"You know how to whistle, don’t you, Steve? You just put your
lips together and… blow."
From: "To Have And Have Not."
With the recent death of Lauren
Bacall, the last of the real Stars of Film Noir, for me are gone.
If you ever
saw her in "The Big Sleep" or "Key Largo,"she
epitomized the best of the Women of that genre. With her sexy, throaty,
hard as nails,
approach to men and life, she gave as good as she got. Her femme fatalle character,
left, nail marks on Humphrey Bogart, and their lines made cinematic
history.
Ballin Mundson:
Look your best, my beautiful. This will be the casino's first glimpse of you.
[He kisses her]
Gilda:
I'll look my very best, Ballin.
[Looks at Johnny]
Gilda:
I want all the hired help to approve of me. Glad to have met you, Mr. Farrell. Ballin Mundson:
His name is Johnny, Gilda. Gilda:
Oh, I'm sorry. Johnny is such a hard name to remember and so easy to forget.
[In a breathy voice]
Gilda:
Johnny. There. See you later, Mr. Farrell.
Film Noir means literally (the black film). It was developed during and after the World War II years. American Movies, such as Phantom Lady,Laura, or the Blue Dahlia,, offset the genial musicals and happy endings of films, like Pin Up, with Betty Grable or Moon over Miami, with Alice Faye. They were the yin and yang for theater
goers. The War years fueled Noir with it's tense, anxious,
plots, filled with suspicion and too often unhappy endings.
The films built by dark tone and mood. The men were hard boiled, cynical and disillusioned.
They encountered a beautiful,double-dealing, seductive, Woman either
before a murder or right after. Look at the character, Johnny, played by Glenn Ford. This is a scene between him and Rita Hayworth in Gilda with its typical hard edged lines. (above)
Walter Neff: "Yes, I killed him. I killed him for money - and a woman - and I didn't
get the money and I didn't get the woman. Pretty, isn't it?"
The Plots were complex with undertones and flash backs. The witty,
acerbic dialogue, and characters move it forward. The Movie often
unfolds in a maze, with a brooding disillusioned ending. Double Indemnity starring Fred MacMurray (above) is worth taking time to enjoy- for example.
I
don't know what enthralls us about these wonderful, timely, Movies. I can
only say People like myself love them. I am not alone- there are plenty
of Collectors. Maybe it's the combination of clothes and hard-boiled
Men and Dames.
I received an invitation to join the Blog hop from Rebeca Schiller. She and I met on the Writer Unboxed Facebook group. We share a love of writing and of politics.
I've recently gone back to blogging. I thought it would be fun to write about slices of history.With an M.A. in the subject it's hard for me not to still have an avid interest, but when I started writing the creative side of me craved fiction- not just any fiction, but mystery and set in quaint little towns with an amateur sleuth. I hope you know where I am going with this, because it surprised me as much as anybody. I thought I would write great tomes of history.
What am I currently working on? I am writing a mystery series set in a southern town during the years prior to World War II and continuing through 1945. I had always been fascinated with the year 1939, so it seemed a good start. My heroine who is a nervous, good- hearted soul, seems the last person to solve murders. In fact they had to be forced on her. All Clemmie wants is to find room and board without holding out a can for donations. What she ends up with is a body.
Another major character is an old boyfriend she refused to marry. Charlie is the Sheriff in the small town of Tuscumbia. He is an
unmarried, older man dealing with a old maid sleuth. Still nothing deters
him. He is determined to find a killer so he enters the world of Pentecostal religion.
A cast of smaller characters.
I sing opera.
Her alcoholic Landlady who was a traveler and a great beauty in the Belle Epoque days of Paris. She is forever singing opera. But a fierce champion of freedom she reminds her Neighbors women wore no underclothing in the 1920's not just today.
I sing opera too.
Her Parrot who loves dogs.
.
Why do I write what I write?
I enjoy mystery, sleuths that come in and solve things all while baking apple pie. Not that my Sleuth does very well at that art. She does however excel at reading people. I love humor within the page and I like to eat while I read so I abhor too much gore. But writing in this era also gives me the chance to research 1939 and the World War II Era as the series progresses. I like the social movement, the clothes, the hair, the movies what don't I like? Even though historically it was a hard decade with lots of rationing and anxiety about War.
