One of the strangest aspects of the transition between the 4th and 50 in Hollywood was the virtual disappearance of the thriller and movie of black. Usually Hollywood movies of the 50 is bright and colorful, and even his darkest films as The Big Heat (1953), appear bathed in light as compared to 40. The thriller survived to some extent in the early 50's. But the honest detectives like Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon (1941) and Philip Marlowe Murder, My Sweet (1944), The Big Sleep, The Lady of the Lake (1946), The Brasher Doubloon and (1947) gave way to far less virtuoso Mike Hammer adaptations of novels Mickey Spillane, who characterized the decade of the 50. I, The Jury (1953), Kiss me Deadly (1955) and My Gun Is Quick (1957). The change is exemplified by their own choice of players. Although Bogart does show some toughness, does not hide his sense of humor and deep vulnerability, qualities lacking in the personality of Ralph Meeker in Kiss me Deadly . However, while the thriller and black film largely disappeared from the Hollywood of the 50, his spirit continued. This was particularly evident in the acts of violence in films 50.
The classic gangster films of the 30 violence tended to be fast, not ritualized, not enhanced by cinematic effects such as fast-paced and close-ups, and executed usually by firearms. On the contrary, violence in the film thriller and black of the 40 usually consisted of beatings, burns, cuts, mutilation, poisoning, falls from high buildings. This felt much more tactile and immediate violence is evident, especially in the gangster movies of the 50, but also in other genres such as Westerns and war movies. An example that raised several comments at the time was shot in the hand of James Stewart in The Man from Laramie (1955). Among the most disturbing acts of violence of the gangster films of the 50 are those perpetrated against women, such as the disfigurement of his face suffered by Gloria Grahame in The Big Heat , and the threat of throwing sulfuric acid from the beautiful face of Vicky (Cyd Charisse) in Chicago year 30 (1959).
Increasing violence in American cinema of the decade of the 50 is perhaps a reflection of the concerns that was behind the apparent stability of Eisenhower's America. I wanted to see also the presence of a similar concern in the fantasy film about mutants and monstrous beings emerged as a result of the experiments mucleares, as well as morbid and destructive atmosphere of family melodramas of the period.
This film is mostly related with the figure of Alfred Hitchcock, for which the decade of the 50 was an especially prolific. In his films, classic Hollywood narrative patterns are subtly subverted by the sharpness and irony. His protagonists are developed often in mundane environments, and are a professional tennis player in Strangers on a Train (1951), a priest, I confess (1952), a press photographer temporarily invalid, The Rear Window (1954), and advertising in the death the heels (1959). All they see how the world collapses around him wrapping them up in nightmare situations. Those nightmares are not yet a social, not focus on character relationships with the outside world, but rather on the fragility of his own personality and identity, and the horrors that may be found in depths of his psyche. Thus, the priest I confess , the tennis player Strangers on a Train and advertising With North by Northwest, in fact, the appearance of guilty men, while the police Vertigo (1957), becomes a necrophiliac, and temporary invalid Rear Window, in a "voyeur."
But the darkest film all shot by Hitchcock's genius during the late 50's, and perhaps better reflects the concern that America was in this period is Wrong Man (1956), in which a single musician (Henry Fonda) is wrongly identified as a store robber. Slowly and deliberately, the judicial process is going to allocate this role, while his family falls apart because of this experience, and his wife were sinking into madness.
seems that highly stylized genres such as films gangster, thriller and suspense black cinema, offer a retrospective, a much more complete mood of a particular society at a given time that films more overtly social. In any case, have held up better over time, as evidenced by today's viewing, as well as the work of Franz Kafka, perhaps he, like anyone, has themed this great theme of the twentieth century: the obstacle. Yes, it was also the largest discovery of signs of modern life. Then came Hitchcock.
"He who seeks does not find, but who does not seek is found." Kafka, diary
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