Film gris

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Film gris (German "gray film") describes a series of films from the late 1940s and early 1950s that were made within the genre or movement of film noir .

definition

The term film gris was created in 1985 by film historian Thom Andersen in his essay Red Hollywood . It describes a series of films that emerged as part of the pessimistic thriller of the 1940s, classified as film noir , and which sought "greater psychological and social realism". Andersen was referring specifically to films made between 1947 and 1951 that were produced, written or staged by mostly left-wing filmmakers. This included works by Jules Dassin , Robert Rossen , Joseph Losey , Cy Endfield , Abraham Polonsky and John Berry , all of whom no longer found work in Hollywood during the anti-communist McCarthy era due to their political stance , but also John Huston's Asphalt Jungle . Recurring themes and motives are the emphasis on social inequalities within the capitalist system , class barriers and antagonisms, the blurring boundaries between business and crime, police corruption or the inability of the law to protect its citizens.

Andersen wrote about the origin of the term film gris, it seemed appropriate to him because "we have been taught to equate communism with desolation and gloom [in the original: 'greyness' = gray], and these films are often bleak and depressing". He saw John Garfield as the "exemplary actor" in these films .

In More than Night: Film Noir in Its Contexts, James Naremore pointed out the problematic nature of the term: Charles Higham, Joel Greenberg and John Tuska used the same term to delimit those films within the film noir that compared to the “black” representatives like Woman without a conscience have a greater emphasis on the melodramatic . Nevertheless, Andersen's definition has prevailed in the majority of the film analysis. In addition to the filmmakers named by Andersen, Naremore suggested the inclusion of Orson Welles and the filmmakers known as the Hollywood Ten .

Filmography

Only films classified as "Film gris" by Thom Andersen:

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Thom Andersen: “Red Hollywood” . In: Suzanne Ferguson, Barbara S. Groseclose (Ed.): Literature and the Visual Arts in Contemporary Society. Ohio State University Press, Columbus 1985, pp. 141-196.
  2. ↑ Andrew Spicer: Historical Dictionary of Film Noir. Scarecrow Press / Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham (Maryland) 2010, p. 92.
  3. ↑ James Naremore: More than Night: Film Noir in Its Contexts. University of California Press, Berkeley / Los Angeles / London 1998, ISBN 0-520-21294-0 , pp. 123-125. See also Charles Higham, Joel Greenberg: Hollywood in the Forties. A. S. Barnes, New York 1968; John Tuska: Dark Cinema: American Film Noir in Cultural Perspective. Greenwood Press, Westport 1984.
  4. ↑ So z. B. - alongside John Naremore and Andrew Spicer - Frank Krutnik, M. Keith Booker , Charles J. Maland and Dana Polan. Cf. Frank Krutnik: “Un-American” Hollywood: Politics and Film in the Blacklist Era. Rutgers University Press, 2007; M. Keith Booker: Film and the American Left: A Research Guide. Greenwood Press, Westport, 1999; Charles J. Maland: Film Gris: Crime, Critique and Cold War Culture in 1951. in: Criticism, Vol. 26, No. 3; Dana Polan: Detour . Review on Sensesofcinema.com of July 17, 2002, accessed on March 7, 2013. In contrast, Stephen E. Faison and the Lexicon of Film Terms of the University of Kiel refer exclusively to Tuska's definition, cf. Stephen E. Faison: Existentialism, Film Noir, and Hard-Boiled Fiction. Cambria Press, 2008; Entry in the Lexicon of Film Terms of the Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, accessed on March 7, 2013.
  5. ↑ JJames Naremore: More than Night: Film Noir in Its Contexts. University of California Press, Berkeley / Los Angeles / London 1998, pp. 123-125.
  6. ↑ a b c d Films added by Andersen in the 2007 epilogue to Un-American Hollywood . Cf. Frank Krutnik: “Un-American” Hollywood: Politics and Film in the Blacklist Era. Rutgers University Press, 2007, p. 265.