Arrow offers up a pair of titles which go against the noir current.
It’s almost impossible to look at film noir and not think of the many beloved tropes which have helped make it the genre it remains today. There’s the femme fatale, the anti-hero detective, the sprawling metropolitan landscape and the venturing into the darkness of society, all of which made for dynamic cinema and ensured audiences would always keep coming back. Such traits can rightfully be considered conventions and staples, which fans continue to embrace. Yet it’s always a little surprising (in the best of ways) to stumble on a noir title that so clearly belongs to the genre, but has dared to stray from the typical path other efforts of its kind have followed. Usually, when a noir film ventures into the realm of experimental, it can’t help but elevate other elements of the story its telling, such as romance. While romance can be found fairly often in most noir titles, it’s often used as a means to an end for some characters with the emotion being kept at an arm’s length to be used only as a tool of manipulation.
Recently, Arrow brought new life to two such titles which strayed from the typical noir fare in a number of ways while using the romance of each one in ways not too often seen in the genre. In 1946’s So Dark the Night, celebrated French detective Henri Cassin (Steven Geray) goes to a quaint inn in the country for some rest after finding himself overworked by his job. He soon finds himself falling for Nanette (Micheline Cheirel), the innkeepers beautiful, younger daughter. When Nanette is found murdered, Henri must battle both an unseen killer and the recesses of his own tortured mind in order to avenge his beloved’s death. Meanwhile, in 1944’s Phantom Lady, well-to-do businessman Scott Henderson (Alan Curtis) finds himself stood up by his wife and asks a mysterious woman to be his date for the evening. When his wife turns up dead, his only alibi is his nameless date whom no one even remembers seeing. With Scott now in jail awaiting trial for a murder he didn’t commit, it’s up to Carol (Ella Raines), his loyal secretary to prove his innocence by tracking down the phantom lady.
The differences between So Dark the Night and Phantom Lady are easy to spot. One takes place in the big city, the other in the rural French countryside; one features a celebrated detective and the other an amateur sleuth. At the same time, it’s the similarities between both movies which make them strong, solid entries in the genre. There’s the act of desperation seen in So Dark the Night’s Henri as he searches for the killer of his betrothed and the hunger which drives Phantom Lady’s Carol as she embarks on a quest to clear her boss’s name. Love cannot help but be the catalyst for everything which happens to our heroes, forcing them to go to places they never thought they’d find themselves. Henri believes he has found a true goddess in Nanette, a woman he thought could never love him, making her demise all the more painful to absorb for both him and us. On the other hand, Carol in Phantom Lady has spent ages loving Scott from afar, maintaining a professional relationship the entire time. When her secret love is framed for murder, it’s Carol who believes in his innocence enough to do what she needs to do to prove it and in turn, confront the romantic feelings within her. Throughout both So Dark the Night and Phantom Lady is the idea of the elusive figure invisible to both protagonists who proves to be the key to the main characters finding justice for the ones they love. There’s also the common element of both Henri and Carol trying to outrun fate and destiny (factors which are almost always present in noir) by not letting any sort of predetermination dictate their future relationship with love.
You have to admire the way both titles bravely stray from the noir formula while remaining in the spirit of the genre. So Dark the Night’s locale chooses Paris, the city of love, as one of its central locations before moving on to the idyllic French countryside. While neither contains the noir stain of New York or San Francisco, the settings become tainted and instantly off-putting when death suddenly strikes. Meanwhile, Phantom Lady’s female protagonist is a sharp departure from the noir blueprint. Typically, if a woman wasn’t a femme fatale in the noir world, she was either a throwaway character or a tragic victim. Here, not only is Raines’s Carol a resourceful amateur sleuth, but she’s also a determined one; hell bent on clearing the man she admires most in her life. But it’s in the theme of madness where both titles find the most unconventional of common ground. Most of the motives behind the crimes in a film noir lie in either profit or passion making the genre rather cut and dry in this regard. However, So Dark the Night and Phantom Lady both incorporate the element of madness through key characters. Henri finds himself to be a damaged detective, battling schizophrenia as he struggles to bring justice to the woman he loves. Meanwhile, the titular character in Phantom Lady is eventually shown to have gone made following her own encounter with romance which has led to a mental unraveling. While these departures from the standard noir practices led to mixed results for the films in question, they’re admirably used all the way through and show just how far the limits of the genre could venture.
As films, both titles have their own individual plusses and minuses. So Dark the Night can’t help but feel a little too choppy and the execution of the risks it takes don’t always contain the kind of oomph one would expect. Yet the psychology of the film goes deeper than most might assume, revealing itself to be a movie that has more to unpack (particularly in the mind of the main character) than most noirs. Phantom Lady on the other hand manages its changes to the genre tropes almost seamlessly to the point where they feel completely natural. The film boasts a delicious villain and a heroine who rescues the hero after a journey jam packed with twists and turns. Maybe the fact that both films refused to play strictly to the noir rules is the reason the two movies aren’t held up in the same regard as other genre staples. But it’s their boldness and uniqueness for which they’re remembered today as both worthwhile examples of noir and a reminder of the limitless possibilities within the genre.
So Dark the Night and Phantom Lady are both available on Blu-Ray from Arrow Video.
Further reading:
https://cinapse.co/arrow-heads-roundup-audition-horror-express-and-mysteries-from-luigi-bazzoni-joseph-h-lewis-4a249cac8269https://cinapse.co/arrow-heads-roundup-audition-horror-express-and-mysteries-from-luigi-bazzoni-joseph-h-lewis-4a249cac8269
