 Los Angeles has always played an interesting role in the film noir genre. The city was home to hundreds of film noirs in the 40s, 50s, and 60s, and to this day, the mass majority of modern film noir being released takes place in and around Los Angeles. In the earliest days of the genre, LA was set as a location out of convenience and necessity. It was cheap and efficient to shoot in the back lots or on location around the city, and changing the city would just be a burden. In addition, the works of Chandler, Kane, and Hammett, which inspired the film noir movement, were almost always set around Los Angeles. However, as the genre solidified itself as one of the cornerstones of American cinema, the location began to take on a meaning of its own. Shooting on location, it's a must for film noir, because film noir is reality. It was a place of hope, the embodiment of the American dream, a place where anyone can become anything. Many characters of film noir are aspiring actors, screenwriters, and models, all trying to find success in the city. However, Los Angeles also has a darker side, one that author John G. Kowalti describes as big business politics crime in the whole underlying social and environmental structure of Los Angeles in his paper discussing Chinatown, essentially a place that, from the outside looking in, appears as though anything is possible. However, when characters land there, they find that it was all an exaggeration, a dream, an idea of something that isn't actually there. But film noir's treatment of Los Angeles is really just a microcosm of its overarching message, the illusion of something good, which reveals itself to be much worse than what anyone could have possibly imagined. Today, I'd like to take a closer look into film noir, and especially focus on how it looks at the American dream, the idea that anyone can make their life anything that through hard work and dedication, all dreams can become a reality. Film noir takes this idea and ultimately shows the mindset is just a dream, and it comes at a true cost. This general sense of jeopardy in life, which is what exists in all film noir, then it's a correct representation of the anxiety caused by the system. Film noir's rise to popularity dates back to the late 1930s and early 1940s. Following the Great Depression and the Second World War, the mindset in America was one of success. After a victory overseas, the nation's economy was growing stronger than ever, and with it came hope. The archetypal beginning of many film noir's is one of ambition. Our protagonist has an idea or is lured into a plot to become successful. In Double Endemnity, Phyllis is living an extravagant life, one of wealth and excess married to Mr. Dietrich's sin, but that isn't good enough for her. She wants it all to herself. She brings Walter Neff into her elaborate scheme to murder her husband to inherit his wealth. Walter wants to be rich. As an insurance salesman, he sees the most rich and successful people living around Los Angeles and aspires to join their ranks. He sees working with Phyllis is the best way to do so. Money and status are goals frequently associated and found with the film noir protagonist, especially with private investigators who are willing to or have already thrown away their morals just to get the next job. Once the protagonist starts to head down the road towards success, they are met with immediate moral challenges. You enter the heart of darkness. It is a descent into hell, both visually and internally, from which you cannot escape until it's over with. And this cuts to the roots of film noir's message about the American dream. As never go as planned, characters may hope to achieve something great to find success either financially or in some other way, but always come up short. There are forces acting upon them that make them give up their ambitions and instead start living a life of normalcy. That is, if they get lucky. After their American dream starts to fall apart, many try to leave. In Sunset Boulevard, our protagonist Joe Gillis wants to leave his Hollywood hopes behind. He chooses to move back to Ohio, but he can't. His ambitions mean too much to him, and he decides that he is going to stay, and it costs him his life. And this shows off one final theme of film noir and the American dream that I want to discuss, the balance between ambition and greed. Whether characters start out wanting to raise their position in society or just want money, eventually the thirst for more takes over, and they realize that in order to become more successful, they'll need to hurt others either financially or literally. Through this film noir reveals that success and wealth comes at a cost, the corruption of self. Almost every character we see throughout the entire genre who has reached conventional success is there because they have sold themselves down, traded their morality for material goods. Film noir reveals that it is possible to reach success, but that success comes at a very steep cost. Well, in the end he got himself a pool. Only the price turned out to be a little high. Hey everyone, I hope you enjoyed. I love the film noir genre so much. I always have so much fun researching it and revisiting it, and I'm so glad I got another excuse to do so. This is a video that has gone through a lot of drafts and a lot of revisions in the script, and I'm glad I was able to finally try to balance something between specific examples, but also broad statements about the genre as a whole, and let me know how you think I did in this field, and if you enjoy this type of content or if you prefer the traditional singular film discussion. So please leave your comment. I'm really interested in your feedback. Anyway, if you're new here, make sure you hit that subscribe button. I have a new video going up every Saturday. If you want more film noir, I put a link to one of my earlier videos in which I discussed the genre and some of its defining traits. Be sure to check that video out if you're interested and I will see you next week. Thanks for watching.