Film Noir Fate Vs The Working Stiff

<p>Noir films about ordinary jobs in a greedy crime-ridden society stalk <em>Fate Vs The Working Stiff. Award winner Bernie Dowling </em>explores an ignored noir sub-genre that evolved from joblessness after World War I and during the devastating Great Depression of 1930-42.</p><p><strong>What's Inside:</strong></p><p class=ql-align-justify>Noir writer Philip Yordan used pattern recognition the basic principle of AI from the 1940s a decade before the first academic book on the subject. So have the ethical conundrums of AI already been a part of Hollywood since its Golden Age? The intriguing Yordan also appropriated the works of other writers and received an Academy Award for nothing.</p><p><strong>The strike:</strong></p><p>The 2023 extended Hollywood actors' and writers' strike challenged the invasion of AI into their workplace</p><p><strong>Pictorial reviews: </strong></p><p>In five pictorial reviews with hundreds of photos Dowling forensically examines films with themes ranging from the dangers facing police working undercover to a motor mechanic lured to theft by materialism. </p><p>And two middle-class attracted to danger as refuges from hum-drum work. </p><p>And a film noir that Dowling regards as the greatest noir of all time with an unemployed musician as the unreliable narrator. It features the creation of an iconic femme fatale by an unknown actor recruited from secretarial work at a Poverty-Row studio.</p><p><strong>The movies:</strong></p><p><strong><em>The Big Combo</em> 1955:</strong>This film and <em>Raw Deal</em><strong> </strong>1948 render the<strong> </strong>sublimest artwork of noir cinematographic genius John Alton.</p><p><strong><em>Scarlet Street</em> 1945: </strong>You cannot overstate the quality of the production of Fritz Lang's unpleasant misanthropic masterwork. It starts off with Edward G. Robinson in reward for his lengthy work history receiving a watch. It harks back to Lang's tyranny of the clock over the artist in <em>Metropolis </em>1927.</p><p><strong><em>Quicksand</em> 1950: </strong> A morality tale warns against greed for capitalistic trinkets. Lead and investor Mickey Rooney was bitter about its failure. Co-investor and second male lead Peter Lorre went bankrupt because of it. Director Irving Pichel was blacklisted soon after.</p><p><strong><em>D.O.A.</em> 1949: </strong>This film about a dull accountant walking on the wild side has a glorious beginning a delightful portrayal of beatnik drug culture and memorable support character actors.</p><p><strong><em>Detour </em>1945: </strong>The greatest of them all. Learn why or why Dowling thinks so.</p><p><strong>The style:</strong></p><p>With humor cultural analysis and a passion for film noir Dowling investigates the representation of the working class during the aftermath of economic depression and war.  The dark undercurrents of Hollywood at work fascinating on and off the screens are unveiled in hardback paperback and eBook.</p><p></p>