Film Noir

James Naremore is Emeritus Chancellors' Professor at Indiana University, where he taught literature and film courses in the departments of English, Comparative Literature, and Communication and Culture. He has lectured widely in the US, Britain, and Europe, and has been a guest professor at the University of Hamburg in Germany, the University of Chicago, the Art Institute of Chicago, and UCLA. His many writings on film, which have been translated into ten languages, include books on acting, genre, and theoretical issues; as well as on directors Orson Welles, Stanley Kubrick, Vincente Minnelli, and Charles Burnett. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Gallery of Art, and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He was also awarded the President's Medal from Indiana University.

• Preface1: The idea of film noir2: The modernist crime novel and Hollywood noir3: Censorship and politics in Hollywood noir4: Budgets and critical discrimination5: Styles of film noir6: The afterlife of noir and the changing mediascapeFurther readingIndex

James Naremore, film noir's most subtle historian, has given us the most incisive, wide-ranging study of this powerful cinematic tradition. His book admirably analyzes trends in the critical literature, traces the social and cultural contexts of noir, and introduces strikingly original ideas--notably noir's ties to literary modernism. As a bonus, Naremore presents carefully judged and gracefully written appreciations of important movies from The Maltese Falcon to Mulholland Drive and beyond. His book is an indispensable work for both novice and connoisseur.