Table of Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Prise de Position: For '50s Noir, or Confessions of a Film Noir Addict xi
Preface: Generalities, or The Rise and Fall of Classic American Film Noir xv
Introduction: Coming Attractions, or The Particulars 1
Part 1 '50s Noir and Anticommunism
1 The Woman on Pier 13: I Married a Communist! 19
2 The Red and the Black: "Black Film" and the Red Menace 40
The Whip Hand: The Red Plague 42
I Was a Communist for the F.B.I: Fear of a Red Planet 48
Walk East on Beacon! "A Red behind Every Tree" 62
Big Jim McLain: Red Hawaii 72
3 Pickup on South Street: Out of the Red and Into the Black 79
Part 2 50's Noir in the Atomic Age
4 D.O.A.: Fatality, Sexuality, Radioactivity 95
5 "Black Film" and the Bomb: Spies and "Cowboys" Red Professors and Thieves 109
The Thief: Alien Nation 110
The Atomic City: Atomic Cowboys and Un-American Indians 120
Shack Out on 101: Bikinis, Bombshells, and the (Red) Planet of the Apes 131
City of Fear: Cobalt-60 137
6 Kiss Me Deadly: The X Factor, or The "Great Whatsit" 144
Part 3 New Media and Technologies
7 Noir en couleur. Color and Widescreen 163
Black Widow: Red Herring 166
House of Bamboo: "Kimono Girl" (Red), Gaijin Gangster-Detective (Black) 173
Slightly Scarlet: Color Me Bad 179
A Kiss before Dying: Pink Is the New Black 187
8 Niagara: Colored Marilyns 196
9 The Glass Web: 3-D, TV, and the Beginning of the End of Classic Noir 212
Conclusion: The Crimson Kimono: Odds for Tomorrow 229
Notes 241
Index 273