Recently I attended a workshop where we attempted to
re-create the classic photographic style that is ‘Film Noir’. This is a favourite look of
mine, so I was particularly interested in mastering the lighting.
Surprising to me, on this occasion the look was created by
studio flash, whereas I had always associated this style with continuous lighting.
The term ‘Film Noir’ was first coined by the French film critic Nino Frank in 1946. Influences have been attributed to the German expressionist cinematic movement of the 1930’s, championed in the films of Fritz Lang.
It is generally thought to be based around stylish Hollywood crime
dramas, usually featuring a cynical private detective and a femme fatale both
with a fatalistic attitude to life. Film Noir actually covers a number of
genres, including horror and science fiction.
The genre is associated with low key lighting and unbalanced
composition within the scenes. Perhaps the best known example is that of ‘The
Maltese Falcon’ starring Humphrey Bogart as the private detective with Mary
Astor as the ‘femme fatale’.
Many of the ideas for plots were taken from the popularity of American cheap crime dramas produced in paperback, generally known by the derogatory term 'pulp fiction'.
This happened to form the title of one of Quentin Tarantino’s take on the genre, producing a film in the more modernist form dubbed ‘Neo-Noir’.
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