Lady, That's My Skull has some wonderful images from a '40s pulp fiction magazine,
Women In Crime (June 1946), a semi-exploitative magazine for male readers in the vein of "True Detective Stories".The first caption sets the tone perfectly: "A Red-Headed Woman Is An Arm Full of Trouble!" There's also a dangerous woman with a high-pitched giggle, a dark sisterly conspiracy, and a stock woman-who-screams-on-cue. There's even a love-triangle Whirlpool of Death, which reminds me of the 1940s Harlequin thrillers I mentioned a few months ago. (Remember Maelstrom: A Brutal Saga of Love and Violence?)
I'll tease you with a couple of images, but do check out the full-size versions on Lady, That's My Skull. The original captions are priceless.
Worth a thousand words
Some of the photos are remarkably evocative; I can invent all kinds of lurid backstories. One caption is particularly Maltese Falconesque:"You got a nice build, kid," Nick said eyeing her up and down. Then he handed her the package. "You ain't so bad yourself," Joyce smiled.
I often like that female "type" as much as the male characters do. Is it because she gives as good as she gets? Because she's quick with a comeback and not ashamed to ogle a man? Yes to all that, but I especially like that interaction when it sets up a potential tug-of-war. In noir, the protagonist is gradually enmeshed in something he can’t escape. Will the woman be part of that? Will they reel each other in? Will they struggle against each other as well as the external plot? Will one get the other in hot water, and the other be a fool for love?
(Found via The Cultural Gutter.)
7 Comments:
Hey, what a fun blog. Why have I never been here? I have a question: can I use your observatory photo on a follow-up post to my Duke & I post? I really appreciated your adding that in!
Welcome, and no worries. This web thingy is like that.
It wasn't my photo, just the first I found with that design. It's from the Stellafane Convention hosted by a telescope company on Breezy Hill, Vermont. (I think these are semi-official photos.)
I've been googling observatories since I saw your post. Commenters on Risky Regencies want more astronomy in romance, which sounds great to me. It's an interesting aspect of the characters, and it would add some unusual architecture too. (Not just for Regencies either--the NY Times reports "a growing number of Americans incorporating observatories into new or existing homes." Love it!)
Sorry, this is totally unrelated to noir and/ or observatories, but I just noticed Bernstein's Body and Soul on your bookberg. I've read that! What brought it to your attention? (I found it years ago in my local library, it was pretty old, even then). Have you read it yet? It's about a nun.
I guess you already know that...
'Sokay. Everything's interconnected. Somehow.
I saw Body & Soul as a Masterpiece Theatre series eons ago. I liked the subject and the acting (Kristin Scott Thomas), but I missed the final episode, and I always wondered whether her conflicted feelings about convent life were more fleshed out in the book.
I've just finished it, and I'm still thinking it over. Yes, her train of thought is more fleshed out--I hadn't realized from the TV series how long she'd doubted her vocation before the family crisis. But after reading the book, if anything her interactions with the "outside" world now seem less developed. It's good though, and provocative. I may re-read it.
I've always had a conflicting relationship with film noir. On one hand, I love the tropes, and I love the strong heroines. On the other hand, I don't like how the heroines bring about the male's doom. I suppose I'm too much of a romance reader.
I've been meaning to comment on this post forever. Finally dug out my copy of Getting Even by Woody Allen in which he does the film noir pastiche Mr Big. An armful of trouble asks a private eye to find God for her:
"Her story was beginning to interest me. Spoiled co-ed. High IQ and a body I wanted to know better.
'What does God look like?'
'I've never seen him'
'How do you know He exists?'
'That's for you to find out.'
'Oh great, then you don't know what he looks like? Or where to begin looking?'
'No. Though I suspect he's everywhere. In the air, in every flower. In you and I - and in this chair.'
'Uh huh.' So she was a pantheist. I made a mental note and said I'd give her case a try - for a hundred bucks a day, expenses and a dinner date."
His first lead is a rabbi.
"'Could I get a suit like this for fourteen dollars if there was no God? Here, feel this gabardine - how can you doubt?'"
Later, God pops up in the morgue - but who did it? Needless, to say, it was the dame. She tries to slug him with her forty five. But he gets her first, with his thirty eight.
Your tbr list continues to intrigue. Have you read The Rachel Papers yet? I found the protagonist one of the most vile and obnoxious boys to have ever graced the pages of the novel - yet I really enjoyed it. The rare insight into the unvarnished masculine mind was unsettling and astonishing. Amis was very young when he wrote it, and there must be strong autobiographical elements to it...
I heard a Gallant short story on the New Yorker podcast - it didn't make me want to read more. Are you a fan?
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