Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir
by Eddie Muller
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Book Summary Information
Author: Eddie MullerEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1998-05-15
ISBN: 0312180764
Number of pages: 208
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Book Reviews of Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir
Book Review: Gin and Cigarettes
Summary: 5 Stars
If you are interested in film noir and looking to purchase a single book on the subject, this is the title that I would recommend. There are dozens of other books available, but this is the one that I would deem as being essential for a beginner. The text of "Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir" is lavishly illustrated with publicity stills and film posters. The writing is uniformly engaging and highly addictive.
The author, Eddie Muller, is a man of parts. He has written novels and biographies, he has provided informative and entertaining commentary tracks as bonus materials for dvds, he has hosted and programmed film festivals and interviewed actors and actresses from Hollywood's Golden Age, he helped found a not for profit corporation that labors to restore vintage films that might otherwise be lost due to the decomposition of nitrate stock while studio attorneys quarrel over ownership issues and so much more. Muller has an interest in prize fighting and exploitation films. He was writing about the grindhouse cinemas long before Quentin Tarantino developed a feature film screenplay on the same topic. Muller is a minor expert on the architecture and geography of his hometown, San Francisco, and can identify all of the filming locations used in the noirs set there, including former landmark buildings that are now demolished.
Given his varied interests, Muller's writing reflects his overall versatility. He is not a one trick pony who rewrites the same book and repeats the same anecdotes over and over again. Muller is authoritative, but humble and approachable at the same time. He does not take himself too seriously and he remains an unrepentant enthusiast. Any man who could attend a revival screening of "Born to Kill" and keep the volatile Lawrence Tierney on a short leash is someone to be admired. Muller received an affectionate head butt for his troubles from Tierney one of Hollywood's most celebrated barroom pugilists and back alley brawlers.
His online essay on the eventful day is hilarious.
As to the subject at hand, film noir, Muller's carefully crafted prose reads as if it were transcribed from a performance by an accomplished improvisational jazz musician, although Muller would be the first to point out that the widespread public association of film noir with jazz is overstated (noir films did not typically include jazz scores until relatively late into the film noir cycle). Many standard reference books on the subject are written by film school professors and academics. Regrettably, some of these scholarly tomes are decidedly dull. Muller is refreshingly readable in contrast and could go fifteen rounds with any of the film school lecturers without putting anyone to sleep. He can hold his own against the scholars and specialists, but his writing reflects a liberal arts background that will resonate with the masses.
If you finish this book, you will learn about the pulp fiction and detective writers who produced the paperbacks that were adapted for the movies, the economics of the "B" film units at the studios, marketing techniques and poster art used to sell the flicks and put fannies in the theater seats, the production code censors and the back stories on the people who made the movies. Edgar G. Ulmer, for example, worked on such a tight budget for the one week wonder "Detour" that the total amount of raw film stock, as measured in feet, available to him for the feature was rationed by the studio penny pinchers at Producers Releasing Corporation.
This book is great fun and it holds up well for rereading. My only complaint is that Muller concentrated on the output of the major studios almost exclusively and, largely, overlooked Poverty Row productions, but that is a small criticism. After reading this book, you may subscribe to Netflix to secure more film titles that were once staples on the late, late show.
Muller does not pull any punches. You may not agree with all of his opinions, but you can respect his positions. The book cover is based upon a scene in the climax of the movie "Dead Reckoning." Muller pans the film for its shortcomings, which include a confusing plot, and relates the problematic history of its script going through multiple rewrites by several writers before the film was shot. I have always enjoyed the film, but Muller recognizes its deficiencies that rendered it good rather than great.
Naturally enough, the book incorporates some of the best dialogue from the movies. Highly recommended.
Summary of Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir
Welcome to Dark City, urban landscape of the imagination. A place where the men and women who created film noir often find themselves dangling from the same sinister heights as the silver-screen avatars to whom they gave life. Eddie Muller, who led readers on a guided tour of the seamier side of motion pictures in Grindhouse: The Forbidden World of 'Adults Only' Cinema, now takes us on a spellbinding trip through treacherous terrain: Hollywood in the post-World War II years, when art, politics, scandal, style--and brilliant craftsmanship--produced a new approach to moviemaking, and a new type of cultural mythology.
Dark City is a 1999 Edgar Award Nominee for Best Critical / Biographical Work.
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