Went with another noir tonight: The Stranger by Orson Welles - not at all to be confused or associated with the story of the same name by Camus. Perhaps more than anything I'm really interested in seeing any and all films starring Edward G. Robinson; I just love his face. It's so... earnest, and his mouth is so wide and his lips are so thin and expressive. Anyhow, the film clocked in at a short 1hr:24, but anything longer would have destroyed the tone. What I really took notice in this Welles film particularly was his ability to capture beautiful singles. Citizen Kane, for example, mostly employed depth of field shots, and of course, some singles of Kane here and there, but the singles definitely stood way way out in The Stranger. I liked that he also chose to design them in varying ways: lots of close ups pushed off the horizontal line, medium shots in canted angles. He also captured "the look" really well: that split second in which a character reveals something to the audience by a slight movement or change in his/her facial expression. The shots and "the look" combined definitely helped create the noir tone in this film.
Too tired to write more, but as is custom, here are some screen shots:
Oh wait, after posting these I just remembered something else I wanted to say: doesn't Welles look like a super hot hipster? I mean come on, that single of him is so good. Definitely hot. Definitely a hipster I've known.
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