The Noir Of the Week review was posted 29 July 2007 with an updated intro by you. The issue is that at some point you were as unaware of McGivern’s contribution as Alexander was, and your feedback on that score could have been more elegant.

Thank you for the gracious comments. It’s much appreciated. Keep up the good work — and, like I’m trying to do, read the source material as much as possible. Writers deserve more credit. Hope to see you and father at the next Noir City festival.

As for “checking my files more often,” regarding my neglect of McGivern in the “Noir of the Week” review of “The Big Heat” — that excerpt was written 12 years ago, long before I’d actually read McGivern’s novels and realized that he was, in fact, the visionary behind not only “The Big Heat,” but thosee other noir films I mentioned.

And be careful who you call an “arrogant pundit” — it could get them a job on CNN or Fox News.

He says:

“The film’s power is mainly due to the talents of two men: screenwriter Sydney Boehm, a former crime reporter responsible for more crackerjack noir scripts than anyone else, and Lang, whose work is almost synonymous with noir. His early German films, Metropolis and M, etched the first blueprints of Dark City: omnipotent external forces dictating the fate of innocent people, and uncontrollable internal urges leading to self-destruction.”

I suggest Mr Muller check his files more often and hits the CAPSLOCK key less often.

I was (in retrospect) rather naively attempting to defend Alexander’s review against an arrogant pundit. It might be worthwhile going through the reviews on this site to see how many reviews following ‘the’ paradigm.

If you bothered to read the reviews on my blog you will see I do go beyond the paradigm in almost every review, and I regularly post on writers, books, and cinematographers.

And to forestall any cries of “self-promotion”, I actually endeavour to make a contribution here, and simply not make “bird calls” like others who drop some shit about a great review while making a pitch for their site before flying out.

And don’t worry about me crashing your cosy little coterie of mutual-admiration, it’s not my style.

This is an amazing review! I’m a big fan of The Big Heat. You may want to stop by Noir of the Week sometime and see our reviews. Eddie Muller did one on The Big Heat a while back: http://tinyurl.com/5serzz

However, I do agree that McGivern’s work as the writer deserved a stronger emphasis on my part, as his is a rich history within the “rogue cop” sub-genre as Eddie rightly points out.

Of course, as film noir says, the auteur theory is a paradigm for modern criticism, but it’s hardly THE paradigm. And the auteur theory gets roundly laughed at in certain circles, most notably by Hollywood pros, who know that Eddie is correct (even though writers are often treated like sh*t).

Although he does do auteur-centered criticism, a place to go for some other kinds is Jim Emerson’s Scanners blog.

That said, the auteur method of criticism certainly is a useful shorthand, although it often shortchanges very important collaborators.

films noir, I wanted to say in my earlier post, your writing about The Big Heat is excellent, and the quote from Sartre is entirely approrpiate, especially as it relates to Debby Marsh and her actions.

The director as auteur is the paradigm for modern film criticism and the contributions of others receive less attention. Is this fair?

The director as well as carrying the creative burden is entrusted with delivering a quality product on budget and on time. A focus on the director is natural as a film’s failure or success rests on his or her creative talent and directorial skills.

So there should be no apologies for focusing on the director or his oeuvre when discussing a film. This is not to deny that movie production is a collaborative effort, but it is the director who carries the singular responsibility of completing the picture.

Unfortunately, it is not always possible for a film reviewer to be aware of the origins of the story – particularly when a movie was made 50 or 60 years ago.

The rogue cop theme, for example, has been pervasive in crime novels for many decades and is hardly original, so unless one has actually read a novel or story, one can’t know the degree to which it informs the film, how good the story was, or how well it was written.

I think Eddie was being a bit hard on Alexander, and to say that “Lang did a splendid job on adapting someone else’s vision” is also unfair to Lang. A film may be adapted from story, but it is a director’s ‘realisation’ that brings it to the screen.

Eddie, I thank you for pointing out the glaring oversight of my review in not giving McGivern much more credit for his wonderful story. Your caveat is exactly my greatest regret about my piece, as I intended to highlight McGivern’s contributions to noir, but never did.

Eddie, if your latter initial is M., I have had the great pleasure of meeting you with my father at the San Francisco Castro Theatre two years in a row at Noir City. If that is the case, I would like to say that I’m staying in the shadows and enjoying your book. Thank you again.

When I made an attempt to review The Big Heat last year – a pathetic effort against your work Alexander – I saw (if it makes any sense)a feminist critique. There are no femme fatales in this movie, only strong women, who do the dirty work required to bring a male-owned system of oppression and corruption to account.

Debbie Marsh is an existential hero, as are the other major femmes, the murdered barfly and the clerk at the wrecker’s yard, who each take responsibility and act.

As Jean Paul Sartre wrote:

“I am responsible for everything… except for my very responsibility, for I am not the foundation of my being. Therefore everything takes place as if I were compelled to be responsible. I am abandoned in the world … in the sense that I find myself suddenly alone and without help, engaged in a world for which I bear the whole responsibility without being able, whatever I do, to tear myself away from this responsibility for an instant.” – Jean Paul Sartre, ‘Being and Nothingness’ (1943)