It’s Noirvember! And no, that’s not a typo 🙂

This year I decided to take up the challenge and make a series of posts related to the area of film noir, which is a subject near and dear to my heart (wouldn’t you guess, with that pseudonym).

What is Noirvember?

It’s a month-long celebration of film noir! The idea started back in 2010, when social media specialist Marya E. Gates decided to catch up on top noir films and tweeted on the experience using the hashtag #noirvember. It quickly became popular and today it’s celebrated all around the world as the month of appreciation for the moody, nostalgic film.

What can you do to celebrate Noirvember?

Watch movies, of course! But Noirvember can be a celebration of all things noir-related, be it music, literature, art, make up or fashion, etc. I am definitely planning on writing about more than just movies, so stay tuned!

But what is noir anyway?

Traditionally film noir is a style (rather than genre) of movies of the 1940s and 1950s. They are usually noted for the fatalism of stories as well as a literal and metaphorical darkness. Noir films are full of worn-out detectives and dangerous femmes fatales, murder, greed, corruption, violence, exploitation, adultery and treachery – all the things we hold near and dear to our hearts. I say “traditionally”, because movie critics argue about the definition of film noir to this day. The term itself was coined by critics rather than film makers, which means even the creators of the handful of movies that is universally agreed on as the film noir canon, didn’t know they were doing noir. Opinions also differ on whether noir ended in the 1950s or whether we can still find noir (or better yet, neo-noir) movies today.

I could write a lot more about the subject (it’s not like I wrote a thesis on it… or did I?) but there’s a whole month in front of us to explore what noir is and can be. Let’s get to it! Come back tomorrow to see what I write about!

bonus points to you if you recognize the quote I used in this post 🙂