Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as stretching from the early 1940s to the late 1950s. Film noir of this era is associated with a low-key black-and-white visual style that has roots in German Expressionist cinematography. Many of the prototypical stories and much of the attitude of classic noir derive from the hardboiled school of crime fiction that emerged in the United States during the Depression.

The term ''film noir'', French for "black film", first applied to Hollywood films by French critic Nino Frank in 1946, was unknown to most American film industry professionals of the classic era. Cinema historians and critics defined the noir canon in retrospect. Before the notion was widely adopted in the 1970s, many of the classic film noirs were referred to as melodramas. The question of whether film noir qualifies as a distinct genre is a matter of ongoing debate among scholars.

Film noir encompasses a range of plots—the central figure may be a private eye (''The Big Sleep''), a plainclothes policeman (''The Big Heat''), an aging boxer (''The Set-Up''), a hapless grifter (''Night and the City''), a law-abiding citizen lured into a life of crime (''Gun Crazy''), or simply a victim of circumstance (''D.O.A.''). Though the noir mode was originally identified with American productions, films now customarily described as noir have been made around the world. Many pictures released from the 1960s onward share attributes with film noirs of the classic period, often treating noir conventions in a self-referential manner. Such latter-day works in a noir mode are often referred to as neo-noirs. The tropes of film noir have inspired parody since the mid-1940s.

Problems of definition

The questions of what defines film noir and what sort of category it is provoke continuing debate. "We'd be oversimplifying things in calling film noir oneiric, strange, erotic, ambivalent, and cruel": this set of attributes constitutes the first of many attempts to define film noir made by French critics Raymond Borde and Etienne Chaumeton in their 1955 book ''Panorama du film noir américain 1941–1953'' (''A Panorama of American Film Noir''), the original and seminal extended treatment of the subject. They emphasize that not every film noir embodies all five attributes in equal measure—one might be more dreamlike; another, particularly brutal. The authors' caveats and repeated efforts at alternative definition have been echoed in subsequent scholarship: in the more than five decades since, there have been innumerable further attempts at definition, yet in the words of cinema historian Mark Bould, film noir remains an "elusive phenomenon ... always just out of reach".

Though film noir is often identified with a visual style, unconventional within a Hollywood context, that emphasizes low-key lighting and unbalanced compositions, films commonly identified as noir evidence a variety of visual approaches, including ones that fit comfortably within the Hollywood mainstream. Film noirs similarly embrace a variety of genres, from the gangster film to the police procedural to the gothic romance to the social problem picture—any example of which from the 1940s and 1950s, now seen as noir's classic era, was likely to be described as a "melodrama" at the time. While many critics refer to film noir as a genre itself, others argue that it can be no such thing. While noir is often associated with an urban setting, many classic noirs take place in small towns, suburbia, rural areas, or on the open road; so setting cannot be its genre determinant, as with the Western. Similarly, while the private eye and the femme fatale are character types conventionally identified with noir, the majority of film noirs feature neither; so there is no character basis for genre designation as with the gangster film. Nor does film noir rely on anything as evident as the monstrous or supernatural elements of the horror film, the speculative leaps of the science fiction film, or the song-and-dance routines of the musical.

A more analogous case is that of the screwball comedy, widely accepted by film historians as constituting a "genre": the screwball is defined not by a fundamental attribute, but by a general disposition and a group of elements, some—but rarely and perhaps never all—of which are found in each of the genre's films. However, because of the diversity of noir (much greater than that of the screwball comedy), certain scholars in the field, such as film historian Thomas Schatz, treat it as not a genre but a "style". Alain Silver, the most widely published American critic specializing in film noir studies, refers to film noir as a "cycle" and a "phenomenon", even as he argues that it has—like certain genres—a consistent set of visual and thematic codes. Other critics treat film noir as a "mood", characterize it as a "series", or simply address a chosen set of films they regard as belonging to the noir "canon". There is no consensus on the matter.

Background

Cinematic sources

Film noir's aesthetics are deeply influenced by German Expressionism, an artistic movement of the 1910s and 1920s that involved theater, photography, painting, sculpture, and architecture, as well as cinema. The opportunities offered by the booming Hollywood film industry and, later, the threat of growing Nazi power led to the emigration of many important film artists working in Germany who had either been directly involved in the Expressionist movement or studied with its practitioners. Directors such as Fritz Lang, Robert Siodmak, and Michael Curtiz brought a dramatically shadowed lighting style and a psychologically expressive approach to visual composition, or mise-en-scène, with them to Hollywood, where they would make some of the most famous of classic noirs. Lang's magnum opus, ''M''—released in 1931, two years before his departure from Germany—is among the first major crime films of the sound era to join a characteristically noirish visual style with a noir-type plot, one in which the protagonist is a criminal (as are his most successful pursuers).

By 1931, Curtiz had already been in Hollywood for half a decade, making as many as six films a year. Movies of his such as ''20,000 Years in Sing Sing'' (1932) and ''Private Detective 62'' (1933) are among the early Hollywood sound films arguably classifiable as noir—scholar Marc Vernet offers the latter as evidence that dating the initiation of film noir to 1940 or any other year is "arbitrary". Giving Expressionist-affiliated filmmakers particularly free stylistic rein were Universal horror pictures such as ''Dracula'' (1931), ''The Mummy'' (1932)—the former photographed and the latter directed by the Berlin-trained Karl Freund—and ''The Black Cat'' (1934), directed by Austrian émigré Edgar G. Ulmer. The Universal horror that comes closest to noir, both in story and sensibility, however, is ''The Invisible Man'' (1933), directed by Englishman James Whale and photographed by American Arthur Edeson. Edeson would subsequently photograph ''The Maltese Falcon'' (1941), widely regarded as the first major film noir of the classic era.

The Vienna-born but largely American-raised Josef von Sternberg was directing in Hollywood at the same time. Films of his such as ''Shanghai Express'' (1932) and ''The Devil Is a Woman'' (1935), with their hothouse eroticism and baroque visual style, specifically anticipate central elements of classic noir. The commercial and critical success of Sternberg's silent ''Underworld'' in 1927 was largely responsible for spurring a trend of Hollywood gangster films. Popular films in the genre such as ''Little Caesar'' (1931), ''The Public Enemy'' (1931), and ''Scarface'' (1932) demonstrated that there was an audience for crime dramas with morally reprehensible protagonists. An important, and possibly influential, cinematic antecedent to classic noir was 1930s French poetic realism, with its romantic, fatalistic attitude and celebration of doomed heroes. The movement's sensibility is mirrored in the Warner Bros. drama ''I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang'' (1932), a key forerunner of noir. Among those films not themselves considered film noirs, perhaps none had a greater effect on the development of the genre than America's own ''Citizen Kane'' (1941), the landmark motion picture directed by Orson Welles. Its visual intricacy and complex, voiceover-driven narrative structure are echoed in dozens of classic film noirs.

Italian neorealism of the 1940s, with its emphasis on quasi-documentary authenticity, was an acknowledged influence on trends that emerged in American noir. ''The Lost Weekend'' (1945), directed by Billy Wilder, yet another Vienna-born, Berlin-trained American auteur, tells the story of an alcoholic in a manner evocative of neorealism. It also exemplifies the problem of classification: one of the first American films to be described as a film noir, it has largely disappeared from considerations of the field. Director Jules Dassin of ''The Naked City'' (1948) pointed to the neorealists as inspiring his use of on-location photography with nonprofessional extras. This semidocumentary approach characterized a substantial number of noirs in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Along with neorealism, the style had a homegrown precedent, specifically cited by Dassin, in director Henry Hathaway's ''The House on 92nd Street'' (1945), which demonstrated the parallel influence of the cinematic newsreel.

Literary sources

The primary literary influence on film noir was the hardboiled school of American detective and crime fiction, led in its early years by such writers as Dashiell Hammett (whose first novel, ''Red Harvest'', was published in 1929) and James M. Cain (whose ''The Postman Always Rings Twice'' appeared five years later), and popularized in pulp magazines such as ''Black Mask''. The classic film noirs ''The Maltese Falcon'' and ''The Glass Key'' (1942) were based on novels by Hammett; Cain's novels provided the basis for ''Double Indemnity'' (1944), ''Mildred Pierce'' (1945), ''The Postman Always Rings Twice'' (1946), and ''Slightly Scarlet'' (1956; adapted from ''Love's Lovely Counterfeit''). A decade before the classic era, a story of Hammett's was the source for the gangster melodrama ''City Streets'' (1931), directed by Rouben Mamoulian and photographed by Lee Garmes, who worked regularly with Sternberg. Wedding a style and story both with many noir characteristics, released the month before Lang's ''M'', ''City Streets'' has a claim to being the first major film noir.

Raymond Chandler, who debuted as a novelist with ''The Big Sleep'' in 1939, soon became the most famous author of the hardboiled school. Not only were Chandler's novels turned into major noirs—''Murder, My Sweet'' (1944; adapted from ''Farewell, My Lovely''), ''The Big Sleep'' (1946), and ''Lady in the Lake'' (1947)—he was an important screenwriter in the genre as well, producing the scripts for ''Double Indemnity'', ''The Blue Dahlia'' (1946), and ''Strangers on a Train'' (1951). Where Chandler, like Hammett, centered most of his novels and stories on the character of the private eye, Cain featured less heroic protagonists and focused more on psychological exposition than on crime solving; the Cain approach has come to be identified with a subset of the hardboiled genre dubbed "noir fiction". For much of the 1940s, one of the most prolific and successful authors of this often downbeat brand of suspense tale was Cornell Woolrich (sometimes under the pseudonym George Hopley or William Irish). No writer's published work provided the basis for more film noirs of the classic period than Woolrich's: thirteen in all, including ''Black Angel'' (1946), ''Deadline at Dawn'' (1946), and ''Fear in the Night'' (1947).

Another crucial literary source for film noir was W. R. Burnett, whose first novel to be published was ''Little Caesar'', in 1929. It would be turned into a hit for Warner Bros. in 1931; the following year, Burnett was hired to write dialogue for ''Scarface'', while ''Beast of the City'' was adapted from one of his stories. At least one important reference work identifies the latter as a film noir despite its early date. Burnett's characteristic narrative approach fell somewhere between that of the quintessential hardboiled writers and their noir fiction compatriots—his protagonists were often heroic in their way, a way just happening to be that of the gangster. During the classic era, his work, either as author or screenwriter, was the basis for seven films now widely regarded as film noirs, including three of the most famous: ''High Sierra'' (1941), ''This Gun for Hire'' (1942), and ''The Asphalt Jungle'' (1950).

Classic period

Overview

The 1940s and 1950s are generally regarded as the "classic period" of American film noir. While ''City Streets'' and other pre-WWII crime melodramas such as ''Fury'' (1936) and ''You Only Live Once'' (1937), both directed by Fritz Lang, are categorized as full-fledged noir in Alain Silver and Elizabeth Ward's film noir encyclopedia, other critics tend to describe them as "proto-noir" or in similar terms. The film now most commonly cited as the first "true" film noir is ''Stranger on the Third Floor'' (1940), directed by Latvian-born, Soviet-trained Boris Ingster. Hungarian émigré Peter Lorre—who had starred in Lang's ''M''—was top-billed, though he did not play the lead. He would play secondary roles in several other formative American noirs. Though modestly budgeted, at the high end of the B movie scale, ''Stranger on the Third Floor'' still lost its studio, RKO, $56,000, almost a third of its total cost. ''Variety'' magazine found Ingster's work "too studied and when original, lacks the flare to hold attention. It's a film too arty for average audiences, and too humdrum for others." ''Stranger on the Third Floor'' was not recognized as the beginning of a trend, let alone a new genre, for many decades. Most of the film noirs of the classic period were similarly low- and modestly budgeted features without major stars—B movies either literally or in spirit. In this production context, writers, directors, cinematographers, and other craftsmen were relatively free from typical big-picture constraints. There was more visual experimentation than in Hollywood filmmaking as a whole: the Expressionism now closely associated with noir and the semidocumentary style that later emerged represent two very different tendencies. Narrative structures sometimes involved convoluted flashbacks uncommon in non-noir commercial productions. In terms of content, enforcement of the Production Code ensured that no film character could literally get away with murder or be seen sharing a bed with anyone but a spouse; within those bounds, however, many films now identified as noir feature plot elements and dialogue that were very risqué for the time.

Thematically, film noirs were most exceptional for the relative frequency with which they centered on women of questionable virtue—a focus that had become rare in Hollywood films after the mid-1930s and the end of the pre-Code era. The signal film in this vein was ''Double Indemnity'', directed by Billy Wilder; setting the mold was Barbara Stanwyck's unforgettable femme fatale, Phyllis Dietrichson—an apparent nod to Marlene Dietrich, who had built her extraordinary career playing such characters for Sternberg. An A-level feature all the way, the film's commercial success and seven Oscar nominations made it probably the most influential of the early noirs. A slew of now-renowned noir "bad girls" would follow, such as those played by Rita Hayworth in ''Gilda'' (1946), Lana Turner in ''The Postman Always Rings Twice'' (1946), Ava Gardner in ''The Killers'' (1946), and Jane Greer in ''Out of the Past'' (1947). The iconic noir counterpart to the femme fatale, the private eye, came to the fore in films such as ''The Maltese Falcon'' (1941), with Humphrey Bogart as Sam Spade, and ''Murder, My Sweet'' (1944), with Dick Powell as Philip Marlowe. Other seminal noir sleuths served larger institutions, such as Dana Andrews's police detective in ''Laura'' (1944), Edmond O'Brien's insurance investigator in ''The Killers'', and Edward G. Robinson's government agent in ''The Stranger'' (1946).

The prevalence of the private eye as a lead character declined in film noir of the 1950s, a period during which several critics describe the form as becoming more focused on extreme psychologies and more exaggerated in general. A prime example is ''Kiss Me Deadly'' (1955); based on a novel by Mickey Spillane, the best-selling of all the hardboiled authors, here the protagonist is a private eye, Mike Hammer. As described by Paul Schrader, "Robert Aldrich's teasing direction carries ''noir'' to its sleaziest and most perversely erotic. Hammer overturns the underworld in search of the 'great whatsit' [which] turns out to be—joke of jokes—an exploding atomic bomb." Orson Welles's baroquely styled ''Touch of Evil'' (1958) is frequently cited as the last noir of the classic period. Some scholars believe film noir never really ended, but continued to transform even as the characteristic noir visual style began to seem dated and changing production conditions led Hollywood in different directions—in this view, post-1950s films in the noir tradition are seen as part of a continuity with classic noir. A majority of critics, however, regard comparable films made outside the classic era to be something other than genuine film noirs. They regard true film noir as belonging to a temporally and geographically limited cycle or period, treating subsequent films that evoke the classics as fundamentally different due to general shifts in filmmaking style and latter-day awareness of noir as a historical source for allusion.

