The Maltese Falcon - John Huston


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INTRODUCTION

This review is written in an attempt to determine the elements of Film Noir in the film The Maltese Falcon directed by John Huston in 1941. The theory to use is semantic and syntactic approach to genres. 

THEORY DISCUSSION

Film Noir features a world of criminals, darkness, and violence. The characters's central motives are usually greed, lust, and ambition as there are no good person in the film. Every character is up to something and never reveal their real side. Film Noir also portrays fear and desire in reality as the world is not always pure and simple. 

Visually, Film Noir is usually dark with lots of shadows due to high-contrast lighting, and it's German expressionistic. It also has cynical, dark, and pessimistic themes with corrupted characters, blurred morals and intellect, and features hard-boiled antihero vs femme fatale. 

SYNOPSIS

Spade and Archer is the name of a San Francisco detective agency for Sam Spade and Miles Archer. They are partners but Sam doesn't like Miles much. 

A knockout, who goes by the name of Miss Wonderly, walks into their office; by that night everything's changed. Miles is dead, and so is a man called Floyd Thursby. 

It seems Miss Wonderly is surrounded by dangerous men. Her only hope of protection comes from Sam who is suspected by the police as one of the murder. 

More murders are yet to come, and it will all be because of the dangerous men and their lust for a statuette of a bird: The Maltese Falcon. 

ANALYSIS

The darkness in the film was shown visually through German Expressionism (GE). It had high-contrast lighting and a lot of shading in the film. Vertical and horizontal lines also appeared a lot in the shots of the film. GE elements can also be found through the sets and costumes in the film.

In the film, the character portrayals were very clear in terms of motives and personality. There were motives behind every of their actions. Every character's motives normally evolved around greediness, lies, selfishness, lusts, crimes, and more. They showed no guilt for committing crimes and achieving goals using tactics.

Femme fatale was featured in the film by shaping Miss Wonderly's character as a strong, sexual expressive, manipulative, ambitious lady. She wanted money and power, and achieved her motives by pretending as a weak lady who begged for man's protection and needed love.

The antihero of this film was Spade. He's a cunning and tough character in the film, his fists were always ready to fight. He's also a liar and a greedy man. Although he was tough, he's still fell for Miss Wonderly's trap and helped her everytime she needed him. 

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, every actions of character in Film Noir comes with motives behind it. The plot of the film usually features hard boiled antihero and femme fatale. 

REFERENCE


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