In the novel, The Big Sleep, the main character, Philip Marlowe, is a prime example of the hard-boiled detective, found in the noir genre. Merriam Websters' dictionary defines noir as, "crime fiction featuring hard-boiled cynical characters and bleak sleazy settings." (Noir) When Philip Marlowe is hired by old man General
Sternwood, to track down a blackmailer, he is immediately thrust into the sleazy, filthy world of General Sterwoods' two daughters, Carmen and Vivian. Marlowe finds himself entangled in extortion, kidnapping, pornography, seduction, and murder to name a few ribald characteristics.
The detective in this genre is usually characterized by several common traits.
For example, in Film: A Critical Introduction, by Maria Pramaggiore and Tom Wallis, they state, "Like the Cowboy in the Western, the hard-boiled detective is a loner." (351)
Marlowe is friends with neither the cops nor the criminals, and often, not even the people who hire him, like him. This doesn't bother the hard-boiled detective in the least.
Pramaggiore and Wallis also state,"He is an investigator who stands just outside the law, yet remains the moral center of the film." (351) Philip Marlowe, has an encounter with Canino, in which Marlowe makes this statement, "I didn't want him with an empty gun." (Chandler 202) The apparent reason for this is that Marlowe knew that he was going to have to kill Canino, and he was making sure that even if he had to do it cold- bloodedly, he did not want to be incriminated.
In the book, Critical Survey of Mystery and Detective Fiction, it states "Marlowe is the newest incarnation of the questing knight, challenged by the modern dragons of well-connected gangsters and entitled millionaires i...
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...ind and air to you. You just slept the big sleep, not caring about the nastiness of how you died or where you fell. Me, I was part of the nastiness now."
The Big Sleep, characterizes the hard-boiled detective genre with it's darkness, futility, cruelty, hopelessness, and a main character who reflects all of this in detail.
Works Cited
Chandler, Raymond. The Big Sleep. New York: Vintage, 1992. Print.
Pramaggiore, Maria, and Tom Wallis. Film: A Critical Introduction. Boston: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon, 2006. 351. Print
Webster, Merriam. "Noir." Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 30 Mar. 2014.
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Yarbrough, Scott D. "Hard-Boiled Detectives." Critical Survey Of Mystery & Detective
Fiction, Revised Edition (2008): 1-9. Literary Reference Center. Web. 31 Mar. 2014.
Good evening and welcome to tonight’s episode of Learning Literature. Tonight we will be celebrating the 20th anniversary of Gattaca by analysing the techniques text producers employ to construct representations of social issues relating to marginalised groups. We will focus on two classic pieces of literature, Ken Kessey’s, One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, as well as Andrew Niccol’s Gattaca. Through a range of techniques, the text producers have included representations of freedom and independence, power, as well as discrimination in each of their respective texts.
The films Young Frankenstein and One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest can be viewed as a critical analysis of society’s issues and dysfunctions in the form of satire and parody using humor. While Young Frankenstein, Mel Brooks cinematic version of the gothic novel, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, uses parody in the form of Horatian satire, which is achieved through gentle ridicule and using a tone that is indulgent, tolerant, amused and witty. The film One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, the adaptation of the Ken Kesey novel, uses a form of satire called Juvenalian satire which is demonstrated in the form of attacks on vice and error with contempt and indignation. Horatian satire will produce a humor response from the reader instead of anger or indignation as Juvenalian satire. Juvenalian satire, in its realism and its harshness, is in strong contrast to Horatian satire (Kent and Drury).
Film Noir is a genre of distinct and unique characteristics. Mostly prominent in the 40s and 50s, the genre rarely skewed from the skeletal plot to which all Film Noir pictures follow. The most famous of these films is The Big Sleep (1946) directed by Howard Hawks. This film is the go to when it comes to all the genre’s clichés. This formula for film is so well known and deeply understood that it is often a target for satire. This is what the Coen brothers did with 1998’s The Big Lebowski. This film follows to the T what Film Noir stands for.
