Nightmare Alley: Film Noir and the American Dream

360 Pages·2012·3.32 MB·English

by  Mark Osteen

NIGHTMARE ALLEY
NIGHTMARE ALLEY
FILM NOIR AND THE AMERICAN DREAM
MARK OSTEEN
© 2013 The Johns Hopkins University Press
All rights reserved. Published 2013
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Osteen, Mark.
Nightmare alley : film noir and the American dream / Mark Osteen.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4214-0780-7 (hdbk. : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-4214-0832-3
(electronic) — ISBN 1-4214-0780-9 (hdbk. : alk. paper) — ISBN 1-4214-0832-
5 (electronic)
1. Film noir—United States—History and criticism. 2. Motion pictures—
Social aspects—United States—History—20th century. 3. American Dream in
art. 4. National characteristics, American, in motion pictures. I. Title.
PN1995.9.F54O88 2013
791.43′6556—dc232012017652
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CONTENTS
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Film Noir and the American Dream
1 “Someone Else’s Nightmare”: Exploring Noir Dreamscapes
2 Missing Persons: Self-Erasure and Reinvention
3 Vet Noir: Masculinity, Memory, and Trauma
4 Framed: Forging Noir Identities
5 Noir’s Cars: Automobility and Amoral Space
6 Nocturnes in Black and Blue: Memory, Morality, and Jazz Melody
7 Femmes Vital: Film Noir and Women’s Work
8 Left-Handed Endeavor: Crime, Capitalism, and the Hollywood Left
Conclusion: American Nightmares
Notes
Filmography
Works Cited
Index
ILLUSTRATIONS
The geek is a main attraction in Nightmare Alley’s carnival
The dream sequence in Spellbound features an array of disembodied eyes
Ole Anderson (Burt Lancaster) and Kitty Collins (Ava Gardner) in The Killers
Jane Greer as femme fatale Kathie Moffat in Out of the Past
In Dark Passage Vincent Parry (Humphrey Bogart) connects with Irene Jansen
(Lauren Bacall)
John Muller (Paul Henreid) prepares to cut his own face in Hollow Triumph
Floyd Bowers (Steve Brodie) and Montgomery (Robert Ryan) in Crossfire
In Act of Violence Frank Enley (Van Heflin) confesses to his wife, Edith (Janet
Leigh)
Detective McPherson (Dana Andrews) dreams of the eponymous Laura (Gene
Tierney)
Hardy Cathcart (Clifton Webb) tries to control his wife, Mari (Cathy Downs), in
The Dark Corner
Professor Wanley (Edward G. Robinson) is entranced by a portrait in The
Woman in the Window
In They Live by Night, Bowie (Farley Granger) and Keechie (Cathy O’Donnell)
fall in love
Bart (John Dall) and Annie (Peggy Cummins) at their convertible in Gun Crazy
Emmett Myers (William Talman) abducts Bowen (Frank Lovejoy) and Collins
(Edmond O’Brien) in The HitchHiker
Opening “The Great Whatsit” in Kiss Me Deadly
Lily (Ida Lupino) improvises with Pete (Cornel Wilde) in Road House
Rita Hayworth as Gilda ironically urges us to put the blame on Mame
Marie Allen (Eleanor Parker) is Caged
Dr. Quinada (James Mason) is dwarfed by Smith Ohlrig (Robert Ryan) in
Caught
The heist gang plans a “left-handed endeavor” in The Asphalt Jungle
In The Prowler Webb Garwood (Van Heflin) wants what he sees in the Gilvray
house
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This project has been long in the making, and many people have contributed to
its completion. To thank everyone would require far too much space, but I would
like to acknowledge and express my gratitude for the help of several people in
particular.
I’m grateful to Professors Julie Grossman and Paul Saint-Amour for their
support. My colleagues in the English Department at Loyola University
Maryland have furnished a lively intellectual community where I could test the
ideas found herein. I’m particularly grateful to my colleague Paul Lukacs for
suggesting the Franklin and Emerson connections. My department’s support also
included encouraging me to teach courses in which my embryonic notions could
grow; the students in those courses helped me develop those notions. To them I
offer my hearty thanks.
Barbara Hall and the staff at the Special Collections Department of the
Margaret Herrick Library deserve a special note of gratitude. The resources and
staff at that institution—which for film scholars comes pretty close to heaven on
earth—have deepened and enriched this project immeasurably.
I’m grateful to the anonymous reader for the Johns Hopkins University Press
for perusing the manuscript so promptly and thoroughly; such alacrity is both
laudable and rare.
As always, my greatest debt is to my wife, Leslie Gilden, for providing a
patient ear as I rattled on about sometimes obscure films, for providing a second
set of eyes as we viewed the movies together, and for voicing challenges that
helped me to refine my ideas in our many and various discussions of these films.
An earlier version of chapter 4 was published in the Journal of Film and
Video; an earlier version of chapter 5 was published in the Journal of Popular
Film and Television.
All illustrations, except those in chapter 5, were purchased from the Kobal
Collection. The rest come from Jerry Ohlinger’s Movie Material Store. I thank
these vendors for their assistance.
NIGHTMARE ALLEY