When you think about film noir, Tim Burton's Batman is a great example. The one basic idea that comes to mind about film noir is "dark." First, you have the setting for the movie, Gotham City, which was constructed completely by sets. Gotham is a dark, corrupted, crowded city build with skyscrapers and greed. As are most modern cities, Gotham’s nothing but building after building, metal and concrete. The only things separating buildings are crowded streets filled with people, trash, and cars. It almost gives you a feeling of oneness but is in fact claustrophobic and isolated. The rich are separated from the poor majority by their huge houses and defiant fences. There is barely ever any lightness to the city, only dark days full of corruption. Gotham city is a prison itself.
Film noir has a different type of "hero" for the lead. In most movies with a superhero as the main character people expect a pure action movie, but that’s not exactly what they got for Tim Burton’s Batman. Burton dove deeper into who Batman really was rather than just the crime fighting hero. Batman is a dark, conflicted person who is just that, a human. He’s not someone with supernatural abilities, just a person with high-tech gadgets and a mortal life. Bruce Wayne is a man with a dark past and slightly unstable mind set. He fits the film noir’s description of their "hero" very well and that is what makes Batman so loved and relatable.
A large part of film noir is fatalism, the belief that we are powerless to do anything other than what we actually do. In short, asking if we really do have free will. Even though Burton’s Batman was very much film noir, I don’t feel as if he insinuated it into this movie well. The only instance I can possibly see it is where Jack creates Batman and Batman creates Joker. This situation lead to an inevitable end in which Batman destroys what destroyed him. Even though he has done this, Bruce continues to be Batman and fight evil, for he will always need it.
The last piece of film noir is femme fatales. This is where women were basically independent and capable of doing things that were not thought acceptable for them. In film noir movies the women were "glamorous and dangerous." Our leading lady, Vicki Vale, was in some ways like this. She was the "pure" yet very capable woman.
I think you're spot-on with the conflicted, different type of "hero." In all the Batman series I have seen, the directors do a pretty decent job of showing Batman's multiple personality and conflicted side fairly well. I like what you say about fatalism, and I actually did not notice the fact that the movie questioned whether or not we have free will.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with your description of Vicky Vale. I think she is in some ways a femme fatale, such as when she seduces Batman. However, she is not as power thirsty as the typically described femme fatale.