Journey Into Fear: Characteristics of Noir in Angel
Written by Arethusa, and originally published on The Existential Scoobies.

It was a world where women with a past and men with no future spent eternal nights in the city streets.(1)

Descended from the crime and gangster books and magazines of the 20s and 30s, and expanding to the movies of the 40s and early 50s, noir (French for black) was not a separate genre-it was a matter of mood, style and tone.(2) Writers heavily influenced by Hemmingway's sparse, naturalistic prose and disillusioned by WW I wrote stories of hard-boiled detectives, alienated by society and controlled only by their own shaky moral code. These books and cheap pulp magazines were dubbed roman noir by French writers. Twenty years later French critics named the wave of low budget crime movies with stark lighting and starker themes film noir.(4)

After WW II, many soldiers returned home restless after years of dangerous activity, lonely for the camaraderie of military life, and unable to slip back into the mainstream of American society, where soldiers were returning to the dull responsibilities of school, work, and family. Marriage was out of the question, the wholesome American girl unattainable. These lives, often mired in crime, corruption and cruelty,(5) were echoed in film noir.

Film noir is set in the big city streets at night. The protagonist is alienated from society, and vulnerable to betrayal, especially by a woman. He is lonely, filled with fears and nightmares. The lines between good and evil blur as the antihero tries to fight his inevitable descent into degredation and death. Betrayal is inevitable. Plot twists, reversals of expectations, and flashbacks build suspense and a feeling of dread.(6)

In Angel, noir elements have been fused into a fantasy/horror television show as easily as they have melded with western, gangster and crime movies. Angel is fundamentally noir, with a vampire protagonist who is alienated from society by his very nature, eternally seeking redemption and fighting evil, but never winning.

The streets, sewers and office buildings of Los Angeles are Angel's setting, and it is nearly always night, a vampire's natural habitat. Stephen Holden describes the standard ingredients of film noir in a nutshell: A world-weary private eye finds himself trapped in a decadent, crime-ridden society. Even when he solves a case, good doesn't necessarily triumph over evil. The evil is simply mopped up. The milieu of film noir is a stark night world of dark angles and elongated shadows, where rain glistens on windows and windshields and faces are barred with shadows that suggest some imprisonment of body or soul. This dark, brooding atmosphere, coupled with an equally somber view of life, mark a movie as film noir.(7)

"I just know what it feels like to be trapped. Insulated from the outside world. Existing, without living," Angel says to explain why he wants to help others. (Corrupt, not filmed) He is derided by Holland Manners, a corrupt lawyer at Wolfram and Hart.

"See, for us, there is no fight. Which is why winning doesn't enter into it. We - go on - no matter what. Our firm has always been here. In one form or another. The Inquisition. The Khmer Rouge. We were there when the very first cave man clubbed his neighbor. See, we're in the hearts and minds of every single living being. And *that* - friend - is what's making things so difficult for you. - See, the world doesn't work in spite of evil, Angel. - It works with us. - It works because of us." (Reprise)

The crimes that terrorize every noir city often have a demon's face on Angel. Demons are the physical manifestations of fears and nightmares in Angel, and the demon world, flourishing under the nose of the city but invisible to most, is like the world of criminals and misfits that floats under the surface of every big city. Part demon himself, Angel , a 247-year-old vampire cursed by Gypsies with the restoration of his soul and conscience, consumed by remorse for his past bloodletting and doomed to wander the earth in an agonizing in-between state, neither human nor monster (Paley)(8) hunts those that the police cannot or will not. (People who live by day) have help.

"The whole world is designed for them, so much that they have no idea what goes on around them after dark. They don't see the weak ones lost in the night-or the things that prey on them," Angel said. (Into the Dark) (9).




(1) Does Film Noir Mirror the Culture of Contemporary America?


(2) Writing the New Noir Film


(3) Narrative Innovations in Film Noir by Michael Mills


(4) Night of the Soul: American Film Noir


(5) No Place for a Woman: The Family in Film Noir by John Blaser

(6) Film Noir's Progressive Portrayal of Women

(7) The Outer Limits of Film Noir

(8) Shadows of Film Noir by Brian Fairbanks

(9) Film Noir Films by Tim Birks

(10) English 101: Introduction to Film by Matthew Hurt