Five Emigre Directors and the Rise of Film Noir
Martin Marks
No enrollment limit, no advance sign up
Participants welcome at individual sessions (series)
This series will demonstrate how film noir emerged as a powerful alternative to other film styles and genres in Hollywood from the 1930s to the 1950s. Many of these still carry a punch, due to their emphasis on pervasive corruption and crime as forces disrupting the social fabric and civic virtue. Their dark and complexly-textured visual styles, convoluted plots with femme fatales, psychotic villains, and flawed heroes, have become enduring motifs, picked up again and again in "neo-noir." The series will present key films by four émigré directors who moved to Hollywood when the Nazis rose to power: Edgar Ulmer, Fritz Lang, Robert Siodmak, and Billy Wilder. Their turn to Noir film-making was an urgent response to the ongoing political crises in their native countries, as well as responses to the terrible tragedies witnessed and experienced in their personal lives. Series hosted by Martin Marks, who will give brief introductions to each film prior to its screening. A short discussion period will follow each film.
Contact: Martin Marks, mmmarks@MIT.EDU
Sponsor: Comparative Media Studies
Double Indemnity (1944)
Martin Marks
directed by Billy Wilder
Mon Jan 9, 03-05:00pm, 2-105
The Woman in the Window (1944)
Martin Marks
directed by Fritz Lang
Wed Jan 11, 03-05:00pm, 2-105
Detour (1945)
Martin Marks
directed by Edgar Ulmer
Wed Jan 18, 03-05:00pm, 2-105
The Spiral Staircase (1945)
Martin Marks
directed by Robert Siodmak
Mon Jan 23, 03-05:00pm, 2-105
The Killers (1946)
Martin Marks
directed by Robert Siodmak
Wed Jan 25, 03-05:00pm, 2-105
Where the Sidewalk Ends (1950)
Martin Marks
directed by Otto Preminger
Mon Jan 30, 03-05:00pm, 2-105
Latest update: 01-Dec-2011
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