By Imogen Sara Smith

On Sale: Mar 30, 2027
Page Count: 272 pages
Publisher: Running Press Adult
ISBN-13: 9798894143255

$32.00

$42.00 CAD

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Turner Classic Movies host and Dark City Dames author Eddie Muller and Criterion Channel host Imogen Sara Smith offer an essential tour of international film noir, highlighting renowned movie classics and obscure noir masterpieces from around the world.

Film noir has long been considered uniquely American, but Noir Around the World presents movies awash in noir themes and style that were made all over the globe. The journey entails a far-ranging itinerary of enthralling crime stories, celebrating renowned classics such as The Third Man (England, 1949), Rififi (France, 1955), and Bitter Rice (Italy, 1949), and unearthing obscure noir masterpieces from South America, Korea, Scandinavia, and the Middle East. In the process, the authors trace the artistic crosspollination that fueled the most significant cinematic movements of all-time, from neo-realism’s origins in early 1940s Italy, to the postwar “rubble films” of vanquished nations, from the “sun tribe” films that changed Japanese cinema, to the innovations of the French and Czech “New Waves” —all of which intersected with noir in ways both subtle and stunning.

Noir Around the World features some of the most popular international actors of all-time: Jean Gabin, Pedro Armendariz, Lucia Bosè, Toshiro Mifune, and a young Ingrid Bergman. Readers will encounter extraordinary filmmakers such as Edith Carlmar (the Ida Lupino of Norway), Sweden’s Hasse Ekman, and Mexico’s Roberto Gavaldon, alongside familiar American directors like Edward Dmytryk and Robert Siodmak, making sensational films noir for international audiences.

Illustrated by more than 150 black-and-white photos and full-color poster artwork, Noir Around the World is a stunning and revelatory movie guide from equally insightful and entertaining tour guides, Eddie Muller and Imogen Sara Smith.

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Turner Classic Movies

Eddie Muller is known internationally as the Czar of Noir. As founder and president of the Film Noir Foundation he has been instrumental in resurrecting and restoring rare examples of the genre from around the world. He is the host of Turner Classic Movies’ popular Noir Alley franchise, broadcast weekly throughout North America. He produces and hosts NOIR CITY, a festival of film noir across nine U.S. cities. He has written extensively on noir, with his seminal work Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir named by The Hollywood Reporter one of the “100 Greatest Film Books of All-Time.” Other Muller titles include Dark City Dames, Eddie Muller’s Noir Bar, and Kid Noir.

Imogen Sara Smith is a film critic and historian based in New York City. She is the author of two books, In Lonely Places: Film Noir Beyond the City and Buster Keaton: The Persistence of Comedy and has contributed to several other volumes including The Lady with the Torch: Columbia Pictures 1929-1959. She writes for Sight & Sound, Film Comment, Cineaste, Reverse Shot, and many other publications, and is editor-in-chief of NOIR CITY magazine. Imogen is a host and guest programmer on the Criterion Channel and writer for the Criterion Collection, and she has taught film history and criticism at NYU, the School of Visual Arts, and Maine Media Workshops.

Eddie Muller

About the Author

Eddie Muller, aka the “Czar of Noir” and recipient of the Raven Award from the Mystery Writers of America, is the host of Turner Classic Movies’ Noir Alley, and the author of novels, biographies, movie histories, plays, and films. He also programs and hosts the Noir City film festival series, and as founder of the Film Noir Foundation Eddie has been instrumental in restoring and preserving dozens of lost noir classics. He lives in Northern California.

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