OUT OF THE PAST AND INTO FLARES: NEO-NOIR IN 1970s AMERICA

As political corruption, disillusionment with 1960s optimism, and growing outrage over the Vietnam War became increasingly pertinent in the United States in the early 1970s, Hollywood’s reins were taken over by a generation mostly born during its “Golden Age”. Innately conscious of genre conventions and feeling an affinity with the psychological destabilisation of the immediate post-World War II era, filmmakers and audiences were, as noted by Paul Schrader in his iconic and influential 1972 essay “Notes on Film Noir”, “again taking a look at the underside of the American character”. Adapting and reinventing the forms of Hollywood’s ’40s and ’50s crime procedurals and melodramas without the restrictions of Production Code censorship, “neo-noir” of the ’70s further heightened the genre’s sense of alienation and moral ambivalence through an even deeper pessimism, ironic self-referentiality and an autumnal melancholy, and through the careful deployment of ageing figures from the genre’s classic period such as Robert Mitchum in The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973) and John Huston in Chinatown (1974). These films also channelled the confusion and disillusionment of their era by recasting noir’s world through the lens of contemporary filmmaking, replacing the high-contrast black-and-white imagery of classic crime cinema with, for example, the sun-stroked haziness of Robert Altman’s The Long Goodbye (1973) or the murky darkness of Alan J. Pakula’s Klute (1971). This season surveys a variety of works made both within and outside of the Hollywood system, roughly spanning the period from the close of the ’60s to the resignation of President Richard Nixon in the wake of Watergate in 1974, exploring how America’s fractured psyche was reflected on screen during this vibrant and chaotic period.

Wednesday 26 March

7:00pm THE LONG GOODBYE

Robert Altman (1973) 112 mins – M

Made in the middle of the extraordinary run of eight features Altman completed in the first half of the 1970s, this loose and playful adaptation of Raymond Chandler’s 1953 detective novel provides a fascinating take on the genre, Hollywood’s legacy and the vertical landscape of Los Angeles. Elliott Gould laconically transforms Chandler’s Marlowe into a cat-loving, down-on-his-luck private eye whose moral code is severely challenged by the selfish insularity of modern America. Featuring an extraordinary rogues’ gallery of supporting players including Sterling Hayden, Mark Rydell, Nina van Pallandt, Henry Gibson and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

9:10pm DIRTY HARRY

Don Siegel (1971) 102 mins – MA 15+

Clint Eastwood and the mythic “certainties” of the classic Hollywood genre movie collide with the chaos and decay of a factionalised early 1970s urban America, the New Society, and law and order politics. Featuring a memorable score by Lalo Schifrin and gritty San Francisco locations filmed by Bruce Surtees, Siegel’s influential neo-noir draws upon the notorious real-life case of the Zodiac killer in its troubling exploration of justice, ethics, fascism and the limits of lawful society. Siegel’s definitive statement on the conservative backlash remains disturbingly relevant to our times.

CTEQ ANNOTATION
Dirty Harry
by Rick Thompson

Wednesday 2 April

7:00pm KLUTE

Alan J. Pakula (1971) 114 mins – M

At the height of her fame as an actor and anti-war activist, Jane Fonda starred in her Oscar-winning role as a high-class Manhattan sex worker embroiled in a murder case. Commercially and critically successful on release, this is celebrated as much as a “neo-woman’s film” (Molly Haskell) as it is a neo-noir. The innovative score by Michael Small, combined with a stylistic focus on aural surveillance, prophetically reflects the political paranoia of the era. Cinematography by frequent Pakula collaborator Gordon Willis (often called the “prince of darkness” for his work on this, The Godfather and several other films). With Donald Sutherland and Roy Scheider.

CTEQ ANNOTATION
Klute
by Karli Lukas

9:10pm THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE

Peter Yates (1973) 102 mins – M

Based on the celebrated novel by George V. Higgins, Yates’ tersely directed, moodily scored (by Dave Grusin), fatalistic, gritty and suspenseful drama, set in Boston’s criminal underworld, is now widely regarded as one of the key 1970s neo-noirs, despite being largely ignored by audiences on first release. Robert Mitchum plays a low-level middleman who gets caught behind the wheel of a truck full of stolen goods. As he tries to navigate the intricacies of staying out of jail, it becomes apparent just how many of his “friends” are caught in the same web of non-existent loyalties. With Peter Boyle.

Wednesday 9 April

7:00pm CHINATOWN

Roman Polanski (1974) 130 mins – M

By reflecting the unease of the Vietnam War and Watergate era, Polanski masterfully updates the classic noir formula to create “one of the most unremittingly bleak statements on How Things Work in America” (Scott Tobias). Jack Nicholson plays J. J. “Jake” Gittes, hired to investigate suspected infidelity but quickly drawn into a dense web of crime and corruption set against the backdrop of internecine disputes over the water supply to Los Angeles. Boasting stellar performances by Nicholson, Faye Dunaway and John Huston, a masterfully structured script by Robert Towne, and a stunning recreation of sun-drenched 1930s LA, this is frequently cited as one of the greatest films of all time.

4K DCP.

9:25pm THE HONEYMOON KILLERS

Leonard Kastle (1970) 107 mins – M

An obsessive nurse forces her attentions upon an underwhelming grifter. Before long the affair mutates into a swindling and killing spree of bizarre violence and petite bourgeois self-delusion. This twisted tale, loosely based on late ’40s noirish facts updated to the crass aesthetics of the ’60s, is both a cult gross-out classic and a witty fable of deluded love and moral paradox. Initially helmed by Martin Scorsese and based on the infamous “Lonely Hearts Killers” case, it was taken over by screenwriter and opera director Kastle for his only feature.

35mm print.