All of his actions combined lead to the main character’s suicidal action. When Friar Lawrence secretly marries Romeo and Juliet, it causes more stress for the two. Although the marriage stopped Romeo’s first impulse to fight Tybalt, it led to the Capulet’s misunderstanding of their mourning daughter. Lastly, the biggest mistake the Friar commits, is supplying the sleeping potion to Juliet. "
The human body and mind are the most complex and intricate tools known to man. The connection between the two are remarkable, the way body feels pain and the mind is able to understand from where and how the pain is being formed, the way the body lags and drops when the mind does not have enough sleep and rest. Most curiously, it is the way our body and mind speak to each other without really knowing. It is the uncomfortable feeling in your chest, the tenseness of your shoulders and the goose-bumps on your arms that are the very basics of human intuition. Intuition is knowing something without having a logical or reasonable explanation to follow the feeling. But it is when our intuition overcomes our ability to think that we become paranoid; constantly looking over our shoulders, noticing people and objects that were never noticed before, and having this retching feeling that someone is out to get you. Paranoia is a thought process where anxiety and fear accumulate to the point where the person suffers from irritation and delusions. It is often developed through an inner guilty conscience which threatens the self. It is that exact tingling sensation in your stomach, the tightness in your throat and the eerie feeling that you are being watched that makes James and Hitchcock's pieces realistically fantastical. The alternate worlds illustrated in these pieces are not of those of dreams and fairy tales, nor those people superheroes or chimeras, but a realist world, where the minds of the characters are exposed and the only source of reliability. James depicts a young woman who struggles to be a heroine for her wards, only to be torn between the lines of sanity as she questions the existence of two ghosts, while Hitchcock’s psycho can ...
......"[Marlow]. To illustrate how effectively the previous lies are preparing Marlow - he didn't even choke on this one! Lie #7: "His end was in every way worthy of his life"[Marlow]. Taken at face value that may very well have been a true statement however, Marlow intended for it to carry the false impression of a noble, honorable and worthy death and life.
Woolrich reinforced the detective fictions of yesterday, introducing to the American audience new detectives, who not only wheels a gun but also uses their knowledge of psychoanalysis to catch the perpetrator and solve the crime. Though Woolrich extends his knowledge of the human mind, he, just like MacDonald, Chandler and Hammett gives reference to 18th-century authors which include Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Edgar Allan Poe.
The Big Sleep Movie and Novel & nbsp; On first inspection of Raymond Chandler's novel, The Big Sleep, the reader discovers that the story unravels quickly through the narrative voice of Philip Marlowe, the detective hired by the Sternwood family of Los Angeles to solve a mystery for them. The mystery concerns the General Sternwood's young daughter, and one Mr. A. G. Geiger. Upon digging for the answer to this puzzle placed before Marlowe for a mere $25 dollars a day plus expenses, Marlowe soon finds layers upon layers of mystifying events tangled in the already mysterious web of lies and deception concerning the Sternwood family, especially the two young daughters. & nbsp; When reading the novel, it is hard to imagine the story without a narrator at all. It certainly seems essential for the story's make-up to have this witty, sarcastic voice present to describe the sequence of events. Yet, there is a version of Chandler's novel that does not have an audible storyteller, and that version is the 1946 movie directed by Howard Hawks. & nbsp; Hawks' version of The Big Sleep is known to be one of the best examples of the film genre-film noir. "
My initial inspiration for this piece was Trifles, which funnily enough only shares the characteristic of detectives being involved within the plot. As per suggestion on my proposal, I developed my idea of detectives solving a case further by including dialogue and inter-personnel relationships similar to those found in Glengarry Glen Ross. Taking the idea of different members of the real-estate office discussing work and plotting in Glengarry Glen Ross, and applying them to a trio of detectives on a case was interesting to say the least.
"therefore, since I can not prove a lover, To entertain these fair well spoken days, I am determined to be a villain".As a villain Richard must be heartless, he can not let his emotions interfere with his actions.
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When a person becomes trapped in a situation that stems from an individual with greater authority, being manipulative can be a very promising method to escape. The Thousand and One Nights does a very good job of being a good example of someone in this situation that uses stories within a story to capture encapsulate the attention of the reader. Despite the many little stories that go into the text, the main story behind it all is about a king named King Shahrayar and how he goes insane after catching his wife having sexual relations with a slave. After he sees this happen, he realizes that he can never trust any woman again and none of them are trustworthy. By expressing his views on women, he decides to marry a different woman every night, then the next morning have them killed by beheading. This is an ongoing event that brings death to most of the women in the village. Soon after, the king’s Vizier’s daughter, Shahrazad, came up with a brilliant idea that will end up saving her fellow countrywomen and hopefully keep the king from murdering so many innocent people. Her method behind all this is by telling the kind a different story every night that leaves him on a cliffhanger, making him curious enough to keep her alive for another day to continue her story. Shahrazad keeps herself spared from the king because of her cunning, and compassionate personality.
Carmen Sternwood is described with profoundness but in a different (less sexual) sense than her sister is. Marlowe encounters her on many occasions and is thorough in describing her--from her first flirtations to her continuous irritations. In t...
Dick presents our main character, Commissioner John Anderton, as the balding, pot-bellied founder of a revolutionary new crime detection system who's been showing his years for longer than he'd care to remember. In the short story, he has just acquired a new assistant, Ed Witwer, and fears being replaced by the younger man. In the beginning, Anderton is portrayed as slightly insecure about his job (to the point of near paranoia of being set-up), as well as his importance to society, though by the e...
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