Tuesday, July 3, 2007

Out of the Past

What a great film. It was a classic film noir full of shadows, plot twists and great punch lines. The two lines that stood out the most in my mind were when Kathie Moffat (Jane Greer) asks Jeff Bailey (Robert Mitchum) if he believes her that she did not take the money and he replies, "Baby, I don't care", followed by a passionate kiss. That was a classic moment. Another line that stood out was also one that took place on the beach in Mexico. Jane Greer's character comes walking down the beach and asks Robert Mitchum's character if he missed her and he relpies, "No more than I would my eyes". I love this line because its his way of saying that he missed her desparately because someone would miss their eyes very much. He is saying that being without her is like not being able to see. There was a fantastic amount of backstabbing in this film which is a characteristic of a film noir. There is firsly a lot of backstabbing between Whit Sterling (Kirk Douglas) and Jeff Bailey. But I believe that the award for the most back stabbing goes hands down to Kathie Moffat. There isn't a person in the film that that woman didn't try to double cross. I think she wins the award for the most cold blooded murders in the film as well. There were also visual aspects characteristic of a film-noir evident in this film. When Jeff is fighting in a struggle with his old partner there is a fantastic dance of shadows across Kathie's horrified face instead if showing all of the actual violence. There was something that the woman who introduced the film mentioned that I think is interesting. The beginning scene is of a car driving into the town, while the very last scene is a car leaving the town and driving away. That was an interesting way to open and close the movie, a way of signaling the begging and end of the story which I think is a way that is ment to give the viewers some kind of closure in knowing that Anne and her former boyfriend get away and escape from the turmoil. Also something that should be addresses is the great amount of lies that were told in this movie. The most prevalent lie came from the "the Kid" or the def boy. He told Anne that Jeff had been planning on going away with Kathie which was the final lie of the movie, which motivated Anne to go away with her former boyfriend. He told this lie for her own good, so that she could move on and not be hung up on Jeff after he had passed away. This was a great film and has made me interested in seeing other film-noirs in the future.

-Lauren Cartwright

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