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Film Noir and the Arts of Lighting

by Patrick Keating

Paperback

$37.95

Hardback

$130.00

eBook (ePub)

$37.95

eBook (PDF)

$37.95

Quantity

Price:: $37.95
ISBN:: 9781978810259
Published:: Jul 12, 2024

Release Date:: 12th July 2024
Publisher:: Rutgers University Press
Imprint:: Rutgers University Press
Series:: Techniques of the Moving Image
Pages:: 266

Description
Praise
Contents
Authors

More than any other set of films from the classical era, the Hollywood film noir is known for its lighting: the cast shadows, the blinking street signs, the eyes sparkling in the darkness. Each effect is rich in symbolism, evoking a world of danger and doppelgangers. But what happens if we set aside the symbolism? This book offers a new account of film noir lighting, grounded in a larger theory of Hollywood cinematography as emotionally engaging storytelling. Above all, noir lighting is dynamic, switching from darkness to brightness and back again as characters change, locations shift, and fates unfold. Richly illustrated, Film Noir and the Arts of Lighting features in-depth analyses of eleven classic movies: The Asphalt Jungle, Sorry, Wrong Number, Odds against Tomorrow, The Letter, I Wake Up Screaming, Phantom Lady, Strangers on a Train, Sweet Smell of Success, Gaslight, Secret beyond the Door, and Touch of Evil.

“What a glamorous book! By glamorous, I mean sophisticated, dramatic, and mysterious, using Patrick Keating’s own definition of the term. That is, with his refined textual analysis and emotionally engaging writing style, Keating sheds lights on film noir’s inexplicable seductiveness.”
- Daisuke Miyao

“Patrick Keating is our ablest commentator on the power of cinematography in American film's history. In this newest volume, Keating stunningly demonstrates how our overall grasp of Hollywood studio-era filmmaking is enriched when we take film noir not as a subversion of the system but its enrichment — an expressive extension of its visual means to some of their most innovative ends. There are rich insights in every turn of the page of this consequential study."

- Dana Polan

"Like a great cinematographer, Keating sheds light on both the form and function of lighting within film noir, substantially recasting our understanding of much of classical Hollywood cinema in the process. A must-read work for noir aficionados and scholars alike."

- Donna Kornhaber

Note on the Text
1 Introduction
2 The Dramatic Arc
3 Lighting Characters
4 Genre, Adaptation, and the Art of Unfolding
5 Lighting Milieu
6 Subjectivity, Symbolism, and Depiction
7 Conclusion
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Index

PATRICK KEATING is a professor in the Department of Communication at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas. He is the author of The Dynamic Frame: Camera Movement in Classical Hollywood and the editor of Cinematography (Rutgers University Press).

Related topics: Art / Popular Culture