What do folks think of classifying Jack Hill’s Pit Stop (shot in 1967, released in 1969) as a late noir?

1) The protagonist checks the noir antihero boxes and has a negative, existential trajectory.

2) The film was shot in unself-conscious black-and-white - 1967 is late for that - and is quite dark visually.

3) The location shooting in the more sordid environs of Southern California is reminiscent of Angel’s Flight, which I wrote about here recently, and other location-shot late noirs.

4) Figure 8 auto racing - this actually existed! - with its constant crashes and injuries is suicidal and inherently “noir” in that sense.

5) As writer-director, Jack Hill clearly intended this movie as “art exploitation” - it is not in any sense a throwaway.

There is a watchable print on Dailymotion.