Directors and the business of noir

While the inceptive noir, ''Stranger on the Third Floor'', was a B picture directed by a virtual unknown, many of the film noirs that have earned enduring fame were A-list productions by name-brand filmmakers. Debuting as a director with ''The Maltese Falcon'' (1941), John Huston followed with the major noirs ''Key Largo'' (1948) and ''The Asphalt Jungle'' (1950). Opinion is divided on the noir status of several of Alfred Hitchcock's thrillers from the era; at least four qualify by consensus: ''Shadow of a Doubt'' (1943), ''Notorious'' (1946), ''Strangers on a Train'' (1951), and ''The Wrong Man'' (1956). Otto Preminger's success with ''Laura'' (1944) made his name and helped demonstrate noir's adaptability to a high-gloss 20th Century-Fox presentation. Among Hollywood's most celebrated directors of the era, arguably none worked more often in a noir mode than Preminger—his other classic noirs include ''Fallen Angel'' (1945), ''Whirlpool'' (1949), ''Where the Sidewalk Ends'' (1950) (all for Fox) and ''Angel Face'' (1952). A half-decade after ''Double Indemnity'' and ''The Lost Weekend'', Billy Wilder made ''Sunset Boulevard'' (1950) and ''Ace in the Hole'' (1951), noirs that were not so much crime dramas as satires on, respectively, Hollywood and the news media. ''In a Lonely Place'' (1950) was Nicholas Ray's breakthrough; his other noirs include his debut, ''They Live by Night'' (1948), and ''On Dangerous Ground'' (1952), noted for their unusually sympathetic treatment of characters alienated from the social mainstream.

Orson Welles had notorious problems with financing, but his three film noirs were well budgeted: ''The Lady from Shanghai'' (1947) received top-level, "prestige" backing, while both ''The Stranger'', his most conventional film, and ''Touch of Evil'', an unmistakably personal work, were funded at levels lower but still commensurate with headlining releases. Like ''The Stranger'', Fritz Lang's ''The Woman in the Window'' (1945) was a production of the independent International Pictures. Lang's follow-up, ''Scarlet Street'' (1945), was one of the few classic noirs to be officially censored: filled with erotic innuendo, it was temporarily banned in Milwaukee, Atlanta, and New York State. ''Scarlet Street'' was a semi-independent—cosponsored by Universal and Lang's own Diana Productions, of which the film's costar, Joan Bennett, was the second biggest shareholder. Lang, Bennett, and her husband, Universal veteran and Diana production head Walter Wanger, would make ''Secret Beyond the Door'' (1948) in similar fashion. Before he was forced abroad for political reasons, director Jules Dassin made two classic noirs that also straddled the major/independent line: ''Brute Force'' (1947) and the influential documentary-style ''The Naked City'' were developed by producer Mark Hellinger, who had an "inside/outside" contract with Universal similar to Wanger's. Years earlier, working at Warner Bros., Hellinger had produced three films for Raoul Walsh, the proto-noirs ''They Drive by Night'' (1940) and ''Manpower'' (1941), and ''High Sierra'' (1941), now regarded as a key work in noir's development. Walsh had no great name recognition during his half-century as a working director, but his noirs ''White Heat'' (1949) and ''The Enforcer'' (1951) had A-list stars and are seen as important examples of the cycle. In addition to the aforementioned, other directors associated with top-of-the-bill Hollywood film noirs include Edward Dmytryk (''Murder, My Sweet'' [1944], ''Crossfire'' [1947])—the first important noir director to fall prey to the industry blacklist—as well as Henry Hathaway (''The Dark Corner'' [1946], ''Kiss of Death'' [1947]) and John Farrow (''The Big Clock'' [1948], ''Night Has a Thousand Eyes'' [1948]).

As noted above, however, most of the Hollywood films now considered classic noirs fall into the broad category of the "B movie". Some were Bs in the most precise sense, produced to run on the bottom of double bills by a low-budget unit of one of the major studios or by one of the smaller, so-called Poverty Row outfits, from the relatively well-off Monogram to shakier ventures such as Producers Releasing Corporation (PRC). Jacques Tourneur had made over thirty Hollywood Bs (a few now highly regarded, most completely forgotten) before directing the A-level ''Out of the Past'', described by scholar Robert Ottoson as "the ''ne plus ultra'' of forties film noir". Movies with budgets a step up the ladder, known as "intermediates" within the industry, might be treated as A or B pictures depending on the circumstance—Monogram created a new unit, Allied Artists, in the late 1940s to focus on this sort of production. Such films have long colloquially been referred to as B movies. Robert Wise (''Born to Kill'' [1947], ''The Set-Up'' [1949]) and Anthony Mann (''T-Men'' [1947], ''Raw Deal'' [1948]) each made a series of impressive intermediates, many of them noirs, before graduating to steady work on big-budget productions. Mann did some of his most celebrated work with cinematographer John Alton, a specialist in what critic James Naremore describes as "hypnotic moments of light-in-darkness". ''He Walked by Night'' (1948), shot by Alton and, though credited solely to Alfred Werker, directed in large part by Mann, demonstrates their technical mastery and exemplifies the late 1940s trend of "police procedural" crime dramas. Put out, like other Mann–Alton noirs, by the small Eagle-Lion company, it was the direct inspiration for the ''Dragnet'' series, which debuted on radio in 1949 and television in 1951. Several directors associated with noir built now well-respected oeuvres largely at the B-movie/intermediate level. Samuel Fuller's brutal, visually energetic films such as ''Pickup on South Street'' (1953) and ''Underworld U.S.A.'' (1961) earned him a unique reputation; his advocates praise him as "primitive" and "barbarous". Joseph H. Lewis directed noirs as diverse as ''Gun Crazy'' (1950) and ''The Big Combo'' (1955). The former—whose screenplay was written by the blacklisted Dalton Trumbo, disguised by a front—features a bank holdup sequence shown in an unbroken take over three minutes long that proved widely influential. The latter, shot by John Alton, takes the shadow-rich noir style to its outer limits. The most distinctive films of Phil Karlson (''The Phenix City Story'' [1955], ''The Brothers Rico'' [1957]) tell stories of vice organized on a monstrous scale. The work of other directors who worked largely at this tier of the industry, such as Felix E. Feist (''The Devil Thumbs a Ride'' [1947], ''Tomorrow Is Another Day'' [1951]), is now relatively obscure. Edgar G. Ulmer spent almost his entire Hollywood career working at B studios—once in a while on projects that achieved intermediate status; for the most part, on unmistakable Bs. In 1945, while at PRC, he directed one of the all-time noir cult classics, ''Detour''. Ulmer's other noirs include ''Strange Illusion'' (1945), also for PRC; ''Ruthless'' (1948), for Eagle-Lion, which had acquired PRC the previous year; and ''Murder Is My Beat'' (1955), for Allied Artists.

A number of low- and modestly budgeted noirs were made by independent, often actor-owned, companies contracting with one of the larger outfits for distribution. Serving as producer, writer, director, and top-billed performer, Hugo Haas made several such films, including ''Pickup'' (1951) and ''The Other Woman'' (1954). It was in this way that accomplished noir actress Ida Lupino established herself as the sole female director in Hollywood during the late 1940s and much of the 1950s. She does not appear in the best-known film she directed, ''The Hitch-Hiker'' (1953), developed by her company, The Filmakers, with support and distribution by RKO. It is one of the seven classic film noirs produced largely outside of the major studios that have been chosen for the United States National Film Registry. Of the others, one was a small-studio release: ''Detour''. Four were independent productions distributed by United Artists, the "studio without a studio": ''Gun Crazy''; ''Kiss Me Deadly''; ''D.O.A.'' (1950), directed by Rudolph Maté; and ''Sweet Smell of Success'' (1957), directed by Alexander Mackendrick. One was an independent distributed by MGM, the industry leader: ''Force of Evil'' (1948), directed by Abraham Polonsky and starring John Garfield, both of whom would be blacklisted in the 1950s. Independent production usually meant restricted circumstances, but not always—''Sweet Smell of Success'', for instance, despite the original plans of the production team, was clearly not made on the cheap, though like many other cherished A-budget noirs it might be said to have a B-movie soul.

Perhaps no director better displayed that spirit than the German-born Robert Siodmak, who had already made a score of films before his 1940 arrival in Hollywood. Working mostly on A features, he made no fewer than eight films now regarded as classic-era film noirs (a figure matched only by Lang and Mann). In addition to ''The Killers'', Burt Lancaster's debut and a Hellinger/Universal coproduction, Siodmak's other important contributions to the genre include 1944's ''Phantom Lady'' (a top-of-the-line B and Woolrich adaptation), the ironically titled ''Christmas Holiday'' (1944), and ''Cry of the City'' (1948). ''Criss Cross'' (1949), with Lancaster again the lead, exemplifies how Siodmak brought the virtues of the B-movie to the A noir. In addition to the relatively looser constraints on character and message at lower budgets, the nature of B production lent itself to the noir style for directly economic reasons: dim lighting not only saved on electrical costs but helped cloak cheap sets (mist and smoke also served the cause); night shooting was often compelled by hurried production schedules; plots with obscure motivations and intriguingly elliptical transitions were sometimes the consequence of hastily written scripts, of which there was not always enough time or money to shoot every scene. In ''Criss Cross'', Siodmak achieves all these effects with purpose, wrapping them around Yvonne De Carlo, playing the most understandable of femme fatales, Dan Duryea, in one of his many charismatic villain roles, and Lancaster—already an established star—as an ordinary laborer turned armed robber, doomed by a romantic obsession.

{| align="center" width=94% style="text-align:center; font-size:87%; clear:both" | colspan="1" align="center"| ! style="background-color: #DBDABA; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;" | Classic-era film noirs in the National Film Registry |- ! width="55" bgcolor=#ffffff style="background-color: #DBDABA; font-size: 11px;"|1940–49 | style="background-color: #F5F5EC;" | ''The Maltese Falcon'' | ''Shadow of a Doubt'' | ''Laura'' | ''Double Indemnity'' | ''Mildred Pierce'' | ''Detour'' ''The Big Sleep'' | ''The Killers'' | ''Notorious'' | ''Out of the Past'' | ''Force of Evil'' | ''The Naked City'' | ''White Heat'' |- !style="background-color: #DBDABA; font-size: 11px;"|1950–58 |style="background-color: #F5F5EC;" | ''The Asphalt Jungle'' | ''D.O.A.'' | ''Gun Crazy'' | ''Sunset Boulevard'' | ''In a Lonely Place'' ''The Hitch-Hiker'' | ''Kiss Me Deadly'' | ''The Night of the Hunter'' | ''Sweet Smell of Success'' | ''Touch of Evil'' |}

Outside the United States

Some critics regard classic film noir as a cycle exclusive to the United States; Alain Silver and Elizabeth Ward, for example, argue, "With the Western, film noir shares the distinction of being an indigenous American form ... a wholly American film style." Others, however, regard noir as an international phenomenon. Even before the beginning of the generally accepted classic period, there were films made far from Hollywood that can be seen in retrospect as film noirs, for example, the French productions ''Pépé le Moko'' (1937), directed by Julien Duvivier, and ''Le Jour se lève'' (1939), directed by Marcel Carné.

During the classic period, there were many films produced outside the United States, particularly in France, that share elements of style, theme, and sensibility with American film noirs and may themselves be included in the genre's canon. In certain cases, the interrelationship with Hollywood noir is obvious: American-born director Jules Dassin moved to France in the early 1950s as a result of the Hollywood blacklist, and made one of the most famous French film noirs, ''Rififi'' (1955). Other well-known French films often classified as noir include ''Quai des Orfèvres'' (1947), ''Le Salaire de la peur'' (released in English-speaking countries as ''The Wages of Fear'') (1953) and ''Les Diaboliques'' (1955), all directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot; ''Casque d'or'' (1952) and ''Touchez pas au grisbi'' (1954), both directed by Jacques Becker; and ''Ascenseur pour l'échafaud'' (1958), directed by Louis Malle. French director Jean-Pierre Melville is widely recognized for his tragic, minimalist film noirs—''Bob le flambeur'' (1955), from the classic period, was followed by ''Le Doulos'' (1962), ''Le deuxième souffle'' (1966), ''Le Samouraï'' (1967), and ''Le Cercle rouge'' (1970). Scholar Andrew Spicer argues that British film noir evidences a greater debt to French poetic realism than to the expressionistic American mode of noir. Examples of British noir from the classic period include ''Brighton Rock'' (1947), directed by John Boulting; ''They Made Me a Fugitive'' (1947), directed by Alberto Cavalcanti; ''The Small Back Room'' (1948), directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger; ''The October Man'' (1950), directed by Roy Ward Baker; and ''Cast a Dark Shadow'' (1955), directed by Lewis Gilbert. Terence Fisher directed several low-budget thrillers in a noir mode for Hammer Film Productions, including ''The Last Page'' (aka ''Man Bait''; 1952), ''Stolen Face'' (1952), and ''Murder by Proxy'' (aka ''Blackout''; 1954). Before leaving for France, Jules Dassin had been obliged by political pressure to shoot his last English-language film of the classic noir period in Great Britain: ''Night and the City'' (1950). Though it was conceived in the United States and was not only directed by an American but also stars two American actors—Richard Widmark and Gene Tierney—it is technically a UK production, financed by 20th Century-Fox's British subsidiary. The most famous of classic British noirs is director Carol Reed's ''The Third Man'' (1949), like ''Brighton Rock'' based on a Graham Greene novel. Set in Vienna immediately after World War II, it also stars two American actors, Joseph Cotten and Orson Welles, who had appeared together in ''Citizen Kane''.

Elsewhere, Italian director Luchino Visconti adapted Cain's ''The Postman Always Rings Twice'' as ''Ossessione'' (1943), regarded both as one of the great noirs and a seminal film in the development of neorealism. (This was not even the first screen version of Cain's novel, having been preceded by the French ''Le Dernier tournant'' in 1939.) In Japan, the celebrated Akira Kurosawa directed several films recognizable as film noirs, including ''Drunken Angel'' (1948), ''Stray Dog'' (1949), ''The Bad Sleep Well'' (1960), and ''High and Low'' (1963).

Among the first major neo-noir films—the term often applied to films that consciously refer back to the classic noir tradition—was the French ''Tirez sur le pianiste'' (1960), directed by François Truffaut from a novel by one of the gloomiest of American noir fiction writers, David Goodis. Noir crime films and melodramas have been produced in many countries in the post-classic area. Some of these are quintessentially self-aware neo-noirs—for example, ''Il Conformista'' (1969; Italy), ''Der Amerikanische Freund'' (1977; Germany), ''The Element of Crime'' (1984; Denmark), ''As Tears Go By'' (1988; Hong Kong), and ''El Aura'' (2005; Argentina). Others simply share narrative elements and a version of the hardboiled sensibility associated with classic noir, such as ''The Castle of Sand'' (1974; Japan), ''Insomnia'' (1997; Norway), ''Croupier'' (1998; UK), ''Blind Shaft'' (2003; China), and ''The Square'' (2008; Australia).

Neo-noir and echoes of the classic mode

1960s and 1970s

While it is hard to draw a line between some of the noir films of the early 1960s such as ''Blast of Silence'' (1961) and ''Cape Fear'' (1962) and the noirs of the late 1950s, new trends emerged in the post-classic era. ''The Manchurian Candidate'' (1962), directed by John Frankenheimer, ''Shock Corridor'' (1962), directed by Samuel Fuller, and ''Brainstorm'' (1965), directed by experienced noir character actor William Conrad, all treat the theme of mental dispossession within stylistic and tonal frameworks derived from classic film noir. ''The Fugitive'' (1963–67) brought classic noir themes and mood to television for an extended run.

In a different vein, films began to appear that self-consciously acknowledged the conventions of classic film noir as historical archetypes to be revived, rejected, or reimagined. These efforts typify what came to be known as neo-noir. Though several late classic noirs, ''Kiss Me Deadly'' in particular, were deeply self-knowing and post-traditional in conception, none tipped its hand so evidently as to be remarked on by American critics at the time. The first major film to overtly work this angle was French director Jean-Luc Godard's ''À bout de souffle'' (''Breathless''; 1960), which pays its literal respects to Bogart and his crime films while brandishing a bold new style for a new day. In the United States, Arthur Penn (''Mickey One'' [1964], drawing inspiration from Truffaut's ''Tirez sur le pianiste'' and other French New Wave films), John Boorman (''Point Blank'' [1967], similarly caught up, though in the ''Nouvelle vague'''s deeper waters), and Alan J. Pakula (''Klute'' [1971]) directed films that knowingly related themselves to the original film noirs, inviting audiences in on the game.

