Julie Grossman (Le Moyne College)
gros@****.com (Log-in to reveal)

This panel looks at American film noir’s subversions of conventional hierarchies and power structures to examine how the genre is able to imagine alternative perspectives on the American Dream and cultural narratives of success and economic achievement. The panel seeks to highlight conflicts among individuals and social groups or institutions that film noir illuminates or contests through style, narrative, or performance, as these films (or television shows) feature culturally sidelined characters who rebel, resist, or attempt to erode existing or felt powers that be.

In The Asphalt Jungle (1950), corrupt lawyer Alonzo D. Emmerich (Louis Calhern) shares that “Crime is a left-handed form of human endeavor.” In The Big Clock (1948), Elsa Lanchester’s Louise Patterson says, “Isn’t it a pity…. The wrong people always have money.” These lines from classic film noir point to the genre’s interrogation of mainstream narratives of American success and economic achievement. This panel looks at American film noir’s subversions of conventional hierarchies and power structures to examine how the genre is able to imagine alternative perspectives on the American Dream and cultural narratives of success. Proposals that focus on such subversions or disruptions in film or television noir are welcome. How does Agent Dale Cooper in Twin Peaks subvert traditional notions of masculinity with his intuitive detecting and commitment to being in the moment? How are the many sidelined characters in classic film noir— men and women on the skids— able to question or deconstruct institutions and authority figures? Analyses might include discussion of character or supporting actors such as Elisha Cook, Jr., Theresa Harris, Thelma Ritter, Gloria Grahame or Shelley Winters, who subvert conventions from the margins. Do such subversions take place as a result of verbal agility, stylistic flourishes (as Paul Schrader famously wrote, film noir provides “aesthetic solutions to sociological problems”) and mise en scene, or other aspects of image, performance, script, or narrative? How do contemporary noir TV shows continue classic noir’s disruptions? For example, last year’s Apple TV show Sugar reveals hardboiled detective John Sugar (Colin Farrell) to be an alien, introducing a new kind of disruption from unfamiliar territories (beyond Earth); Sugar additionally disrupts narrative progress by inserting quick shots from famous classic noirs such as Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity.

The panel seeks to highlight conflicts among individuals and social groups or institutions that film noir illuminates or contests through style, narrative, or performance, as these films and shows feature culturally sidelined characters who rebel, resist, or attempt to erode existing or felt powers that be.