world wars, but I see there were equally comic and romance films in those periods too.






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