A manifest affiliation with noir traditions—which, by its nature, allows different sorts of commentary on them to be inferred—can also provide the basis for explicit critiques of those traditions. In 1973, director Robert Altman flipped off noir piety with ''The Long Goodbye''. Based on the novel by Raymond Chandler, it features one of Bogart's most famous characters, but in iconoclastic fashion: Philip Marlowe, the prototypical hardboiled detective, is replayed as a hapless misfit, almost laughably out of touch with contemporary mores and morality. Where Altman's subversion of the film noir mythos was so irreverent as to outrage some contemporary critics, around the same time Woody Allen was paying affectionate, at points idolatrous homage to the classic mode with ''Play It Again, Sam'' (1972).

The most acclaimed of the neo-noirs of the era was director Roman Polanski's 1974 ''Chinatown''. Written by Robert Towne, it is set in 1930s Los Angeles, an accustomed noir locale nudged back some few years in a way that makes the pivotal loss of innocence in the story even crueler. Where Polanski and Towne raised noir to a black apogee by turning rearward, director Martin Scorsese and screenwriter Paul Schrader brought the noir attitude crashing into the present day with ''Taxi Driver'' (1976), a cackling, bloody-minded gloss on bicentennial America. In 1978, Walter Hill wrote and directed ''The Driver'', a chase film as might have been imagined by Jean-Pierre Melville in an especially abstract mood.

Hill was already a central figure in 1970s noir of a more straightforward manner, having written the script for director Sam Peckinpah's ''The Getaway'' (1972), adapting a novel by pulp master Jim Thompson, as well as for two tough private eye films: an original screenplay for ''Hickey & Boggs'' (1972) and an adaptation of a novel by Ross Macdonald, the leading literary descendant of Hammett and Chandler, for ''The Drowning Pool'' (1975). Some of the strongest 1970s noirs, in fact, were unwinking remakes of the classics, "neo" mostly by default: the heartbreaking ''Thieves Like Us'' (1973), directed by Altman from the same source as Ray's ''They Live by Night'', and ''Farewell, My Lovely'' (1975), the Chandler tale made classically as ''Murder, My Sweet'', remade here with Robert Mitchum in his last notable noir role. Detective series, prevalent on American television during the period, updated the hardboiled tradition in different ways, but the show conjuring the most noir tone was a horror crossover touched with shaggy, ''Long Goodbye''–style humor: ''Kolchak: The Night Stalker'' (1974–75), featuring a Chicago newspaper reporter investigating strange, usually supernatural occurrences.

1980s and 1990s

The turn of the decade brought Scorsese's black-and-white ''Raging Bull'' (cowritten by Schrader); an acknowledged masterpiece—the American Film Institute ranks it as the greatest American film of the 1980s and the fourth greatest of all time—it is also a retreat, telling a story of a boxer's moral self-destruction that recalls in both theme and visual ambience noir dramas such as ''Body and Soul'' (1947) and ''Champion'' (1949). From 1981, the popular ''Body Heat'', written and directed by Lawrence Kasdan, invokes a different set of classic noir elements, this time in a humid, erotically charged Florida setting; its success confirmed the commercial viability of neo-noir, at a time when the major Hollywood studios were becoming increasingly risk averse. The mainstreaming of neo-noir is evident in such films as ''Black Widow'' (1987), ''Shattered'' (1991), and ''Final Analysis'' (1992). Few neo-noirs have made more money or more wittily updated the tradition of the noir double-entendre than ''Basic Instinct'' (1992), directed by Paul Verhoeven and written by Joe Eszterhas. The film also demonstrates how neo-noir's polychrome palette can reproduce many of the expressionistic effects of classic black-and-white noir.

Among big-budget auteurs, Michael Mann has worked frequently in a neo-noir mode, with such films as ''Thief'' (1981) and ''Heat'' (1995) and the TV series ''Miami Vice'' (1984–89) and ''Crime Story'' (1986–88). Mann's output exemplifies a primary strain of neo-noir, in which classic themes and tropes are revisited in a contemporary setting with an up-to-date visual style and rock- or hip hop–based musical soundtrack. Like ''Chinatown'', its more complex predecessor, Curtis Hanson's Oscar-winning ''L.A. Confidential'' (1997), based on the James Ellroy novel, demonstrates an opposite tendency—the deliberately retro film noir; its tale of corrupt cops and femme fatales is seemingly lifted straight from a film of 1953, the year in which it is set. Director David Fincher followed the immensely successful neo-noir ''Se7en'' (1995) with a film that developed into a cult favorite after its original, disappointing release: ''Fight Club'' (1999) is a ''sui generis'' mix of noir aesthetic, perverse comedy, speculative content, and satiric intention. Working generally with much smaller budgets, brothers Joel and Ethan Coen have created one of the most extensive film oeuvres influenced by classic noir, with films such as ''Blood Simple'' (1984) and ''Fargo'' (1996), considered by some a supreme work in the neo-noir mode. The Coens cross noir with other generic lines in the gangster drama ''Miller's Crossing'' (1990)—loosely based on the Dashiell Hammett novels ''Red Harvest'' and ''The Glass Key''—and the comedy ''The Big Lebowski'' (1998), a tribute to Chandler and an homage to Altman's version of ''The Long Goodbye''. The characteristic work of David Lynch combines film noir tropes with scenarios driven by disturbed characters such as the sociopathic criminal played by Dennis Hopper in ''Blue Velvet'' (1986) and the delusionary protagonist of ''Lost Highway'' (1996). The ''Twin Peaks'' cycle, both TV series (1990–91) and film, ''Fire Walk with Me'' (1992), puts a detective plot through a succession of bizarre spasms. David Cronenberg also mixes surrealism and noir in ''Naked Lunch'' (1991), inspired by the William S. Burroughs novel.

Perhaps no American neo-noirs better reflect the classic noir A-movie-with-a-B-movie-soul than those of director-writer Quentin Tarantino; neo-noirs of his such as ''Reservoir Dogs'' (1992) and ''Pulp Fiction'' (1994) display a relentlessly self-reflexive, sometimes tongue-in-cheek sensibility, similar to the work of the New Wave directors and the Coens. Other films from the era readily identifiable as neo-noir (some retro, some more au courant) include director John Dahl's ''Kill Me Again'' (1989), ''Red Rock West'' (1992), ''The Last Seduction'' (1993), ''To Die For'' (1995), and ''A Perfect Murder'' (1998); four adaptations of novels by Jim Thompson—''The Kill-Off'' (1989), ''After Dark, My Sweet'' (1990), ''The Grifters'' (1990), and the remake of ''The Getaway'' (1994); and many more, including adaptations of the work of other major noir fiction writers: ''The Hot Spot'' (1990), from ''Hell Hath No Fury'', by Charles Williams; ''Miami Blues'' (1990), from the novel by Charles Willeford; and ''Out of Sight'' (1998), from the novel by Elmore Leonard. Several films by director-writer David Mamet involve noir elements: ''House of Games'' (1987), ''Homicide'' (1991), ''The Spanish Prisoner'' (1997), and ''Heist'' (2001). On television, the series ''Moonlighting'' (1985–89) paid homage to classic noir while demonstrating an unusual appreciation of the sense of humor often found in the original cycle. Between 1983 and 1989, Mickey Spillane's hardboiled private eye Mike Hammer was played with wry gusto by Stacy Keach in a series and several stand-alone television films (an unsuccessful revival followed in 1997–98). The British miniseries ''The Singing Detective'' (1986), written by Dennis Potter, tells the story of a mystery writer named Philip Marlow; widely considered one of the finest neo-noirs in any medium, some critics rank it among the greatest television productions of all time.

2000s

The Coens' referenced the noir tradition again with ''The Man Who Wasn't There'' (2001); a black-and-white crime melodrama set in 1949, it features a scene apparently staged to mirror the one from ''Out of the Past'' pictured above. Lynch's ''Mulholland Drive'' (2001) continued in his characteristic vein, making the classic noir setting of Los Angeles the venue for a noir-inflected psychological jigsaw puzzle. British-born director Christopher Nolan's black-and-white debut, ''Following'' (1998), was an overt homage to classic noir. During the new century's first decade, he was one of the leading Hollywood directors of neo-noir with the acclaimed ''Memento'' (2000), the remake of ''Insomnia'' (2002), and his dark-toned superhero films, ''Batman Begins'' (2005) and ''The Dark Knight'' (2008).

Director Sean Penn's ''The Pledge'' (2001), though adapted from a very self-reflexive novel by Friedrich Dürrenmatt, plays noir comparatively straight, to devastating effect. Screenwriter David Ayer updated the classic noir bad-cop tale, typified by ''Shield for Murder'' (1954) and ''Rogue Cop'' (1954), with his scripts for ''Training Day'' (2001) and, adapting a story by James Ellroy, ''Dark Blue'' (2002); he later wrote and directed the even darker ''Harsh Times'' (2006). Michael Mann's ''Collateral'' (2004) features a performance by Tom Cruise as an assassin in the lineage of ''Le Samouraï''. The torments of ''The Machinist'' (2004), directed by Brad Anderson, evoke both ''Fight Club'' and ''Memento''. In 2005, Shane Black directed ''Kiss Kiss Bang Bang'', basing his screenplay in part on a crime novel by Brett Halliday, who published his first stories back in the 1920s. The film plays with an awareness not only of classic noir but also of neo-noir reflexivity itself. |title=''Sin City Original Motion Picture Soundtrack'' (review)|publisher=Allmusic|accessdate=2010-02-13}}}} With ultra-violent films such as ''Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance'' (2002) and ''Thirst'' (2009), Park Chan-wook of South Korea has been the most prominent director outside of the United States to work regularly in a noir mode in the new millennium. The most commercially successful neo-noir of this period has been ''Sin City'' (2005), directed by Robert Rodriguez in extravagantly stylized black and white with the odd bit of color. The film is based on a series of comic books created by Frank Miller (credited as the film's codirector), which are in turn openly indebted to the works of Spillane and other pulp mystery authors. Similarly, graphic novels provide the basis for ''Road to Perdition'' (2002), directed by Sam Mendes, and ''A History of Violence'' (2005), directed by David Cronenberg; the latter was voted best film of the year in the annual ''Village Voice'' poll. Writer-director Rian Johnson's ''Brick'' (2005), featuring present-day high schoolers speaking a version of 1930s hardboiled argot, won the Special Jury Prize for Originality of Vision at the Sundance Film Festival. The television series ''Veronica Mars'' (2004–7) also brought a youth-oriented twist to film noir. Examples of this sort of generic crossover have been dubbed ''teen noir''.

Science fiction noir

In the post-classic era, the most significant trend in noir crossovers has involved science fiction. In Jean-Luc Godard's ''Alphaville'' (1965), Lemmy Caution is the name of the old-school private eye in the city of tomorrow. ''The Groundstar Conspiracy'' (1972) centers on another implacable investigator and an amnesiac named Welles. ''Soylent Green'' (1973), the first major American example, portrays a dystopian, near-future world via a self-evidently noir detection plot; starring Charlton Heston (the lead in ''Touch of Evil''), it also features classic noir standbys Joseph Cotten, Edward G. Robinson, and Whit Bissell. The film was directed by Richard Fleischer, who two decades before had directed several strong B noirs, including ''Armored Car Robbery'' (1950) and ''The Narrow Margin'' (1952).

The cynical and stylish perspective of classic film noir had a formative effect on the cyberpunk genre of science fiction that emerged in the early 1980s; the film most directly influential on cyberpunk was ''Blade Runner'' (1982), directed by Ridley Scott, which pays evocative homage to the classic noir mode (Scott would subsequently direct the poignant noir crime melodrama ''Someone to Watch Over Me'' [1987]). Scholar Jamaluddin Bin Aziz has observed how "the shadow of Philip Marlowe lingers on" in such other "future noir" films as ''Twelve Monkeys'' (1995), ''Dark City'' (1998), and ''Minority Report'' (2002). Fincher's feature debut was ''Alien 3'' (1992), which evoked the classic noir jail film ''Brute Force''.

Cronenberg's ''Crash'' (1996), an adaptation of the speculative novel by J. G. Ballard, has been described as a "film noir in bruise tones". The hero is the target of investigation in ''Gattaca'' (1997), which fuses film noir motifs with a scenario indebted to ''Brave New World''. ''The Thirteenth Floor'' (1999), like ''Blade Runner'', is an explicit homage to classic noir, in this case involving speculations about virtual reality. Science fiction, noir, and anime are brought together in the Japanese films ''Ghost in the Shell'' (1995) and ''Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence'' (2004), both directed by Mamoru Oshii. Television anime series with science fiction noir themes include ''The Big O'' (1999) and ''Noir'' (2001).

Parodies

Film noir has been parodied many times, in many manners. In 1945, Danny Kaye starred in what appears to be the first intentional film noir parody, ''Wonder Man''. That same year, Deanna Durbin was the singing lead in the comedic noir ''Lady on a Train'', which makes fun of Woolrich-brand wistful miserablism. Bob Hope inaugurated the private-eye noir parody with ''My Favorite Brunette'' (1947), playing a baby photographer who is mistaken for an ironfisted detective. In 1947 as well, The Bowery Boys appeared in ''Hard Boiled Mahoney'', which had a similar mistaken-identity plot; they spoofed the genre once more in 1953's ''Private Eyes'' (1953). Two RKO productions starring Robert Mitchum take film noir over the border into self-parody: ''The Big Steal'' (1949), directed by Don Siegel, and ''His Kind of Woman'' (1951). The "Girl Hunt" ballet in Vincente Minnelli's ''The Band Wagon'' (1953) is a ten-minute distillation of—and play on—noir in dance. ''The Cheap Detective'' (1978), starring Peter Falk, is a broad spoof of several films, including the Bogart classics ''The Maltese Falcon'' and ''Casablanca''. Carl Reiner's black-and-white ''Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid'' (1982) appropriates clips of classic noirs for a farcical pastiche. Robert Zemeckis's ''Who Framed Roger Rabbit?'' (1988) develops a noir plot set in 1940s L.A. around a host of cartoon characters.

Noir parodies come in darker tones as well. ''Murder by Contract'' (1958), directed by Irving Lerner, is a deadpan joke on noir, with a denouement as bleak as any of the films it kids. An ultra-low-budget Columbia Pictures production, it may qualify as the first intentional example of what is now called a neo-noir film; it was likely a source of inspiration for both Melville's ''Le Samouraï'' and Scorsese's ''Taxi Driver''. Belying its parodic strain, ''The Long Goodbye''s final act is seriously grave. ''Taxi Driver'' caustically deconstructs the "dark" crime film, taking it to an absurd extreme and then offering a conclusion that manages to mock every possible anticipated ending—triumphant, tragic, artfully ambivalent—while being each, all at once. Flirting with splatter status even more brazenly, the Coens' ''Blood Simple'' is both an exacting pastiche and a gross exaggeration of classic noir. Adapted by director Robinson Devor from a novel by Charles Willeford, ''The Woman Chaser'' (1999) sends up not just the noir mode but the entire Hollywood filmmaking process, with seemingly each shot staged as the visual equivalent of an acerbic Marlowe wisecrack.

