I found this an incredibly superficial look at reel noir. Some reviewers, seeing the Life logo on the cover, thought it was a magazine, its not, there are no ads and almost all the photos are film stills according to the photo credits. I think there are three that were taken by Life photographers. The book is probably seventy percent or more photos.
Oddly, only half the paperback considers proper noir movies from the forties and fifties, just eleven, which misses several classics, like The big sleep (Howard Hawks, 1946) The asphalt jungle (John Huston,1950) or Touch of evil (Orson Wells,1958) the other half looks at nine movies from the seventies onwards, called here as Neo noir. I think these were added because most of the book's buyers/readers will have seen them.
As there is so little text there isn't an index or bibliography. But if you want know more about this intriguing movie genre Film noir (ISBN 9780879514792) by Silver and Ward is an encyclopedia reference with 480 pages. Eddie Muller's Dark city (ISBN 9780762498970) is a treat about these movies. Both books put Life's Film noir to shame.
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