How does my individual writing process work?
I sit down and write. I simply begin with a what if? Then I let my main character do a lot of the work. She is in the middle of finding a body. What would her reaction be? I ask a lot of questions while I am letting the words flow. I should point out the words don't always come easy and some days I know they are rubbish. Pure junk. I really can't seem to do it any other way because I have a hard time writing and sticking to outlines. So I let the WIP flow until about page 100. At that point I usually need to sit down and see how this will wrap up. It's not perfect and the first draft will certainly need editing. But it seems to be the way I work best.
Thanks to Rebeca Schiller for tagging me. You can reach her here.
Doors are a portal to our dreams. If only knew what was on the other side...we think.
But this blue I’m compelled to glorify—
it’s not robin’s egg, navy, or indigo;
it’s a shade that should be named “devastation blue,”
the excruciating, lacerative blue of today’s sky
whose incandescence suggests
that its nearest blood kin is neither
violet nor emerald,
but gold—this blue must be
gold’s daughter,
the flame inside the flood,
the flood inside the wind,
the wind inside the flame.
Open wide the blue door in front of me
That portal to the sea and to the mountains beyond
On terraces carved from the salt kissed air
Where I will sit until the sun gives birth to the stars
I gather up my papers
Tussled by the evening breeze
The ink dries quickly
And my songs rest quietly upon the page
My friends and I we chat until it is a bit to cold for comfort
Maybe they are a source of creativity.
But how will we ever know unless we have the courage to open them?
References "Another Poem on Blue" Weekly Hubris and "The Blue Door (A Poem) L'Ennemi
We have created Art around them celebrating their grace. We have written poetry...listen to the words of William Butler Yeats from the Wild Swans at Coole....
'The trees are in their autumn beauty,
The woodland paths are dry,
Under the October twilight the water
Mirrors a still sky;
Upon the brimming water among the stones
Are nine-and-fifty swans.
The nineteenth autumn has come upon me
Since I first made my count;
I saw, before I had well finished,
All suddenly mount
And scatter wheeling in great broken rings
Upon their clamorous wings.
I have looked upon those brilliant creatures,
And now my heart is sore.
All's changed since I, hearing at twilight, The first time on this shore,
The bell-beat of their wings above my head,
Trod with a lighter tread. Unwearied still, lover by lover,
They paddle in the cold
Companionable streams or climb the air;
Their hearts have not grown old;
Passion or conquest, wander where they will,
Attend upon them still.
But now they drift on the still water,
Mysterious, beautiful;
Among what rushes will they build,
By what lake's edge or pool
Delight men's eyes when I awake some day
To find they have flown away?"
We have celebrated Kings feeding them.
RENAISSANCE
TAPESTRY 15TH CENTURY The Lohengrin legend. Young Duke Elias, Charles
the Bold of Burgundy, feeding the swans. From Flanders.
We have given them a wild mysticism.
References: William Morris at the Victoria and Albert Museum and Wawel Castle Cracow Poland. Leda and the Swan Flemish medieval tapestry unkown source.
During the middle of the eighteenth century, a style became popular in
France and adopted by the fashion conscious elite. It became known as the robe à la française in France, the mantua in England. According to Madeline
Delpierre, that was due to a French engraver by the name of Hubert Gravelot. He had
returned from England after twenty years to France and published a series of
fashion plates that aided the popularity of the style.
It became very fashionable particularly at Court. The gown had a panel in the middle of the back that went from neck to hem in one piece. The panel had pleats at the top and waist which flowed freely into the skirt. At the front the skirt was detached to the bodice forming a point slightly below the waist opening to reveal a separate stomacher.
The painted silk gown (above) revealed the presence of a plant gum binder and four colors were used for the palette: red and brown lake, prussian blue and gamboge. These details identify the dress as most likely European. Details given are England, material either Dutch or German.
But what did it look like on...(see left).
Ref. The Fashionable Past: a blog of costume and design. The Metropolitan Museum of Art