In other media, the television series ''Sledge Hammer!'' (1986–88) lampoons noir, along with such topics as capital punishment, gun fetishism, and Dirty Harry. ''Sesame Street'' (1969–curr.) occasionally casts Kermit the Frog as a private eye; the sketches refer to some of the typical motifs of noir films, in particular the voiceover. Garrison Keillor's radio program ''A Prairie Home Companion'' features the recurring character Guy Noir, a hardboiled detective whose adventures always wander into farce (Guy also appears in the Altman-directed film based on Keillor's show). Firesign Theatre's Nick Danger has trod the same not-so-mean streets, both on radio and in comedy albums. Cartoons such as ''Garfield's Babes and Bullets'' (1989) and comic strip characters such as Tracer Bullet of ''Calvin and Hobbes'' have parodied both film noir and the kindred hardboiled tradition—one of the sources from which film noir sprang and which it now overshadows.

Identifying characteristics

In their original 1955 canon of film noir, Raymond Borde and Etienne Chaumeton identified twenty-two Hollywood films released between 1941 and 1952 as core examples; they listed another fifty-nine American films from the period as significantly related to the field of noir. A half-century later, film historians and critics had come to agree on a canon of approximately three hundred films from 1940–58. There remain, however, many differences of opinion over whether other films of the era, among them a number of well-known ones, qualify as film noirs or not. For instance, ''The Night of the Hunter'' (1955), starring Robert Mitchum in an acclaimed performance, is treated as a film noir by some critics, but not by others. Some critics include ''Suspicion'' (1941), directed by Alfred Hitchcock, in their catalogues of noir; others ignore it. Concerning films made either before or after the classic period, or outside of the United States at any time, consensus is even rarer.

To support their categorization of certain films as noirs and their rejection of others, many critics refer to a set of elements they see as marking examples of the mode. The question of what constitutes the set of noir's identifying characteristics is a fundamental source of controversy. For instance, critics tend to define the model film noir as having a tragic or bleak conclusion, but many acknowledged classics of the genre have clearly happy endings (e.g., ''Stranger on the Third Floor,'' ''The Big Sleep,'' ''Dark Passage,'' and ''The Dark Corner''), while the tone of many other noir denouements is ambivalent. Some critics perceive classic noir's hallmark as a distinctive visual style. Others, observing that there is actually considerable stylistic variety among noirs, instead emphasize plot and character type. Still others focus on mood and attitude. No survey of classic noir's identifying characteristics can therefore be considered definitive. In the 1990s and 2000s, critics have increasingly turned their attention to that diverse field of films called neo-noir; once again, there is even less consensus about the defining attributes of such films made outside the classic period.

Visual style

The low-key lighting schemes of many classic film noirs are associated with stark light/dark contrasts and dramatic shadow patterning—a style known as chiaroscuro (a term adopted from Renaissance painting). The shadows of Venetian blinds or banister rods, cast upon an actor, a wall, or an entire set, are an iconic visual in noir and had already become a cliché well before the neo-noir era. Characters' faces may be partially or wholly obscured by darkness—a relative rarity in conventional Hollywood filmmaking. While black-and-white cinematography is considered by many to be one of the essential attributes of classic noir, the color films ''Leave Her to Heaven'' (1945) and ''Niagara'' (1953) are routinely included in noir filmographies, while ''Slightly Scarlet'' (1956), ''Party Girl'' (1958), and ''Vertigo'' (1958) are classified as noir by varying numbers of critics.

Film noir is also known for its use of low-angle, wide-angle, and skewed, or Dutch angle shots. Other devices of disorientation relatively common in film noir include shots of people reflected in one or more mirrors, shots through curved or frosted glass or other distorting objects (such as during the strangulation scene in ''Strangers on a Train''), and special effects sequences of a sometimes bizarre nature. Night-for-night shooting, as opposed to the Hollywood norm of day-for-night, was often employed. From the mid-1940s forward, location shooting became increasingly frequent in noir.

In an analysis of the visual approach of ''Kiss Me Deadly'', a late and self-consciously stylized example of classic noir, critic Alain Silver describes how cinematographic choices emphasize the story's themes and mood. In one scene, the characters, seen through a "confusion of angular shapes", thus appear "caught in a tangible vortex or enclosed in a trap." Silver makes a case for how "side light is used ... to reflect character ambivalence", while shots of characters in which they are lit from below "conform to a convention of visual expression which associates shadows cast upward of the face with the unnatural and ominous".

Structure and narrational devices

Film noirs tend to have unusually convoluted story lines, frequently involving flashbacks and other editing techniques that disrupt and sometimes obscure the narrative sequence. Framing the entire primary narrative as a flashback is also a standard device. Voiceover narration, sometimes used as a structuring device, came to be seen as a noir hallmark; while classic noir is generally associated with first-person narration (i.e., by the protagonist), Stephen Neale notes that third-person narration is common among noirs of the semidocumentary style. Neo-noirs as varied as ''The Element of Crime'' (surrealist), ''After Dark, My Sweet'' (retro), and ''Kiss Kiss Bang Bang'' (meta) have employed the flashback/voiceover combination.

Bold experiments in cinematic storytelling were sometimes attempted during the classic era: ''Lady in the Lake'', for example, is shot entirely from the point of view of protagonist Philip Marlowe; the face of star (and director) Robert Montgomery is seen only in mirrors. ''The Chase'' (1946) takes oneirism and fatalism as the basis for its fantastical narrative system, redolent of certain horror stories, but with little precedent in the context of a putatively realistic genre. In their different ways, both ''Sunset Boulevard'' and ''D.O.A.'' are tales told by dead men. Latter-day noir has been in the forefront of structural experimentation in popular cinema, as exemplified by such films as ''Pulp Fiction'', ''Fight Club'', and ''Memento''.

Plots, characters, and settings

Crime, usually murder, is an element of almost all film noirs; in addition to standard-issue greed, jealousy is frequently the criminal motivation. A crime investigation—by a private eye, a police detective (sometimes acting alone), or a concerned amateur—is the most prevalent, but far from dominant, basic plot. In other common plots the protagonists are implicated in heists or con games, or in murderous conspiracies often involving adulterous affairs. False suspicions and accusations of crime are frequent plot elements, as are betrayals and double-crosses. According to J. David Slocum, "protagonists assume the literal identities of dead men in nearly fifteen percent of all noir." Amnesia is fairly epidemic—"noir's version of the common cold", in the words of film historian Lee Server. Film noirs tend to revolve around heroes who are more flawed and morally questionable than the norm, often fall guys of one sort or another. The characteristic protagonists of noir are described by many critics as "alienated"; in the words of Silver and Ward, "filled with existential bitterness". Certain archetypal characters appear in many film noirs—hardboiled detectives, femme fatales, corrupt policemen, jealous husbands, intrepid claims adjusters, and down-and-out writers. Among characters of every stripe, cigarette smoking is rampant. From historical commentators to neo-noir pictures to pop culture ephemera, the private eye and the femme fatale have been adopted as the quintessential film noir figures, though they do not appear in most films now regarded as classic noir. Of the twenty-three National Film Registry noirs, in only four does the star play a private eye: ''The Maltese Falcon'', ''The Big Sleep'', ''Out of the Past'', and ''Kiss Me Deadly''. Just four others readily qualify as detective stories: ''Laura'', ''The Killers'', ''The Naked City'', and ''Touch of Evil''.

Film noir is often associated with an urban setting, and a few cities—Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, and Chicago, in particular—are the location of many of the classic films. In the eyes of many critics, the city is presented in noir as a "labyrinth" or "maze". Bars, lounges, nightclubs, and gambling dens are frequently the scene of action. The climaxes of a substantial number of film noirs take place in visually complex, often industrial settings, such as refineries, factories, trainyards, power plants—most famously the explosive conclusion of ''White Heat'', set at a chemical plant. In the popular (and, frequently enough, critical) imagination, in noir it is always night and it always rains.

A substantial trend within latter-day noir—dubbed "film soleil" by critic D. K. Holm—heads in precisely the opposite direction, with tales of deception, seduction, and corruption exploiting bright, sun-baked settings, stereotypically the desert or open water, to searing effect. Significant predecessors from the classic and early post-classic eras include ''The Lady from Shanghai''; the Robert Ryan vehicle ''Inferno'' (1953); the French adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's ''The Talented Mr. Ripley'', ''Plein soleil'' (''Purple Noon'' in the U.S., more accurately rendered elsewhere as ''Blazing Sun'' or ''Full Sun''; 1960); and director Don Siegel's version of ''The Killers'' (1964). The tendency was at its peak during the late 1980s and 1990s, with films such as ''Dead Calm'' (1989); ''After Dark, My Sweet''; ''The Hot Spot''; ''Delusion'' (1991); and ''Red Rock West'', and TV's ''Miami Vice''.

Worldview, morality, and tone

Film noir is often described as essentially pessimistic. The noir stories that are regarded as most characteristic tell of people trapped in unwanted situations (which, in general, they did not cause but are responsible for exacerbating), striving against random, uncaring fate, and frequently doomed. The films are seen as depicting a world that is inherently corrupt. Classic film noir has been associated by many critics with the American social landscape of the era—in particular, with a sense of heightened anxiety and alienation that is said to have followed World War II. In author Nicholas Christopher's opinion, "it is as if the war, and the social eruptions in its aftermath, unleashed demons that had been bottled up in the national psyche." Film noirs, especially those of the 1950s and the height of the Red Scare, are often said to reflect cultural paranoia; ''Kiss Me Deadly'' is the noir most frequently marshaled as evidence for this claim.

Film noir is often said to be defined by "moral ambiguity", yet the Production Code obliged almost all classic noirs to see that steadfast virtue was ultimately rewarded and vice, in the absence of shame and redemption, severely punished (however dramatically incredible the final rendering of mandatory justice might be). A substantial number of latter-day noirs flout such conventions: vice emerges triumphant in films as varied as the grim ''Chinatown'' and the ribald ''Hot Spot''.

The tone of film noir is generally regarded as downbeat; some critics experience it as darker still—"overwhelmingly black", according to Robert Ottoson. Influential critic (and filmmaker) Paul Schrader wrote in a seminal 1972 essay that "''film noir'' is defined by tone", a tone he seems to perceive as "hopeless". In describing the adaptation of ''Double Indemnity,'' noir analyst Foster Hirsch describes the "requisite hopeless tone" achieved by the filmmakers, which appears to characterize his view of noir as a whole. On the other hand, definitive film noirs such as ''The Big Sleep'', ''The Lady from Shanghai'', and ''Double Indemnity'' itself are famed for their hardboiled repartee, often imbued with sexual innuendo and self-reflexive humor—notes of another tone.

See also

Film gris

List of film noir

Notes

''His Kind of Woman'' was originally directed by John Farrow, then largely reshot under Richard Fleischer after studio owner Howard Hughes demanded rewrites. Only Farrow was credited.

In ''Academic Dictionary of Arts'' (2005), Rakesh Chopra notes that the high-contrast film lighting schemes commonly referred to as "chiaroscuro" are more specifically representative of tenebrism, whose first great exponent was the Italian painter Caravaggio (p. 73). See also Ballinger and Graydon (2007), p. 16.

References

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Erickson, Glenn (2004). "Fate Seeks the Loser: Edgar G. Ulmer's ''Detour''", in Silver and Ursini, ''Film Noir Reader 4'', pp. 25–31.

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Greene, Naomi (1999). ''Landscapes of Loss: The National Past in Postwar French Cinema''. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-00475-7

Greenspun, Roger (1973). "Mike Hodges's 'Pulp' Opens; A Private Eye Parody Is Parody of Itself", ''The New York Times'', February 9 (available online).

Hanson, Helen (2008). ''Hollywood Heroines: Women in Film Noir and the Female Gothic Film''. London and New York: I.B. Tauris. ISBN 1-84511-561-9

Hayde, Michael J. (2001). ''My Name's Friday: The Unauthorized But True Story of Dragnet and the Films of Jack Webb''. Nashville, Tenn.: Cumberland House. ISBN 1-58182-190-5

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Hirsch, Foster (2001 [1981]). ''The Dark Side of the Screen: Film Noir''. New York: Da Capo. ISBN 0-306-81039-5

Holden, Stephen (1999). "Hard-Boiled as a Two-Day-Old Egg at a Two-Bit Diner", ''The New York Times'', October 8 (available online).

Holm, D. K. (2005). ''Film Soleil''. Harpenden, UK: Pocket Essentials. ISBN 1-904048-50-1

Hunter, Stephen (1982). "''Blade Runner''", in his ''Violent Screen: A Critic's 13 Years on the Front Lines of Movie Mayhem'' (1995), pp. 196–99. Baltimore: Bancroft. ISBN 0-9635376-4-4

Irwin, John T. (2006). ''Unless the Threat of Death is Behind Them: Hard-Boiled Fiction and Film Noir''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 0-8018-8435-7

James, Nick (2002). "Back to the Brats", in ''Contemporary North American Film Directors'', 2d ed., ed. Yoram Allon, Del Cullen, and Hannah Patterson, pp. xvi–xx. London: Wallflower. ISBN 1-903364-52-3

Jones, Kristin M. (2009). "Dark Cynicism, British Style", ''Wall Street Journal'', August 18 (available online).

Kennedy, Harlan (1982). "Twenty-First Century Nervous Breakdown", ''Film Comment'', July/August.

Kirgo, Julie (1980). "''Farewell, My Lovely'' (1975)", in Silver and Ward, ''Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference'', pp. 101–2.

Kolker, Robert (2000). ''A Cinema of Loneliness'', 3d ed. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-512350-6

Krutnik, Frank, Steve Neale, and Brian Neve (2008). ''"Un-American" Hollywood: Politics and Film in the Blacklist Era''. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press. ISBN 0-8135-4198-0

Lynch, David, and Chris Rodley (2005). ''Lynch on Lynch'', rev. ed. New York and London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 0-571-22018-5

Lyons, Arthur (2000). ''Death on the Cheap: The Lost B Movies of Film Noir''. New York: Da Capo. ISBN 0-306-80996-6

Macek, Carl (1980). "''City Streets'' (1931)", in Silver and Ward, ''Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference'', pp. 59–60.

Macek, Carl, and Alain Silver (1980). "''House on 92nd Street'' (1945)", in Silver and Ward, ''Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference'', pp. 134–35.

Mackendrick, Alexander (2006). ''On Film-making: An Introduction to the Craft of the Director''. New York: Macmillan. ISBN 0-571-21125-9

Maslin, Janet (1996). "Deadly Plot by a Milquetoast Villain", ''The New York Times'', March 8 (available online).

McGilligan, Patrick (1997). ''Fritz Lang: The Nature of the Beast''. New York and London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 0-571-19375-7

Muller, Eddie (1998). ''Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir''. New York: St. Martin's. ISBN 0-312-18076-4

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Schatz, Thomas (1998 [1996]). ''The Genius of the System: Hollywood Filmmaking in the Studio Era'', new ed. London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 0-571-19596-2

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Server, Lee (2002). ''Robert Mitchum: "Baby I Don't Care"''. New York: Macmillan. ISBN 0-312-28543-4

Server, Lee (2006). ''Ava Gardner: "Love Is Nothing"''. New York: Macmillan. ISBN 0-312-31209-1

Silver, Alain (1996 [1975]). "''Kiss Me Deadly'': Evidence of a Style", rev. ver., in Silver and Ursini, ''Film Noir Reader [1]'', pp. 209–35 (available online).

Silver, Alain (1996). "Introduction", in Silver and Ursini, ''Film Noir Reader [1]'', pp. 3–15 (available online).

Silver, Alain, and James Ursini (and Robert Porfirio—vol. 3), eds. (2004 [1996–2004]). ''Film Noir Reader'', vols. 1–4. Pompton Plains, N.J.: Limelight.

