A guest post by Christie Santo
Noir romance sounds contradictory when you think about it. Noir, as defined, is characterized by its cynicism, fatalism, and moral ambiguity; hard to combine that with the excitement and mystery associated with love and romance. Yet, many films hold this premise.
Notable film-noir romances
Renowned Noir romances include Gilda, Out of the Past, In A Lonely Place, and the most acclaimed Double Indemnity and The Postman Always Rings Twice. Although you would expect no possibility of a noir having a happy ending, many do (Clash by Night, Pickup on South Street, Gilda, Out of the Past, etc.). However, the HEA (happily ever after) doesn’t come without a price.
Noir tropes
When my husband and I sat down to write our Neo-Noir Romance, Ravens In The Rain, we knew we wanted to include the illustrious tropes. The heavy contrast lighting, Venetian blinds, the femme fatale, the detective type, the hard-luck love story, and an inconvenient crime that pulls in the protagonist. Not all Noir contains these tropes, although many do. There are so many tropes to pull from, more than I’ve listed here. And the rules of Noir are heavily debated. As the Neo-Noir genre grows, the standards are subverted and reinvented in other forms. One element remains: the cynical hero may or may not come out unscathed.
Heavy contrast lighting
Most of the film noirs from the ‘30s, ‘40s, and ’50s would fall into the “B Movie” category. The low cost required by the studios provided the directors and cinematographers with creative opportunities, and the distorted realism of German Expressionism fit the bill, literally. Single setups with multiple actors reduced filming time. And heavy contrast low-key lighting limited the cost of set design. The byproduct is hyper-expressive performances and intense focus upon the emotional building blocks of the plot. Eventually, the success of these films and the hard-edged performances it stimulated helped show that Noir is adaptable to a higher finish.
Femme fatale
She’s the attractive seductress who’s likely to cause trouble, intentional or otherwise. She uses her beauty and charms to pursue her desires, and sometimes to the detriment of herself, as well. In modern times, this trope often is subverted to represent its opposite, the homme fatale.
The detective
He’s the private eye, detective, cop, or reporter whose investigatory discovery is the plot’s narrative. Usually, they are dragged into this investigation, reluctantly or unwillingly at first. This trope can also represent any curious protagonist.
Disillusion/pessimism
Noir, in French, means black or dark. The term film noir was first stated by French critic Nino Frank in 1946, referring to the pessimistic nature of this collection of films. That the “rejection of sentimental humanism” is common among them.
The crime
I haven’t seen a noir that doesn’t have a crime or at least the threat of a crime. If it’s not the instigating event, or the world in which the characters live, or what the characters are building up to, like a heist, then you know it will come in like a bang in the third act.
Paranoia, claustrophobia, faltering grasp on reality
When you are deep in a tunnel and the light is dwindling, it’s easy to lose your grasp on the horizon, get turned upside down, or panic with thoughts of the unknown. Use of paranoia, claustrophobia, poisonings, or drunk blackouts are often used in noir for that very reason. At some point, going down the rabbit hole will have you losing your grip on reality.
Urban decay
The setting usually matches the mindset of the protagonist. It’s a dark, dark world out there where hope is hard to come by and a snake around every corner.
Hard luck love story
If a noir includes a love story, it never runs its course smoothly, and if they do end up together in the end, it’s not without some headache. There was a lot of headache in Gilda. (Spoilers) Rita Hayworth’s character puts her love interest through the wringer for no good reason, for in the end, when the misunderstanding is put to rest, all is right again. However, in In a Lonely Place, ending up together is impossible because of all the previous psychological damage.
Film noir vs. hardboiled crime
Film noir defined a genre of filmmaking during a specific time, but some of those films were adaptations from novels. And those books were not categorized or known as noir. It was the films that made them so. In novels, Noir can be many different genres (crime, suspense, hardboiled, detective fiction, or mystery). Yet those genres aren’t in their entirety considered noir. Would you look for a psychological romantic mystery in the hardboiled crime section? So even though many film noirs have come from hardboiled crime, it is not an exact match.
Noir should have its own genre category with correlating sub-genres, especially in today’s ever-changing digital world where niche interests are becoming more and more popular. You should be able to search for noir and its sub-genres (noir romance, or noir sci-fi, or western noir, or the ever-growing Nordic noir).
Hopefully, this inspires you to watch and read more noir, noir romance, or contemporary noir. For starters, you can read Ravens In The Rain: A Noir Love Story for release on September 22, 2021.
Ravens In The Rain: A Noir Love Story
Ravens In The Rain is an unconventional noir between a woman with a past and a man with no future where love is no fairy tale. Carney and Pru, down on luck and down on love, meet over a game of chance, and the mystery of the other’s intentions, compounded by their overwhelming attraction toward each other, compels them into a game of cat and mouse. They ante up and play this game of love or survival that has you wondering who’s the villain and who’s the hero and how it will all play out. When murder is brought to their doorstep the game gets serious.
A psychological tale between a poet and a filmmaker that has even the cat wondering if it’s really the mouse, what is real, and who is telling the truth. Is love on the table? Or is it life?
Authors’ links (links will open in a new tab)
Christie & Jeff Santo
Authors of Ravens In The Rain: A Noir Love Story
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