The newest edition of the NC e-zine has more to recommend it than has been the case for awhile, but it comes at the cost of its centering device: film noir itself. Too many of its essays veer away from films that can credibly be called noir: editor Imogen Smith attempts to dance around this with what have become the standard feints--terms such as "noirish" (an approach only acceptable in the hands of the late great encyclopedist John Grant) and "noir-stained" (a term so nebulous that it dovetails--or is that swan-dives?--into Supreme Court Justice Byron White's observation about pornography).

This straying from noir is front and center right from the start--Rachel Walther's essay on three American-born actors in 1950s Italy is intended to channel the breezy sweep often evident in the writings of Jake Hinkson (now, apparently, a former contributor). The three actors--Broderick Crawford, Steve Cochran, and John Kitzmiller--make for stranger bedfellows than even the most wild-eyed "Three Godfathers" casting choice, and only one of the films featured by Walther (Lattuada's SENZA PIETA) can actually be considered noir.

It's one of those "wheels within organizational wheels" essays that has the kind of hook which can "work" as the lead story despite it being too far afield from the e-zine's main subject--and it was needed for that since there is nothing else in the issue's content that is at all credible as a lead article. Walther takes care to "quote the boss" (Eddie M. dishes briefly about Kitzmiller...) but spends more time talking about the "during production" travails that befell the directors who went down the rabbit hole with Crawford and Cochrane than she does in following the arc of Kitzmiller's (arguably more historically interesting) career. She winds up cheerleading for the three key films in the article--the previously mentioned SENSA PIETA, and the two with more fashionable directorial pedigrees--IL BIDONE and IL GRIDO--despite the fact that they are clearly lesser works of two lionized directors (and with questionable linkages to film noir).

Perhaps to recenter the issue towards noir, Nick Rossi's look at the production history of the jazz-saturated B-noir THE CRIMSON CANARY follows. Despite Smith's claim that the film--part of the FNF's "Face The Music!" rubber-band-stretched theme in 2026--is "a gem," Rossi almost immediately dismisses it as a cardboard B-noir plot and focuses almost exclusively on the film's rich trove of music.

This essay and Rossi's squib in the previous issue are the type of essays that would ideally appear either in a "festival issue" or in the festival program, but such an approach has never been considered feasible by the man in charge. At any rate, there is probably a book to be written about this particular relationship of jazz to noir--to bookend the previous work of David Butler--and we can hope that Rossi decides to go for it.

Next is a curious, careening, bathroom-sink examination of voyeurs in noir. Zach Vasquez wants to cover the waterfront and show a connection between classic noir and neo-noir, but what emerges is a muddle of mostly predictable and previously-known observations that fail to deliver on an intriguing premise. It's possible that there was more here initially, but that some kind of semi-radical surgery was required, either for coherence or to bring the essay into the e-zine's increasingly anal-retentive word count limits. Virtually the entire history of surveillance in noir (a book-length project in its own write...) is simply overlooked, and only at the rushed tail-end of the essay do we get to the recent nightmare scenarios of authoritarian surveillance that were so prevalent in the late 1960s-mid/late 1970s.

Editor Smith herself follows with coverage of three films from the remarkable filmography of Tastuya Nakadai, one of the greatest actors in Japanese cinema. The "three-film" thing seems to be a way to simultaneously focus the material and reign in the word count--and it does Nakadai something of a disservice, as he deserves a multi-part commemoration along the lines for what was done in the now-buried earlier editions of the e-zine, where key figures (Robert Ryan, Dan Duryea) and worthy individual films (THE BREAKING POINT) were given in-depth examination by a full coalition of writers.

Smith is in her rhapsodic mode here--not necessarily a bad thing--but it does tend to make her wrap-ups for each of the three films seem either half-formed or overly abrupt. She gets a little too interested in the subtle and mysterious nuances of the Japanese language, especially with respect to the strange title of Nakadai's most poignant noir, CASH CALLS HELL (a case where both American and Japanese titles are so baffling that the matter is probably best left unexamined).

What's most problematic, however, is that two of the films here--THE SWORD OF DOOM and THE FACE OF ANOTHER--are clearly Japanese arthouse efforts whose associations with noir are tenuous at best. Smith covers these films well, but struggles mightily to connect their more abstract/abject character studies to noir narrative. Character disintegration and madness become the dominant themes that seem to transfix Smith; she tries to place the films into the continuum of escalating violence in cinema, but that in itself is not a defining characteristic of noir. Given the paucity of coverage for Nakadai's brilliant career, there's no choice but to be grateful for what's here, even if it falls short of what the great actor deserves (and what this talented writer is capable of).

Next--a strangely savage take on pregnancy in noir that first-time contributor W. Carsten Andreson quickly turns into a political tract. The essay ends with the first NC e-zine sidebar completely bereft of any reference to films. While we are completely in agreement with Andreson's position on reproductive rights, such material really seems out of place in the e-zine and brings an oddly combustible essay to a uniquely bizarre conclusion.

Katarina Docalovich, a student in one of Smith's NYU classes, is accorded teacher's pet status with an essay on Filipino filmmaker Catalino Ortiz Brocka (1939-1991), who specialized in political thrillers and message films--both of which were sorely needed during the Marcos regime. In her book IN LONELY PLACES, Smith was often quick to disparage message films (mocking the so-called "liberal pieties" of Joseph Losey's as-relevant-as-ever THE LAWLESS), but as editor, she seems transformed into a crusader for such films. The well-meaning essay ends awkwardly, however, with material that may have been tacked on in order to accommodate design requirements.

From here we enter the departments, which are, as usual, a mixed bag. The obligatory NOIR OR NOT? slot spins its wheel and lands on "not" with Erik Martin valiantly trying to connect the intriguing Japanese period horror film ONIBABA to noir; even he admits near the end of his essay that such a connection is spurious. Long-time contributer Jason Ney (originally recruited by yours truly!) excerpts a portion of his recent book on Richard Fleischer as a "favorite neo-noir" and provides a solid look at the troubled production history and (in his mind) the critical neglect for THE LAST RUN, a George C. Scott vehicle that has its moments.

But it is Rafael Pineda who breathes life into the BOOK VS. FILM "franchise" with a superbly-written look at the significant differences between Patricia Highsmith's source novel and Alfred Hitchcock's film adaptation of STRANGERS ON A TRAIN. There are more memorable turns of phrase to be fond in this essay than in all the other articles combined--one hopes that Smith is duly aware of this and will deploy Pineda on other topics soon.

It is clear that the e-zine brain trust is gearing up for international noir (with a likely emphasis on neo-noir) as the editor and publisher look to build a audience for their 202? book. We will see just how that continues in the next issue/issues that will appear before the next incarnation of NOIR CITY.