Silver, Alain, and Elizabeth Ward (1992). ''Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference to the American Style'', 3d ed. Woodstock, N.Y.: Overlook Press. ISBN 0-87951-479-5 (See also: Silver, Ursini, Ward, and Porfirio [2010]. ''Film Noir: The Encyclopedia'', 4th rev., exp. ed. Overlook. ISBN 1-59020-144-2)

Slocum, J. David (2001). ''Violence and American Cinema''. London and New York: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-92810-9

Spicer, Andrew (2007). ''European Film Noir''. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press. ISBN 0-7190-6791-X

Telotte, J. P. (1989). ''Voices in the Dark: The Narrative Patterns of Film Noir''. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press. ISBN 0-252-06056-3

Thomson, David (1998). ''A Biographical Dictionary of Film'', 3d ed. New York: Knopf. ISBN 0-679-75564-0

Turan, Kenneth (2008). "UCLA's Pre-Code Series", ''Los Angeles Times'', January 27 (available online).

Tuska, Jon (1984). ''Dark Cinema: American Film Noir in Cultural Perspective''. Westport, Conn., and London: Greenwood. ISBN 0-313-23045-5

Tyree, J. M., and Ben Walters (2007). ''The Big Lebowski''. London: BFI Publishing. ISBN 1-84457-173-4

Ursini, James (1995). "Angst at Sixty Fields per Second", in Silver and Ursini, ''Film Noir Reader [1]'', pp. 275–87.

"''Variety'' staff" (anon.) (1940). "''Stranger on the Third Floor''" [review], ''Variety'' (excerpted online).

"''Variety'' staff" (anon.) (1955). "''Kiss Me Deadly''" [review], ''Variety'' (excerpted online).

Vernet, Marc (1993). "''Film Noir'' on the Edge of Doom", in Copjec, ''Shades of Noir'', pp. 1–31.

Wager, Jans B. (2005). ''Dames in the Driver's Seat: Rereading Film Noir''. Austin: University of Texas Press. ISBN 0-292-70966-8

Walker, Michael (1992). "Robert Siodmak", in Cameron, ''The Book of Film Noir'', pp. 110–51.

White, Dennis L. (1980). "''Beast of the City'' (1932)", in Silver and Ward, ''Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference'', pp. 16–17.

Widdicombe, Toby (2001). ''A Reader's Guide to Raymond Chandler''. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood. ISBN 0-313-30767-9

Williams, Linda Ruth (2005). ''The Erotic Thriller in Contemporary Cinema''. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. ISBN 0-253-34713-0

Further reading

Chopra-Gant, Mike (2005). ''Hollywood Genres and Postwar America: Masculinity, Family and Nation in Popular Movies and Film Noir''. London: IB Tauris. ISBN 1-85043-838-2

Cochran, David (2000). ''America Noir: Underground Writers and Filmmakers of the Postwar Era''. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press. ISBN 1-56098-813-4

Dickos, Andrew (2002). ''Street with No Name: A History of the Classic American Film Noir''. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. ISBN 0-8131-2243-0

Dimendberg, Edward (2004). ''Film Noir and the Spaces of Modernity''. Cambridge, Mass., and London: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-01314-X

Dixon, Wheeler W. (2009). ''Film Noir and the Cinema of Paranoia''. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press. ISBN 0-8135-4521-8

Grossman, Julie (2009). ''Rethinking the Femme Fatale in Film Noir: Ready for Her Close-Up''. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 0-230-23328-7

Hannsberry, Karen Burroughs (1998). ''Femme Noir: Bad Girls of Film''. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland. ISBN 0-7864-0429-9

Hannsberry, Karen Burroughs (2003). ''Bad Boys: The Actors of Film Noir''. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland. ISBN 0-7864-1484-7

Hare, William (2003). ''Early Film Noir: Greed, Lust, and Murder Hollywood Style''. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland. ISBN 0-7864-1629-7

Kaplan, E. Ann, ed. (1998). ''Women in Film Noir'', new ed. London: British Film Institute. ISBN 0-85170-666-5

Keaney, Michael F. (2003). ''Film Noir Guide: 745 Films of the Classic Era, 1940–1959''. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland. ISBN 0-7864-1547-9

Martin, Richard (1999). ''Mean Streets and Raging Bulls: The Legacy of Film Noir in Contemporary American Cinema''. Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow. ISBN 0-8108-3642-4

Mason, Fran (2002). ''American Gangster Cinema: From'' Little Caesar ''to'' Pulp Fiction. Houndmills, UK: Palgrave. ISBN 0-333-67452-9

Mayer, Geoff, and Brian McDonnell (2007). ''Encyclopedia of Film Noir''. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood. ISBN 0-313-33306-8

McArthur, Colin (1972). ''Underworld U.S.A.'' New York: Viking. ISBN 0-670-01953-4

Palmer, R. Barton (1994). ''Hollywood's Dark Cinema: The American Film Noir''. New York: Twayne. ISBN 0-8057-9335-6

Palmer, R. Barton, ed. (1996). ''Perspectives on Film Noir''. New York: G.K. Hall. ISBN 0-8161-1601-6

Pappas, Charles (2005). ''It's a Bitter Little World: The Smartest, Toughest, Nastiest Quotes from Film Noir''. Iola, Wisc.: Writer's Digest Books. ISBN 1-58297-387-3

Rabinowitz, Paula (2002). ''Black & White & Noir: America's Pulp Modernism''. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-231-11481-8

Schatz, Thomas (1997). ''Boom and Bust: American Cinema in the 1940s''. Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of California Press. ISBN 0-684-19151-2

Selby, Spencer (1984). ''Dark City: The Film Noir''. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland. ISBN 0-89950-103-6

Shadoian, Jack (2003). ''Dreams and Dead Ends: The American Gangster Film'', 2d ed. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-514291-8

Silver, Alain, and James Ursini (1999). ''The Noir Style''. Woodstock, N.Y.: Overlook Press. ISBN 0-87951-722-0

Spicer, Andrew (2002). ''Film Noir''. Harlow, UK: Pearson Education. ISBN 0-582-43712-1

External links

Film Noir Q&A-style; essay by leading noir critic-historian Eddie Muller; part of the GreenCine website

Film Noir: A Bibliography of Materials and Film Videography holdings of the UC Berkeley Library

Film Noir: An Introduction essay with links to discussions of ten important noirs; part of ''Images: A Journal of Film and Popular Culture''

Film Noir Studies writings by John Blaser, with film noir glossary, timeline, and noir-related media

A Guide to Film Noir Genre ten deadeye bullet points from Roger Ebert

An Introduction to Neo-Noir essay by Lee Horsley

''The Noir Thriller'': Introduction excerpt from 2001 book by Lee Horsley

What Is This Thing Called Noir?: Parts I, II and III essay by Alain Silver and Linda Brookover

Category:Film genres Category:Film styles Category:Film theory Category:French loanwords Category:History of film

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Coordinates	59°34′″N150°48′″N
name	Mickey Rooney
birth name	Joseph Yule, Jr.
birth date	September 23, 1920
birth place	Brooklyn, New York, U.S.
occupation	Actor, comedian, vaudevillian
years active	1922–present
spouse
website	mickeyrooney.com }}

Mickey Rooney (born Joseph Yule, Jr., September 23, 1920) is an American film actor and entertainer whose film, television, and stage appearances span nearly his entire lifetime. He has won multiple awards, including an Honorary Academy Award, a Golden Globe and an Emmy Award. Working as a performer since he was a small child, he was a superstar as a teenager for the films in which he played Andy Hardy, and he has had one of the longest careers of any actor, to date spanning almost 90 years. He is the last surviving male star from 1930s Hollywood. For a younger generation of fans, he gained international fame for his leading role as Henry Dailey in The Family Channel's ''The Adventures of the Black Stallion'', as well as the film itself.

Early life

Rooney was born Joseph Yule, Jr. in Brooklyn, New York, to a vaudeville family. His father, Joseph Yule, was from Scotland, and his mother, Nellie W. (née Carter), was from Kansas City, Missouri. Both of his parents were in vaudeville, appearing in a Brooklyn production of ''A Gaiety Girl'' when Joseph, Jr. was born. He began performing at the age of 17 months as part of his parents' routine, wearing a specially tailored tuxedo.

When he was 14 months old, unbeknownst to everyone, he crawled on stage wearing overalls and a little harmonica around his neck. He sneezed and his father, Joe Sr., grabbed him up, introducing him to the audience as Sonny Yule. He felt the spotlight on him and has described it as his mother's womb. From that moment on, the stage was his home.

His father was a womanizer and heavy drinker, leaving the family when Joe Jr. was only three. While Joe Sr. was traveling, Joe Jr. and his mother moved from Brooklyn, New York to Kansas City, Missouri to live with his aunt. While his mother was reading the entertainment newspaper, Nellie was interested in getting Hal Roach to approach the young star to participate in the ''Our Gang'' series in Hollywood. Roach offered $5 a day to Joe Jr. while the other young stars were paid five times more.

As he was getting bit parts in films; he was working with other established film stars such as Joel McCrea, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. and Jean Harlow. While selling newspapers around the corner, he also entered into Hollywood Professional School, where he went to school with dozens of unfamiliar students such as: Joseph A. Wapner, Nanette Fabray, Judy Garland, Lana Turner, among many others, and later Hollywood High School, where he graduated in 1938.

Career

Mickey McGuire

The Yules separated in 1924 during a slump in vaudeville, and in 1925, Nell Yule moved with her son to Hollywood, California, where she managed a tourist home. Fontaine Fox had placed a newspaper ad for a dark-haired child to play the role of "Mickey McGuire" in a series of short films. Lacking the money to have her son's hair dyed, Mrs. Yule took her son to the audition after applying burnt cork to his scalp. Joe got the role and became "Mickey" for 78 of the comedies, running from 1927 to 1936, starting with ''Mickey's Circus'', released September 4, 1927. These had been adapted from the ''Toonerville Trolley'' comic strip, which contained a character named Mickey McGuire. Joe Yule briefly became Mickey McGuire legally in order to trump an attempted copyright lawsuit (if it was his legal name, the film producers did not owe the comic strip writers royalties). His mother also changed her surname to McGuire in an attempt to bolster the argument, but the film producers lost. The litigation settlement awarded damages to the owners of the cartoon character, as well as compelled the twelve year old actor to refrain from calling himself by the name Mickey McGuire on and off screen.

Rooney later claimed that, during his Mickey McGuire days, he met cartoonist Walt Disney at the Warner Brothers studio, and that Disney was inspired to name Mickey Mouse after him, although Disney always said that he had changed the name from "Mortimer Mouse" to "Mickey Mouse" on the suggestion of his wife.

During an interruption in the series in 1932, Mrs. Yule made plans to take her son on a ten-week vaudeville tour as McGuire, and Fox sued successfully to stop him from using the name. Mrs. Yule suggested the stage name of Mickey Looney for her comedian son, which he altered slightly to Rooney, a less frivolous version. Rooney did other films in his adolescence, including several more of the McGuire films, and signed with MGM in 1934. MGM cast Rooney as the teenage son of a judge in 1937's ''A Family Affair'', setting Rooney on the way to another successful film series.

"Andy Hardy" and Judy Garland

In 1937, Rooney was selected to portray Andy Hardy in ''A Family Affair'' (1937), which MGM had planned as a B-movie. Rooney provided comic relief as the son of Judge James K. Hardy, portrayed by Lionel Barrymore (although Lewis Stone would play the role of Judge Hardy in later films). The film was an unexpected success, and led to thirteen more ''Andy Hardy'' films between 1937 and 1946, and a final film in 1958. Rooney also received top billing as "Shockey Carter" in ''Hoosier Schoolboy'' (1937).

Also in 1937, Mickey made his first film alongside Judy Garland with ''Thoroughbreds Don't Cry''. Garland and Rooney became close friends and a successful song and dance team. Besides three of the Andy Hardy films, where she portrayed Betsy Booth, a younger girl with a crush on Andy, they appeared together in a string of successful musicals, including the Oscar-nominated ''Babes in Arms'' (1939). During an interview in the documentary film, ''When the Lion Roars'', Rooney describes their friendship:

"Judy and I were so close we could've come from the same womb. We weren't like brothers or sisters but there was no love affair there; there was more than a love affair. It's very, very difficult to explain the depths of our love for each other. It was so special. It was a forever love. Judy, as we speak, has not passed away. She's always with me in every heartbeat of my body."

Rooney's breakthrough role as a dramatic actor came in 1938's ''Boys Town'' opposite Spencer Tracy as Whitey Marsh, which opened shortly before his 18th birthday. Rooney was named the biggest box-office draw in 1939, 1940 and 1941. Unquestionably a well-known entertainer by the early 1940s Rooney, with Garland, was one of many celebrities caricatured in Tex Avery's 1941 Warner Bros. cartoon ''Hollywood Steps Out''. As of 2011, Rooney is the only surviving entertainer depicted in the cartoon.

After the war

In 1944, Rooney entered military service. He served more than 21 months, until shortly after the end of World War II. During and after the war he helped entertain the troops in America and Europe, and spent part of the time as a radio personality on the American Forces Network and earned the Bronze Star. After his return to civilian life, his career slumped. He appeared in a number of films, including ''Words and Music'' in 1948, which paired him for the last time with Garland on film (he appeared with her on one episode as a guest on her CBS variety series in 1963). He briefly starred in a CBS radio series, ''Shorty Bell'', in the summer of 1948, and reprised his role as "Andy Hardy", with most of the original cast, in a syndicated radio version of ''The Hardy Family'' in 1949 and 1950 (repeated on Mutual during 1952).

His first television series, ''The Mickey Rooney Show: Hey, Mulligan'' (created by Blake Edwards with Rooney as his own producer), appeared on NBC television for thirty-two episodes between August 28, 1954 and June 4, 1955. In 1951, he directed a feature film for Columbia Pictures, ''My True Story'' starring Helen Walker. Rooney also starred as a ragingly egomaniacal television comedian in the live 90-minute television drama ''The Comedian'', in the ''Playhouse 90'' series on the evening of Valentine's Day in 1957, and as himself in a revue called ''The Musical Revue of 1959'' based on the 1929 film ''The Hollywood Revue of 1929'' which was edited into a film in 1960, by British International Pictures.

In 1958, Rooney joined Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra in hosting an episode of NBC's short-lived ''Club Oasis'' comedy and variety show. In 1960, Rooney directed and starred in ''The Private Lives of Adam and Eve'', an ambitious comedy known for its multiple flashbacks and many cameos. In the 1960s, Rooney returned to theatrical entertainment. He still accepted film roles in undistinguished films, but occasionally would appear in better works, such as ''Requiem for a Heavyweight'' (1962), ''It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World'' (1963), and ''The Black Stallion'' (1979). One of Rooney's more controversial roles came in the highly acclaimed 1961 film ''Breakfast at Tiffany's'' where he played a stereotyped buck-toothed myopic Japanese neighbor (Mr. Yunioshi) of the main character, Holly Golightly.

On December 31, 1961, he appeared on television's ''What's My Line'' and mentioned that he had already started enrolling students in the MRSE (Mickey Rooney School of Entertainment). His school venture never came to fruition, but for several years he was a spokesman/partner in Pennsylvania's Downingtown Inn, a country club and golf resort.

In 1966, while Rooney was working on the film ''Ambush Bay'' in the Philippines, his wife Barbara Ann Thomason (akas: Tara Thomas, Carolyn Mitchell), a former pin-up model and aspiring actress who had won 17 straight beauty contests in Southern California, was found dead in their bed. Beside her was her lover, Milos Milos, an actor friend of Rooney's. Detectives ruled it murder-suicide, which was committed with Rooney's own gun.

