Towards a Neo-Noir-O-Meter
Posted by Solomon on 8/12/2015, 10:39 am
The factors that create neo-noirness seem to me to have a broader range than those that create (classic) noirness, as embodied in Don's Noir-O-Meter. Some neo-noirs do little more than hark back to the classic properties. Others display new and original features altogether and/or take a classic feature like alienation and explore it in new and original ways. The use of humor closely combined with non-humorous activities, often connected to violence and crime, is much more prevalent in neo-noirs. Neo-noirs are mostly in color. Techniques of using color have amplified considerably and can be used to impart a neo-noir ambience. I suspect that a single Neo-Noir-O-Meter may have difficulty distinguishing neo-noirs that are basically working from a classic noir basis from those that in some sense are more truly neo-noirs by employing genuinely new creative elements of a more fundamental kind.
With that as introduction, let's work from the Noir-O-Meter as a basis. I’ve altered the weights of some items to accord with my judgment of their greater or lesser importance in neo-noirs. I’ve dropped some items and replaced them with corresponding others that again seem better suited to characterizing neo-noirs.
CHARACTER ELEMENTS
Femme fatale/homme fatale or other “peril-inducing” character(s): 5 (reduced from 15)
Morally ambiguous characters: 10 (increased from 5)
Alienated protagonist: 10 (increased from 5)
A dupe or a fall guy: 5
Violence relative to character development/interaction: 10
Characters trapped by past events: 10
Degree of character triangulation: 10
[Total character element points remain at 60. The main shifts here owe to my feeling that both moral ambiguity of characters and alienation have become more pervasive in neo-noir.]
VISUAL (MISE-EN-SCENE/SETTING) ELEMENTS
B/W cinematography: 0 [This is dropped]
Color filters; washed out colors; dark colors; enhanced colors: 10 [replaces B/W]
Low-angle shooting/Expressionistic techniques: 5
A sense of fatalism: 20
Use of extreme mise-en-scene (claustrophobic/barren): 10
Use of mise-en-scene to produce alienation: 5
Odd camera angles or visual effects/sequences: 5
An urban setting: 0 [This is dropped; it’s replaced by the next two categories]
Gritty and/or tawdry and/or rundown and/or industrial setting: 5
Upscale office buildings and/or cityscape: 5
Barren and/or exotic location setting: 0 [Dropped and replaced by the next category]
Isolated rural or small town location and/or extreme natural setting: 5
Night club and/or gambling setting: 5
[Total visual elements remain at 75. The changes here reflect the uses of color and more varied locations.]
PLOT/SCREENWRITING ELEMENTS
A convoluted storyline: 0 [dropped]
Use of flashbacks and/or time inversions: 10
A crime at the center of the story: 5 [crime replaces murder or heist]
A betrayal or a double-cross: 5
Story told from the perspective of criminals: 5
Story suffused with black humor: 5 [added]
False accusation or fear of same: 5
Sexual relationships with respect to plot development: 5 [downgraded from 10]
Plot dependent on corruption: 10 [added]
A spoken narrative: 5
Hard-boiled dialogue/repartee: 0 [dropped]
Bleakness of denouement: 10
[Total remains at 65 points. The changes here reflect the greater presence of humor and corruption in plots. Sex has become pervasive but its relation to plot less so. Dialog has more swearing and less repartee altogether.]
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