Author: Seth Harris

Touch of Evil (1958)
Written & Directed by Orson Welles

None of his peers could come close to touching the natural filmmaking genius of Orson Welles. Sometimes, you hear film people overhype a filmmaker or actor, but in this case, believe the hype. Welles delivers a film that looks like nothing else that was out at the time, pushing the boundaries of American cinema once again. Charlton Heston was cast after the release of The Ten Commandments and was curious who would direct. Welles was already in the cast, and Heston suggested the film legend helm the picture. Universal said they would get back to him. He got the picture, rewrote it, and staged one of the most visually exciting film noirs ever made.

Kiss Me Deadly (1955)
Written by A.I. Bezzerides & Robert Aldrich
Directed by Robert Aldrich

At one point, around the halfway mark, I turned to Ariana and said, “This main character… he’s a real scumbag, right?” She agreed. The screenwriter A.I. Bezzerides said, “I wrote it fast because I had contempt for it… I tell you, Spillane didn’t like what I did with his book. I ran into him at a restaurant, and, boy, he didn’t like me.” I haven’t read Spillane’s novel or any of his Mike Hammer work, but I liked how nasty the investigator was. It felt in tune with the world of film noir, where everyone seems to be simmering with misanthropy and taking their anger out on the world. Hammer is no exception to this. Kiss Me Deadly is also a film that has influenced many other pictures as varied as Alex Cox’s Repo Man, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and Pulp Fiction. This is by far the most cynical of all the noir pictures we’ve watched. 

The Big Heat (1953)
Written by Sydney Boehm
Directed by Fritz Lang

What is the Law? Who does it exist to protect? It’s becoming more evident to me, maybe to you too, that the Law as an institution in the States (as that is where I grew up) does not exist to protect me. If I benefit from it, that is an unintended benefit. The Law is in place to protect & serve the wealthy ownership class. The main prerogative of the police as an institution is to protect the rich & their property. If that means cracking the skulls of the plebs, they don’t shed a tear over that. The noir genre is full of characters who find themselves on the receiving end of these systems, and over the years, one subgenre has emerged: the rogue cop. It probably didn’t start here, but The Big Heat was likely one of the significant sparks to see this subgenre grow in popularity. It’s a very reactionary response to social injustice, continuing the fixation on hyper-individualist solutions.