Rooney was awarded an Academy Juvenile Award in 1938, and in 1983 the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences voted him their Academy Honorary Award for his lifetime of achievement. He was mentioned in the 1972 song "Celluloid Heroes" by The Kinks: ''"If you stomped on Mickey Rooney/ He'd still turn round and smile..."''

Character actor

In addition to his film roles, Rooney made numerous guest-starring roles as a character actor for nearly six decades, beginning with an episode of ''Celanese Theatre''. The part led to other roles on such television series as ''Schlitz Playhouse'', ''Playhouse 90'', ''Producers' Showcase'', ''Alcoa Theatre'', ''Wagon Train'', ''G.E. True Theater'', ''Hennessey'', ''The Dick Powell Theatre'', ''Arrest and Trial'', ''Burke's Law'', ''Combat!'', ''The Fugitive'', ''Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre'', ''The Jean Arthur Show'', ''The Name of the Game'', ''Dan August'', ''Night Gallery'', ''The Love Boat'', ''Kung Fu: The Legend Continues'', among many others.

Television, stage and ''The Black Stallion''

Rooney made a successful transition to television and stage work. In 1961, he guest starred in the 13-week James Franciscus adventure–drama television series ''The Investigators'' on CBS. In 1963, he even entered ''The Twilight Zone'', giving a one-man performance in the episode "The Last Night of a Jockey". In 1964, he launched another half-hour sitcom, ''Mickey'', on ABC. The story line had "Mickey" operating a resort hotel in southern California. Son Tim Rooney appeared as Rooney's teenaged son on the program, and Emmaline Henry starred as Rooney's wife. It lasted 17 episodes, ending primarily due to the suicide of co-star Sammee Tong in October 1964.

He won a Golden Globe and an Emmy Award for his role in 1981's ''Bill''. Playing opposite Dennis Quaid, Rooney's character was a mentally challenged man attempting to live on his own after leaving an institution. He reprised his role in 1983's ''Bill: On His Own'', earning an Emmy nomination for the role.

Rooney did the voices for four Christmas TV animated/stop action specials: ''Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town'' (1970), ''The Year Without a Santa Claus'' (1974), ''Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July'' (1979), and ''A Miser Brothers' Christmas'' (2008) — always playing Santa Claus. In 1970, he was approached by television producer Norman Lear to consider taking on the role of Archie Bunker in the upcoming CBS series, ''All in the Family''. Like Jackie Gleason before him, Mickey rejected the role, which ultimately went to Carroll O'Connor.

He continued to work on stage and television through the 1980s and 1990s, appearing in the acclaimed stage play ''Sugar Babies'' with Ann Miller beginning in 1979. He also starred in the short-lived sitcom, ''One of the Boys'', along with 2 unfamiliar young stars, Dana Carvey and Nathan Lane, in 1982. He toured Canada in a dinner theatre production of ''The Mind with the Naughty Man'' in the mid-1990s. He played The Wizard in a stage production of ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' with Eartha Kitt at Madison Square Garden. Kitt was later replaced by Jo Anne Worley. In 1995 he starred with Charlton Heston, Peter Graves and Deborah Winters in the Warren Chaney docudrama ''America: A Call to Greatness''. He also appeared in the documentary ''That's Entertainment! III''.

Rooney voiced Mr. Cherrywood in ''The Care Bears Movie'' (1985), and starred as the Movie Mason in a Disney Channel Original Movie family film 2000's ''Phantom of the Megaplex''. He had a guest spot on an episode of ''The Golden Girls'' as Sophia's boyfriend "Rocko", who claimed to be a bank robber. He voiced himself in the ''Simpsons'' episode "Radioactive Man" of 1995. In 1996–97, Mickey played Talbut on the TV series, Kleo The Misfit Unicorn produced by Gordon Stanfield Animation (GSA). He co-starred in ''Night at the Museum'' in 2006 with Dick Van Dyke and Ben Stiller.

After starring in one unsuccessful TV series and for turning down an offer on a huge TV series, Rooney finally hit the jackpot, at 70, when he was offering a starring role on The Family Channel's, ''The Adventures of the Black Stallion'', where he reprised his role as Henry Dailey from the film of the same name, eleven years earlier. The show was based on a novel by Walter Farley. For this role, he had to travel all the way to Vancouver. Just like the film itself, the ''Black Stallion'' TV series, Rooney became one of the most beloved stars, that the show itself became an immediate hit with teenagers, young adults and people all over the world. The show was also seen in 70 countries. It also lost out to ''Harry and the Hendersons'', when the show was nominated for a Young Artist Award in the "Best Off-Prime Time or Cable Family Series" category.

Also starring on ''Black Stallion'' were Docs Keepin Time who played "The Black Stallion", but did not have a voice part in the series, despite appearing in every episode of the series, with an unfamiliar Canadian high school student, a fan of Rooney's films, a voice-over actor, a future acting instructor, and online radio host, Richard Ian Cox, in the role of Henry's teenaged traveler, Alec Ramsay. The on- and off-screen chemistry between Rooney and Cox was an immediate success story of 1990s television. Richard also had the opportunity to spend a lot of time with Mickey's real-life family, when not filming. For its three seasons on air, Rooney was nominated for a Gemini Award in the category of "Best Performance by an Actor in a Continuing Leading Dramatic Role", but didn't win. By the end of the third season, Black Stallion's ratings were declining, the show was cancelled in 1993, after three seasons and 78 episodes.

In December 2009 he appeared as a guest to a dinner party hosted by David Gest on the UK channel 4 show ''Come Dine With Me''.

Current work

Rooney appeared in television commercials for Garden State Life Insurance Company in 1999, alongside his wife Jan. In commercials shown in 2007, he can be seen in the background washing imaginary dishes.

In 2003, Mickey and Jan Rooney began their association with Rainbow Puppet Productions, providing their voices to the 100th Anniversary production of "Toyland!" an adaptation of Victor Herbert's ''Babes in Toyland''. He created the voice for the Master Toymaker while Jan provided the voice for Mother Goose. Since that time, they have created voices for additional Rainbow Puppet Productions including "Pirate Party" which also features vocal performances by Carol Channing. Both productions continue to tour theaters across the country.

He continues to work in film and tours with his wife in a multi-media live stage production called ''Let's Put On a Show!'' His first performance of this show after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack was in Bend, Oregon, in which Mickey and Jan requested the show begin with the singing of the "Star Spangled Banner" by Jan offstage with only the American Flag visible on stage.

On May 26, 2007, he was grand marshal at the Garden Grove Strawberry Festival. Rooney made his British pantomime debut, playing Baron Hardup in Cinderella, at the Sunderland Empire Theatre over the 2007 Christmas period, a role he reprised in 2009 at the Milton Keynes theatre.

In 2008, Rooney starred as "Chief", a wise old ranch owner, in the independent family feature film ''Lost Stallions: The Journey Home'', marking a return to starring in equestrian-themed productions for the first time since the 1990s TV show ''Adventures of the Black Stallion''. Although they have acted together before, ''Lost Stallions: The Journey Home'' is the sole film to date in which he and Jan portrayed a married couple on screen.

Personal life

Rooney has been married eight times. In the 1950s and 1960s, he was often the subject of comedians' jokes for his alleged inability to stay married. His current marriage, to Jan Chamberlin, has lasted more than 30 years which is longer than his previous seven marriages combined.

In 1942, he married Hollywood starlet Ava Gardner, but the two were divorced well before she became a star in her own right. While stationed in the military in Alabama in 1944, Rooney met and married local beauty queen Betty Jane Phillips. This marriage ended in divorce after he returned from Europe at the end of World War II. His subsequent marriages to Martha Vickers (1949) and Elaine Mahnken (1952) were also short-lived and ended in divorce. In 1958, Rooney married Barbara Ann Thomason, but tragedy struck when she was murdered in 1966. Falling into deep depression, he married Barbara's friend, Marge Lane, who helped him take care of his young children. The marriage lasted only 100 days. He was married to Carolyn Hockett from 1969 to 1974, but financial instability ended the relationship. Finally, in 1978, Rooney married Jan Chamberlin, his eighth wife. , they live in Westlake Village, California. Both are outspoken advocates for veterans and animal rights.

After battling drug addiction and a near bankruptcy caused by gambling and bad investments, Rooney became a born-again Christian in the 1970s, after an unusual encounter with a busboy in a casino coffee shop. Rooney shared his religious beliefs on Jim and Tammy Bakker's Christian television show, ''The PTL Club''.

Rooney's oldest child, Mickey Rooney, Jr., is a born-again Christian, and has an evangelical ministry in Hemet, California. He and several of Rooney's other eight children have worked at various times in show business. One of them, actor Tim Rooney, died in 2006, aged 59.

On September 21, 2005, just days after the death of Liza Minnelli's ex-stepfather, Sid Luft, where he attended his service, Rooney celebrated his 85th birthday at the Regent Theater in Arlington, Massachusetts, where his wife appeared with him in a play titled ''Let's Put On A Show''.

On September 23, 2010, Rooney celebrated his 90th birthday at Feinstein's at Loews Regency in the Upper East Side of New York City. Among the people who were attending the party were: Donald Trump, Regis Philbin, Nathan Lane, Tony Bennett and Jan Rooney, who threw the party for him. In December 2010 he was honored as Turner Classic Movies Star of the Month.

On February 16, 2011, Rooney was granted a temporary restraining order against Christopher Aber, one of Jan Rooney's two sons from a previous marriage. On March 2, 2011 Rooney appeared before a special U.S. Senate committee that was considering legislation to curb elder abuse. Rooney stated that he was financially abused by an unnamed family member. On March 27, 2011, all of Rooney's finances were permanently handed over to lawyers over the claim of missing money.

In April 2011, the temporary restraining order that Rooney was previously granted was voluntarily withdrawn as a result of a confidential settlement between Rooney and his stepson. Christopher Aber and Jan Rooney have denied all the allegations.

Filmography

Selected films

This is a selected list of Rooney's full-length films, both theatrical and made for television.

! Year !! Title
1927	''Orchids and Ermine''
	''The Beast of the City''
''Sin's Pay Day''
''High Speed''
''Fast Companions''
''My Pal, the King''
''Officer Thirteen''
	''The Big Cage''
''The Life of Jimmy Dolan''
''The Big Chance''
''The Chief''
''The World Changes''
	''Beloved''
''The Lost Jungle''
''I Like It That Way''
''Manhattan Melodrama''
''Love Birds''
''Half a Sinner''
''Hide-Out''
''Blind Date''
''Death on the Diamond''
	''The County Chairman''
''Down the Stretch''
''The Devil is a Sissy''
''Hoosier Schoolboy''
''Live, Love and Learn''
''Thoroughbreds Don't Cry''
''You're Only Young Once''
	''Love Is a Headache''
''Judge Hardy's Children''
''Hold That Kiss''
''Lord Jeff''
''Love Finds Andy Hardy''
''Stablemates''
''Out West with the Hardys''
''The Hardys Ride High''
''Andy Hardy Gets Spring Fever''
''Judge Hardy and Son''
	''Young Tom Edison''
''Andy Hardy Meets Debutante''

! Year !! Title
	''Andy Hardy's Private Secretary''
''Men of Boys Town''
''Life Begins for Andy Hardy''
''Babes on Broadway''
	''The Courtship of Andy Hardy''
''A Yank at Eton''
''Andy Hardy's Double Life''
''Thousands Cheer''
	''Andy Hardy's Blonde Trouble''
1946	''Love Laughs at Andy Hardy''
1947	''Killer McCoy''
1949
''The Fireball''
''He's a Cockeyed Wonder''
	''My Outlaw Brother''
1952
''All Ashore''
''A Slight Case of Larceny''
	''Drive a Crooked Road''
''The Atomic Kid''
	''The Bridges at Toko-Ri''
''The Twinkle in God's Eye''
	''The Bold and the Brave''
''Magnificent Roughnecks''
	''Operation Mad Ball''
	''A Nice Little Bank That Should Be Robbed''
''Andy Hardy Comes Home''
	''The Big Operator''
''The Last Mile''
	''Platinum High School''
	''King of the Roaring 20's – The Story of Arnold Rothstein''
''Everything's Ducky''
1962	''Requiem for a Heavyweight''
1963	''It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World''
1964	''The Secret Invasion''
	''Twenty-Four Hours to Kill''
''How to Stuff a Wild Bikini''
	''The Devil In Love''
''Ambush Bay''
1968
	''The Extraordinary Seaman''
''The Comic''
''80 Steps to Jonah''

! Year !! Title
1970	''Cockeyed Cowboys of Calico County''
	''Mooch Goes to Hollywood''
''The Manipulator''
	''Evil Roy Slade''
1973	''The Godmothers''
	''Thunder County''
''Rachel's Man''
''Journey Back to Oz'' (voice)
''The Year Without a Santa Claus''
	''Ace of Hearts''
''From Hong Kong with Love''
1976	''Find the Lady''
	''The Domino Principle''
''Pete's Dragon''
1978	''The Magic of Lassie''
''Arabian Adventure''
''Odyssey of the Pacific''
1982	''The Emperor of Peru''
1983	''Bill: On His Own''
1984	''It Came Upon the Midnight Clear''
1985	''The Care Bears Movie'' (voice)
1986	''Lightning, the White Stallion''
1988	''Bluegrass''
	''Erik the Viking''
''Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland''
	''Home For Christmas''
1991
	''The Milky Life''
''Sweet Justice''
''Silent Night, Deadly Night 5: The Toy Maker''
''Little Nemo: Adventures In Slumberland''
''Maximum Force''
1993	''The Legend of Wolf Mountain''
	''Revenge of the Red Baron''
''The Outlaws: The Legend of O.B. Taggart''
''Making Waves''
1995	''America: A Call to Greatness''
1997	''Killing Midnight''
	''The Face on the Barroom Floor''
''Animals and the Tollkeeper''
''Michael Kael vs. the World News Company''
''Sinbad: The Battle of the Dark Knights''
''Babe: Pig in the City''
	''Holy Hollywood''
''The First of May''
	''Internet Love''
''Phantom of the Megaplex''
2001	''Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp's Adventure'' (voice)
2002	''Topa Topa Bluffs''
2003	''Paradise''
	''Strike the Tent''
''A Christmas Too Many''
	''The Thirsting''
''To Kill a Mockumentary''
''Night at the Museum''
	''The Yesterday Pool''
''Bamboo Shark''
2008	''Lost Stallions: The Journey Home''
2010	''Gerald''
2011

Short subjects

! Year !! Title
1926	''Not to Be Trusted''
	'' Mickey's Circus''
''Mickey's Pals''
''Mickey's Eleven''
''Mickey's Battles''
	''Mickey's Parade''
''Mickey in School''
''Mickey's Nine''
''Mickey's Little Eva''
''Mickey's Wild West''
''Mickey in Love''
''Mickey's Triumph''
''Mickey's Babies''
''Mickey's Movies''
''Mickey's Rivals''
''Mickey the Detective''
''Mickey's Athletes''
''Mickey's Big Game Hunt''
	''Mickey's Great Idea''
''Mickey's Menagerie''
''Mickey's Last Chance''
''Mickey's Brown Derby''
''Mickey's Northwest Mounted''

! Year !! Title
	''Mickey's Initiation''
''Mickey's Midnite Follies''
''Mickey's Surprise''
''Mickey's Mix-Up''
''Mickey's Big Moment''
''Mickey's Strategy''
	''Mickey's Champs''
''Mickey's Explorers''
''Mickey's Master Mind''
''Mickey's Luck''
''Mickey's Whirlwinds''
''Mickey's Warriors''
''Mickey the Romeo''
''Mickey's Merry Men''
''Mickey's Winners''
''Screen Snapshots'' Series 9, No. 24
''Mickey's Musketeers''
''Mickey's Bargain''
	''Mickey's Stampede''
''Mickey's Crusaders''
''Mickey's Rebellion''
''Mickey's Diplomacy''
''Mickey's Wildcats''
''Mickey's Thrill Hunters''
''Mickey's Helping Hand''
''Mickey's Sideline''

! Year !! Title
	''Mickey's Busy Day''
''Mickey's Travels''
''Mickey's Holiday''
''Mickey's Big Business''
''Mickey's Golden Rule''
''Mickey's Charity''
	''Mickey's Ape Man''
''Mickey's Race''
''Mickey's Big Broadcast''
''Mickey's Disguises''
''Mickey's Touchdown''
''Mickey's Tent Show''
''Mickey's Covered Wagon''
	''Mickey's Minstrels''
''Mickey's Rescue''
''Mickey's Medicine Man''
1935	''Pirate Party on Catalina Isle''
1937	''Cinema Circus''
1938	''Andy Hardy's Dilemma''
1940	''Rodeo Dough''
1941	''Meet the Stars #4'': Variety Reel #2
1943	''Show Business at War''
1947	''Screen Snapshots: Out of This World'' Series
1953	''Screen Snapshots: Mickey Rooney – Then and Now''
1958	''Screen Snapshots: Glamorous Hollywood''
1968	''Vienna''
1974	''Just One More Time''
1975	''The Lion Roars Again''
2008	''Wreck the Halls''

Television

Rooney has made countless appearances in TV sitcoms and television films. He has also lent his voice to many animation films. Only his most important work is listed in this section.

