Geek Syndicate
Of course, this being noir,
things don’t stay ordinary
or healthy for very long.
After an idea from out of
the blue and a subsequent
hitchhiking trip and then...
there is the coincidence...
and then as some conversation from the film explains...
“Not much luck?”
“Sure, all bad!’
Then there was a woman, a
scheme and a murder.
All the tropes are present: Fog
drenched street lights and
murky shadows; night-time
driving (probably shot at daytime with a filter); razor-sharp
dialogue and slang; feisty
femme-fatale; plenty of smoking and the drinking of shorts;
cash; ambitious plots; cops;
rain; greed; and of course,
murder. The acting can’t be
20
described as top notch and
the directing will never win
awards, but you don’t notice.
You’re hooked to the poor
schmuck’s story. Detour is not
a long film but it does contain
all the essential elements for a
film-noir. Small but perfectly
formed.
The (Other) Ten Greatest
Film Noirs
• The Maltese Falcon, 1941
Starring: Tom Humphrey
Bogart and Mary Astor,
Dir: John Huston 100 mins.
Sam Spade, private eye,
is hired to protect a woman but after his partner is
shot, everything gets dicey.
Everyone is after the little
black bird and seductive
conversations are everywhere. Is Spade in love?
This film features incredible dialogue, an almost
pointless plot, moral am-
biguity, loneliness and an
untrustworthy dame.
• Double
Indemnity,
1944
starring: Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck
and Edward G. Robinson,
Dir: Billy Wilder 107 mins.
An ordinary insurance man
meets a seductive blonde,
falls in love and plots to kill
her husband. But does his
boss suspect him? Has he
been taken for a ride? Is
there no way out of this fix?
This features a man whose
life is spiraling out of control, a doomed romance,
murder, loose morals and
an untrustworthy dame.
• The Killers, 1946 Starring: Burt Lancaster and
Ava Gardner, Dir: Robert Siodmak 103 mins.
Two mysterious killers turn
up in a run of the mill town.