! Year(s) !! Title
1954–1955	''The Mickey Rooney Show'': ''Hey Mulligan''
1957
1964–1965
1981
1982	''One of the Boys'' (canceled after 13 episodes)
1983	''Bill: On His Own'' (sequel to 1981's "Bill" nominated for Emmy)
1990–1993	''The Adventures of the Black Stallion''

Marriages

! Name !! Years !! Children
Ava Gardner	1942–1943
		Mickey Rooney, Jr. (born July 3, 1945)
Tim Rooney (January 4, 1947 — September 23, 2006)
Martha Vickers	1949–1951	Theodore Michael Rooney (born April 13, 1950)
Elaine Devry	1952–1958
		Kelly Ann Rooney (born September 13, 1959)
Kerry Rooney (born December 30, 1960)
Kimmy Sue Rooney (born September 13, 1963)
Marge Lane	1966–1967
		Jimmy Rooney (adopted from Carolyn's previous marriage) (born 1966)
Jonelle Rooney (born January 11, 1970)
	1978–present

References

Further reading

Rooney, Mickey (1991). ''Life Is Too Short''. (New York: Random House)

Marx, Arthur (1988/reprint). ''The Nine Lives Of Mickey Rooney''. (New York: Berkley Publishing Group)

External links

mickeyrooney.com, Official Site Of Mickey Rooney

Mickey Rooney on the Phil Silvers Show

"Mickey Rooney on America, Christ and Judy Garland: The Hollywood Legend Speaks Out." ''Montreal Mirror'' interview 1998

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an:Mickey Rooney ca:Mickey Rooney cs:Mickey Rooney cy:Mickey Rooney da:Mickey Rooney de:Mickey Rooney es:Mickey Rooney eu:Mickey Rooney fr:Mickey Rooney gl:Mickey Rooney it:Mickey Rooney he:מיקי רוני la:Michael Rooney nl:Mickey Rooney ja:ミッキー・ルーニー no:Mickey Rooney pl:Mickey Rooney pt:Mickey Rooney ro:Mickey Rooney ru:Микки Руни simple:Mickey Rooney sh:Mickey Rooney fi:Mickey Rooney sv:Mickey Rooney tl:Mickey Rooney tr:Mickey Rooney

Coordinates	59°34′″N150°48′″N
name	Peter Lorre
birth name	László Löwenstein
birth date	June 26, 1904
birth place	Rózsahegy (now Ružomberok), Austria-Hungary (now Slovakia)
death date	March 23, 1964
death place	Los Angeles, California, U.S.
occupation	Actor
years active	1929–64
spouse	Celia Lovsky''(1934–45)''Kaaren Verne''(1945–50)'' Anne Marie Brenning''(1953–64)'' 1 child
website	}}

Peter Lorre (26 June 1904 – 23 March 1964) was an Austrian-American actor frequently typecast as a sinister foreigner.

He caused an international sensation in 1931 with his portrayal of a serial killer who preys on little girls in the German film ''M''. Later he became a popular featured player in Hollywood crime films and mysteries, notably alongside Humphrey Bogart and Sydney Greenstreet, and as the star of the successful Mr. Moto detective series.

Biography

Lorre was born as László Löwenstein into a Jewish family in Rózsahegy (Hungarian), Rosenberg (German), Kingdom of Hungary, part of Austria-Hungary, now Ružomberok, Slovakia. His parents were Alois Loewenstein and Elvira Freischberger. When he was a child his family moved to Vienna where Lorre attended school. He began acting on stage in Vienna at the age of 17, where he worked with Richard Teschner, then moved to Breslau, and Zürich. In the late 1920s, the young actor moved to Berlin where he worked with German playwright Bertolt Brecht, most notably in his ''Mann ist Mann''. He also appeared as Dr. Nakamura in the musical ''Happy End'' by Brecht and composer Kurt Weill, alongside Brecht's wife Helene Weigel and co-stars Carola Neher, Oskar Homolka and Kurt Gerron.

The German-speaking actor became famous when Fritz Lang cast him as a child killer in his 1931 film ''M''. In 1932 he appeared alongside Hans Albers in the science fiction film ''F.P.1 antwortet nicht'' about an artificial island in the mid-Atlantic. When the Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933, Lorre took refuge first in Paris and then London, where he was noticed by Ivor Montagu, Alfred Hitchcock's associate producer for ''The Man Who Knew Too Much'' (1934), who reminded the director about Lorre's performance in ''M''. They first considered him to play the assassin in the film, but wanted to use him in a larger role, despite his limited command of English, which Lorre overcame by learning much of his part phonetically. He also was featured in Hitchcock's ''Secret Agent'', in 1935.

Eventually, Lorre went to Hollywood, where he specialized in playing sinister foreigners, beginning with ''Mad Love'' (1935), directed by Karl Freund. He starred in a series of ''Mr. Moto'' movies, a parallel to the better known ''Charlie Chan'' series, in which he played John P. Marquand's seminal character, a Japanese detective and spy. He did not enjoy these films — and twisted his shoulder during a stunt in ''Mr. Moto Takes a Vacation'' — but they were lucrative for the studio and gained Lorre many new fans. In 1939, he was picked to play the role that would eventually go to Basil Rathbone in ''Son of Frankenstein''; Lorre had to decline the part due to illness.

In 1940, Lorre co-starred with fellow horror actors Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff in the Kay Kyser movie ''You'll Find Out''. Lorre enjoyed considerable popularity as a featured player in Warner Bros. suspense and adventure films. Lorre played the role of Joel Cairo in ''The Maltese Falcon'' (1941) and portrayed the character Ugarte in the film classic ''Casablanca'' (1942). Lorre branched out into comedy with the role of Dr. Einstein in ''Arsenic and Old Lace'' (filmed in 1941, released 1944). In 1946 he starred with Sydney Greenstreet and Geraldine Fitzgerald in ''Three Strangers'', a suspense film about three people who are joint partners on a winning lottery ticket.

In 1941, Peter Lorre became a naturalized citizen of the United States. After World War II, Lorre's acting career in Hollywood experienced a downturn, whereupon he concentrated on radio and stage work. In Germany he co-wrote, directed and starred in ''Der Verlorene'' (''The Lost One'') (1951), a critically acclaimed art film in the film noir style. He then returned to the United States where he appeared as a character actor in television and feature films, often spoofing his "creepy" image.

In 1954, he had the distinction of becoming the first actor to play a James Bond villain when he portrayed Le Chiffre in a television adaptation of ''Casino Royale'', opposite Barry Nelson as an American James Bond. (In the spoof-film version of ''Casino Royale'', Ronnie Corbett comments that SMERSH includes among its agents not only Le Chiffre, but also "Peter Lorre and Bela Lugosi".) Also in 1954, Lorre starred alongside Kirk Douglas and James Mason in ''20,000 Leagues under the Sea''.

A famous story is told in Hollywood that in 1956, both Lorre and Vincent Price attended Bela Lugosi's funeral. According to Price, Lorre asked him "Do you think we should drive a stake through his heart just in case?" However, according to Lugosi biographers Arthur Lennig and Gary Don Rhodes, neither actor attended Lugosi's funeral.

In 1959, Lorre appeared in NBC's espionage drama ''Five Fingers'', starring David Hedison, in the episode "Thin Ice". In the early 1960s he worked with Roger Corman on several low-budgeted, tongue-in-cheek, and very popular films. He appeared in a supporting role in the 1961 film, ''Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea''. In 1961, he was interviewed on the NBC program ''Here's Hollywood''.

Marriages and family

He was married three times: Celia Lovsky (1934 – 13 March 1945, divorced); Kaaren Verne (25 May 1945 – 1950, divorced) and Anne Marie Brenning (21 July 1953 – 23 March 1964, his death). In 1953, Anne Marie bore his only child, Catharine. His daughter Catharine made headlines after ''Hillside Strangler'' serial killer Kenneth Bianchi confessed to police investigators after his arrest that he and his cousin and partner in crime Angelo Buono had stopped Catharine Lorre disguised as police officers with the intent of abducting and murdering her in 1977, but after learning that she was the daughter of Peter Lorre, the pair let her go. It was only after Bianchi was arrested that Catharine Lorre realized whom she had met. Catharine died in 1985 of complications arising from diabetes.

In 1963 an actor named Eugene Weingand, who was unrelated to Lorre, attempted to trade on his slight resemblance to the actor by changing his name to "Peter Lorie", but his petition was rejected by the courts. After Lorre's death, however, he referred to himself as Lorre's son.

Health and death

Lorre had suffered for years from chronic gallbladder troubles, for which doctors had prescribed morphine. Lorre became trapped between the constant pain and addiction to morphine to ease the problem. It was during the period of the Moto films that Lorre struggled and overcame his addiction.

Overweight and never fully recovered from his addiction to morphine, Lorre suffered many personal and career disappointments in his later years. He died in 1964 of a stroke. Lorre's body was cremated and his ashes interred at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood. Vincent Price read the eulogy at his funeral.

Legacy and mimicry

Lorre has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, at 6619 Hollywood Boulevard.

Lorre's distinctive accent and large-eyed face became a favorite target of comedians and cartoonists. For example, several Warner Bros. cartoons used a caricature of Lorre's face with an impression by Mel Blanc, including ''Birth of a Notion'', ''Hair-Raising Hare'' and ''Racketeer Rabbit''.

Books and comics

In the early 1940s, the adventures of ''Batman and Robin'' appeared in daily newspapers. One story, ''The Two-Bit Dictator of Twin Mills'', drawn by Batman co-creator Bob Kane, featured a hitman called Jojo who was, according to writer Al Schwartz, made to look like Lorre.

Films, television, and music

Musician and filker Tom Smith won a Pegasus award for Best Classic Filk Song in 2006 entitled "I Want to be Peter Lorre" which appears on his filk album "Homecoming: MarCon 2005", which includes his vocal impersonation of the actor.

The Jazz Butcher's song "Peter Lorre" was first featured on the group's ''Conspiracy'' album, which was released in May 1986.

The stop motion film ''Corpse Bride'' features "The Maggot", a small green worm who lives inside the title's character head. His features and voice (provided by Enn Reitel) are caricatures of Peter Lorre. "From the very beginning Tim wanted the Maggot to be a Peter Lorre-esque character, and we had a good time working with that and it went through various design changes," said co-director Mike Johnson in the book ''Tim Burton's Corpse Bride: An Invitation to the Wedding''.

On September 11, 2007 Brooklyn-based punk band The World/Inferno Friendship Society released a full-length album about Lorre called ''Addicted to Bad Ideas: Peter Lorre's Twentieth Century'', which traces Lorre's film career, drug addiction, and death. It has been performed at the Famous Spiegeltent. The album was subsequently adapted into a multi-media stage production directed by Jay Scheib, which premiered at Webster Hall in New York City on January 9, 2009, and went on to play major arts festivals around the world, including Spoleto Festival USA (Charleston, SC), Luminato Festival (Toronto), Noorderzon Festival (Groningen, Holland) and Theaterformen (Hanover, Germany).

Filmography

''Die Verschwundene Frau'' (1929) (uncredited)

''Der weiße Teufel'' (1930) aka ''The White Devil''

''Mann ist Mann'' (1931) aka ''A Man's a Man''

''M'' (1931)

''Bomben auf Monte Carlo'' (1931) aka ''Bombs Over Monte Carlo''

''Die Koffer des Herrn O.F.'' (1931)

''Fünf von der Jazzband'' (1932)

''Schuß im Morgengrauen'' (1932)

''Der weiße Dämon'' (1932) aka ''Dope''

''Stupéfiants'' (1932)

''F.P.1 antwortet nicht'' (1932)

''Les Requins du pétrole'' (1933)

''Du haut en bas'' (1933)

''Was Frauen träumen'' (1933)

''Unsichtbare Gegner'' (1933)

''The Man Who Knew Too Much'' (1934)

''Mad Love'' (1935)

''Crime and Punishment'' (1935)

''Secret Agent'' (1936)

''Crack-Up'' (1936)

''Nancy Steele Is Missing!'' (1937)

''Think Fast, Mr. Moto'' (1937)

''Lancer Spy'' (1937)

''Thank You, Mr. Moto'' (1937)

''Mr. Moto's Gamble'' (1938)

''Mr. Moto Takes a Chance'' (1938)

''I'll Give a Million'' (1938)

''Mysterious Mr. Moto'' (1938)

''Mr. Moto's Last Warning'' (1939)

''Mr. Moto in Danger Island'' (1939)

''Mr. Moto Takes a Vacation'' (1939)

''Strange Cargo'' (1940)

''I Was an Adventuress'' (1940)

''Island of Doomed Men'' (1940)

''Stranger on the Third Floor'' (1940)

''You'll Find Out'' (1940)

''Der Ewige Jude'' (1940) (archive footage)

''The Face Behind the Mask'' (1941)

''Mr. District Attorney'' (1941)

''They Met in Bombay'' (1941)

''The Maltese Falcon'' (1941)

''All Through the Night'' (1941)

''Invisible Agent'' (1942)

''The Boogie Man Will Get You'' (1942)

''Casablanca'' (1942)

''The Constant Nymph'' (1943)

''Background to Danger'' (1943)

''The Cross of Lorraine'' (1943)

''Passage to Marseille'' (1944)

''The Mask of Dimitrios'' (1944)

''Arsenic and Old Lace'' (1944)

''The Conspirators'' (1944)

''Hollywood Canteen'' (1944)

''Hotel Berlin'' (1945)

''Confidential Agent'' (1945)

''Three Strangers'' (1946)

''Black Angel'' (1946)

''The Chase'' (1946)

''The Verdict'' (1946)

''The Beast with Five Fingers'' (1946)

''My Favorite Brunette'' (1947)

''Casbah'' (1948)

''Rope of Sand'' (1949)

''Quicksand'' (1950)

''Double Confession'' (1950)

''Der Verlorene'' (1951) (also wrote and directed)

''Beat the Devil'' (1953)

''Casino Royale'', a episode of the television series ''Climax!''

''20,000 Leagues Under the Sea'' (1954)

''Around the World in Eighty Days'' (1956)

''Meet Me in Las Vegas'' (1956) (uncredited)

''Congo Crossing'' (1956)

''The Buster Keaton Story'' (1957)

''Silk Stockings'' (1957)

''The Story of Mankind'' (1957)

''The Sad Sack'' (1957)

''Hell Ship Mutiny'' (1957)

''The Big Circus'' (1959)

''Scent of Mystery'' (1960)

''Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea'' (1961)

''Tales of Terror'' (1962)

''Five Weeks in a Balloon'' (1962)

''The Raven'' (1963)

''The Comedy of Terrors'' (1964)

''Muscle Beach Party'' (1964)

''The Patsy'' (1964)

References

Further reading

External links

Watch Peter Lorre in Fritz Lang's M

The Lorre Library of Sound

The Peter Lorre Companion

Photographs of Peter Lorre

The Lodger on Mystery in the Air, 1947, starring Peter Lorre and Agnes Moorehead

Listen to Jack Benny Show 1941-03-09 (402) Guest Peter Lorre - Murder at the Racquet Club

Listen to Jack Benny Podcast 1946-03-24 (579) Guest Peter Lorre - I Stand Condemned

Mystery in the Air (1947)

Category:1904 births Category:1964 deaths Category:20th-century American people Category:20th-century Austrian people Category:20th-century Hungarian people Category:20th-century actors Category:Jewish actors Category:American film actors Category:Austrian film actors Category:Hungarian film actors Category:Hungarian Jews Category:Hungarian emigrants to the United States Category:Austrian emigrants to the United States Category:Naturalized citizens of the United States Category:American people of Austrian-Jewish descent Category:American people of Hungarian-Jewish descent Category:People from Ružomberok Category:Deaths from stroke Category:Burials at Hollywood Forever Cemetery

ar:بيتر لور ast:Peter Lorre ca:Peter Lorre da:Peter Lorre de:Peter Lorre es:Peter Lorre eu:Peter Lorre fr:Peter Lorre gl:Peter Lorre id:Peter Lorre it:Peter Lorre he:פיטר לורה hu:Peter Lorre nl:Peter Lorre ja:ピーター・ローレ no:Peter Lorre pl:Peter Lorre pt:Peter Lorre ru:Петер Лорре simple:Peter Lorre sk:Peter Lorre sh:Peter Lorre fi:Peter Lorre sv:Peter Lorre tr:Peter Lorre

Byron Conrad Haskin (April 22, 1899 – April 16, 1984) was an American film and television director. He was born in Portland, Oregon.

He is remembered today for directing 1953's ''The War of the Worlds'', one of many films where he teamed with producer George Pal. In his early career, he was a special effects artist, with a number of credits on Warner Bros. films, eventually becoming the head of the studio's special effects department. During his tenure there he earned three Oscar nominations for his effects work, and was even recognized with a Scientific and Technical Award citation for developing a rear-projection system useful in effects photography. In the late 1940s he turned to directing, helming ''Treasure Island'', Walt Disney's first live-action feature. In 1953 he began his collaboration with George Pal, followed by ''The Naked Jungle'', ''Conquest of Space'' in 1955, and ''The Power'' in 1967. His other most noteworthy film is the science fiction adventure ''Robinson Crusoe on Mars'', released in 1964. Haskin also worked as a cinematographer and producer.

His career in television included directing six episodes of the original ''The Outer Limits'', including two highly regarded episodes, "The Architects of Fear" and "Demon with a Glass Hand". He also co-produced the original ''Star Trek'' pilot episode, "The Cage".

Haskin appeared as an interviewee on-screen in the 1980 documentary ''Hollywood'' series by Kevin Brownlow. Haskin died in Montecito, California six days before his 85th birthday.

Selected filmography

Director

''Matinee Ladies'' (1927)

''Action in the North Atlantic'' (1943)

''I Walk Alone'' (1948)

''Too Late for Tears'' (1949)

''Treasure Island'' (1950)

''Denver and Rio Grande'' (1952)

''The War of the Worlds'' (1953)

''Long John Silver'' (1954)

''His Majesty O'Keefe'' (1954)

''The Naked Jungle'' (1954)

''Conquest of Space'' (1955)

''The First Texan'' (1956)

''The Boss'' (1956)

''From the Earth to the Moon'' (1958)

''Captain Sindbad'' (1963)

''Robinson Crusoe on Mars'' (1964)

''The Power'' (1968)

Special effects

''A Midsummer Night's Dream'' (1935)

''Dodge City'' (1939)

''The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex'' (1939)

''The Roaring Twenties'' (1939)

''The Sea Hawk'' (1940)

''They Drive by Night'' (1940)

''Knute Rockne, All American'' (1940)

''Santa Fe Trail'' (1940)

''High Sierra'' (1941)

''The Sea Wolf'' (1941)

''The Bride Came C.O.D.'' (1941)

''Captains of the Clouds'' (1942)

''Across the Pacific'' (1942)

''Passage to Marseille'' (1944)

''Arsenic and Old Lace'' (1944)

External links

Category:1899 births Category:1984 deaths Category:People from Portland, Oregon

de:Byron Haskin es:Byron Haskin eu:Byron Haskin fr:Byron Haskin it:Byron Haskin fi:Byron Haskin

Coordinates	59°34′″N150°48′″N
name	Lizabeth Scott
birth name	Emma Matzo
birth date	September 29, 1922
birth place	Scranton, Pennsylvania, U.S. }}

Lizabeth Scott (born September 29, 1922) is an American actress and singer widely known for her film noir roles.

Early life

She was born Emma Matzo (some sources mistakenly give her family name as "Motzas") in the Pine Brook section of Scranton, Pennsylvania, one of six children, to Ruthenian parents who had emigrated from Uzhgorod, in what is now Ukraine. She attended Central High School and Marywood College (now Marywood University).

She later went to New York City and attended the Alvienne School of Drama. In late 1942, she was eking out a precarious living with a small Midtown Manhattan summer stock company when she got a job as understudy for Tallulah Bankhead in Thornton Wilder's play ''The Skin of Our Teeth''. However, Scott never had an opportunity to substitute for Bankhead.

Rise to fame

When Miriam Hopkins was signed to replace Bankhead, Scott quit and returned to her drama studies and some fashion modeling. She then received a call that Gladys George, who was signed to replace Hopkins, was ill, and Scott was needed back at the theatre. She went on in the leading role of "Sabina", receiving a nod of approval from critics at the age of 20. The following night, George was out again and Scott went on in her place.

Soon afterward, Scott was at the Stork Club when film producer Hal Wallis asked who she was, unaware that an aide had already arranged an interview with her for the following day. When Scott returned home, however, she found a telegram offering her the lead for the Boston run of ''The Skin of Our Teeth''. She could not turn it down. She sent Wallis her apologies and went on the road.

Though the Broadway production, in which she was credited as "Girl", christened her "Elizabeth", she dropped the "e" the day after the opening night in Boston, "just to be different".

A photograph of Scott in ''Harper's Bazaar'' magazine was seen by film agent Charles Feldman. He admired the fashion pose and took her on as a client. Scott made her first screen test at Warner Brothers, where she and Wallis finally met. Though the test was bad, the producer recognized her potential. As soon as Wallis set up shop at Paramount, she was signed to a contract. Her film debut was in ''You Came Along'' (1945) opposite Robert Cummings.

Paramount publicity dubbed Scott "The Threat," in order to create an onscreen persona for her similar to Lauren Bacall or Veronica Lake. Scott's smoky sensuality and husky voice lent itself to the film noir genre and, beginning with ''The Strange Love of Martha Ivers'' (1946) starring Barbara Stanwyck and Van Heflin, the studio cast her in a series of noir thrillers. Film historian Eddie Muller has noted that no other actress has appeared in so many noir films, with more than three quarters of her 20 films qualifying.

The dark blonde actress was initially compared to Bacall because of a slight resemblance and a similar voice, even more so after she starred with Bacall's husband, Humphrey Bogart, in the 1947 noir thriller ''Dead Reckoning''. At the age of 25, Scott's billing and portrait were equal to Bogart's on the film's lobby posters and in advertisements. The film was the first of many femme fatale roles for Scott.

She also starred in ''Desert Fury'' (1947), a noir filmed in Technicolor, with John Hodiak, Burt Lancaster, Wendell Corey and Mary Astor. In it, she played Paula Haller, who, on her return from college, falls for gangster Eddie Bendix (Hodiak), and faces a great deal of opposition from the others. Scott was paired with Lancaster, Corey and Kirk Douglas in Wallis' ''I Walk Alone'' (1948), a noirish story of betrayal and vengeance. In 1949, she starred as a vicious femme fatale in ''Too Late for Tears''. The film is unusual for featuring her as the main character, rather than the supporting role most women were relegated to in film noirs of the period.

Having being known professionally as Lizabeth Scott for 4½ years, she appeared at the courthouse in Los Angeles, on October 20, 1949 and had her name legally changed. Another courtroom appearance came several years later, in 1955, when she sued ''Confidential'' magazine for stating that she spent her off-work hours with "Hollywood's weird society of baritone babes" (a euphemism for a lesbian) in an article which claimed Scott's name was found on the clients' list belonging to a call-girl agency. The suit was dismissed on a technicality. After completing ''Loving You'' in 1957, Elvis Presley's second film, Scott retired from the screen. Later that year, she recorded her album, ''Lizabeth''. The next few years saw Scott occasionally guest-star on television, including a 1963 episode of ''Burke's Law''.

Music

After completing her final major film role, Scott signed a recording contract with Vik Records (a subsidiary of RCA Victor) and recorded an album with Henri Rene and his orchestra (in Hollywood on October 28, 29 and 30, 1957). Simply titled ''Lizabeth'', the tracks are a mixture of torch songs and playful romantic ballads. The recordings were arranged by George Wyle and Henri Rene, while Herman Diaz, Jr. produced and directed.

Later years

Despite some rumored romances, no positive records of a relationship exist, and Scott is believed to have never married. She has no children. At least one book has claimed she was a mistress of married film producer Hal Wallis.

While she continued to make some guest appearances on various television shows throughout the 1960s, much of her private time was dedicated to classes at the University of Southern California. In 1972, she made her last film appearance, in ''Pulp'', which starred Michael Caine and Mickey Rooney. After that, she mostly kept away from public view and has declined many interview requests.

She did, however, appear on stage at an American Film Institute tribute to Hal Wallis in 1987. In 2001, she was listed as one of the celebrity guests for the Michael Jackson: 30th Anniversary Special, which screened in the USA on CBS. More recently, she was photographed next to an image of herself on the poster for ''The Strange Love of Martha Ivers'' at the AMPAS Centennial Celebration for Barbara Stanwyck on 16 May 2007. She recently attended another screening of the film on June 28, 2010 as part of AMPAS's "Oscar Noir" series at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.

In 2003, Scott spoke substantially to Bernard F. Dick about her time in films for his biography of producer Hal Wallis. In the book, the author remarks that during his conversation with Scott in a restaurant, Scott (in her 80s) was still able to recite her opening monologue from ''The Skin of Our Teeth'', which she performed on stage at age 20.

Lizabeth Scott has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her contribution to motion pictures at 1624 Vine Street in Hollywood.

Filmography

{| class=wikitable ! No!! Title !! Year !! Studio !! Role !! Director !! Other cast members |- | align=right|1. || ''You Came Along'' || 1945 || Paramount|| Ivy Hotchkiss || John Farrow || Robert Cummings, Don DeFore |- | align=right|2. || ''The Strange Love of Martha Ivers'' || 1946 || Hal Wallis Productions/Paramount || Toni Marachek || Lewis Milestone || Barbara Stanwyck, Van Heflin, Kirk Douglas |- | align=right|3. || ''Dead Reckoning'' || 1947 || Columbia || Coral "Dusty" Chandler || John Cromwell || Humphrey Bogart |- | align=right|4. || ''Desert Fury'' || 1947 || Paramount || Paula Haller || Lewis Allen || John Hodiak, Burt Lancaster, Mary Astor |- | align=right|5. || ''Variety Girl'' || 1947 || Paramount || Herself || George Marshall || Mary Hatcher, Olga San Juan, DeForest Kelley |- | align=right|6. || ''I Walk Alone'' || 1948 || Paramount || Kay Lawrence || Byron Haskin || Burt Lancaster, Kirk Douglas |- | align=right|7. || ''Pitfall'' || 1948 || United Artists || Mona Stevens || André De Toth || Dick Powell, Jane Wyatt, Raymond Burr |- | align=right|8. || ''Too Late for Tears'' || 1949 || United Artists || Jane Palmer || Byron Haskin || Don DeFore, Dan Duryea |- | align=right|9. || ''Easy Living'' || 1949 || RKO || Liza "Lize" Wilson || Jacques Tourneur || Victor Mature, Lucille Ball, Sonny Tufts |- | align=right|10. || ''Paid in Full'' || 1950 || Paramount || Jane Langley || William Dieterle || Robert Cummings, Diana Lynn |- | align=right|11. || ''Dark City'' || 1950 || Paramount || Fran Garland || William Dieterle || Charlton Heston, Viveca Lindfors |- | align=right|12. || ''The Company She Keeps'' || 1951 || RKO || Joan Wilburn || John Cromwell || Jane Greer, Dennis O'Keefe |- | align=right|13. || ''Two of a Kind'' || 1951 || Columbia || Brandy Kirby || Henry Levin || Edmund O'Brien, Terry Moore |- | align=right|14. || ''Red Mountain'' || 1951 || Paramount || Chris || William Dieterle || Alan Ladd, Arthur Kennedy |- | align=right|15. || ''The Racket'' || 1951 || RKO || Irene Hayes || John Cromwell || Robert Mitchum, Robert Ryan |- | align=right|16. || ''Stolen Face'' || 1952 || Hammer / Lippert || Alice Brent ''and''Lily Conover (after surgery) || Terence Fisher || Paul Henreid, André Morell |- | align=right|17. || ''Scared Stiff'' || 1953 || Paramount || Mary Carroll || George Marshall || Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, Carmen Miranda |- | align=right|18. || ''Bad for Each Other'' || 1953 || Columbia || Helen Curtis || Irving Rapper || Charlton Heston, Dianne Foster |- | align=right|19. || ''Silver Lode'' || 1954 || RKO || Rose Evans || Allan Dwan || John Payne, Dan Duryea |- | align=right|20. || ''The Weapon'' || 1957 || Republic || Elsa Jenner || Val Guest || Steve Cochran, Herbert Marshall |- | align=right|21. || ''Loving You'' || 1957 || Paramount || Glenda Markle || Hal Kanter || Elvis Presley, Wendell Corey |- | align=right|22. || ''Pulp'' || 1972 || United Artists || Princess Betty Cippola || Mike Hodges || Michael Caine, Mickey Rooney |}

References

External links

"Lizabeth Scott's Name Really Emma Motzas" - Printed in The Evening Independent, May 21, 1949.

Category:1922 births Category:Actors from Pennsylvania Category:Living people Category:American film actors Category:American female models Category:American stage actors Category:American television actors Category:American people of Ukrainian descent Category:People from Scranton, Pennsylvania

de:Lizabeth Scott fr:Lizabeth Scott it:Lizabeth Scott nl:Lizabeth Scott no:Lizabeth Scott ru:Лизабет Скотт sr:Лизабет Скот fi:Lizabeth Scott