L.A. NOIR: LOS ANGELES AS A CHARACTER

Angel has been described as having a noir and hard-boiled feel. What does this mean to you, as a writer?

Noir means "black" in French, and refers to a style of filmmaking that was prominent in the post-War films of the 1940s. The lighting was very high-contrast, but more than that, the subject matter was dark. The genre of film noir was typified by films such as The Big Sleep and The Maltese Falcon, which were adapted from the pulp detective stories of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett respectively. Such "hard-boiled" protagonists such as Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe set the standard for all private investigators to come, both on the page and on the screen. Later noir films such as Chinatown, Bladerunner, and most recently, L.A.Confidential all followed in the footsteps of writers like Chandler, and directors like John Huston and Howard Hawks. And what all of these classics have in common is more than just a mood, or a feel, or a style.

They all take place in Los Angeles.¹

The mere presence of Hollywood creates a rich tapestry for storytelling—appearance versus reality is key. On the surface, Hollywood glitters with glamour, riches, and prestige while beneath the thin patina broils greed, corruption, depravity and sorrow. The juxtaposition of the appearance of perfect weather, perfect tans, and perfect tree-lines streets, and the reality of Los Angeles underworld of murder and mayhem, drugs and prostitution, graft and corruption, creates a heightened sense of unreality which lends itself to the subject matter. No one is from Los Angeles. It is a city of immigrants chasing dreams or merely escaping the past. The smog-filled air is just as full of hope and dreams as it is desperation and misery made even more apparent by the stunning gulf between the richest of the rich, and the poorest of the poor who all call the city home.

Angel takes the real Los Angeles as well as the fictional Los Angeles of the pulp magazines and novels of the 1920s-1960s, and adds demons, Warriors, Messengers, Slayers, and other creatures that go Bump In the Night. And it works, precisely because La-La-Land is already fictional. It has an international cultural identity that is not bounded by simple facts, but is limited only by the audience's imagination. While in Sunnydale, demons were nothing but animals bent on destruction, in Angel's LA, they are just another ethnic minority trying to eke out a living shoulder to shoulder with the rest. Vampires are high powered business men with lawyers at their beck and call, as well as vicious street gangs battling over turf in South Central. And the head shops and counter-culture hippies and freaks count Magic Store owners and exorcists among them, and no one bats an eye.

Angel, Cordelia, and Doyle don't live in Any City, USA. If you can infuse your fan fiction with actual locales, it will add spark and vitality to your fiction. Study the real Los Angeles as well as its more powerful fictional shadow that has dominated the imaginations of last three generations. Some resources include:

• LA Times: Not just great for local news, but the restaurant and entertainment guides, as well as the weather and living sections are full of perfect details that you can plumb to add a realistic and rich level of detail to your fan fiction.
  
  
• Los Angeles.com: Very different look at the city, including sections on Ethnic communities, religious traditions, lifestyles and community groups, an "urban journal." provides some fantastic insights.
  
  
• City of Los Angeles: Great site for local events, tourism, city charter, and information on permits, licences, maps, and transportation.
  
  
• Los Angeles County: very useful for facts on births/deaths/marriages, and facts and figures.
  
  
• Chandler's LA: Part of a much larger (and very cool) Chandler site. Great overview of locales used in the detective novels of author Raymond Chandler.
  
  
• Digital City: Los Angeles: Another online resource for neighbourhood breakdowns, cultural events, restaurant guides, and more. Very useful for writers looking to get a feel for where a hot new night-club might be, or scuzzy demon bar.
  
  
• LAPD Online: Homepage of the Los Angeles Police Department.

And to tap into the Fictional Los Angeles, check out the following films and novels! Not only will they give you a great feel for the genre, but they are excellent snapshots of the Los Angeles that is the fictional ancestor of Angel's LA.

films

• The Big Sleep was originally screened during WWII, then re-shoots were ordered beefing up the Bogie-Bacall romance. The 1946 edit is perhaps the best known film noir of all-time, bar none.
  
  
• Chinatown is Roman Polanski's 1974 noir masterpiece. Set in the 1930s, Jack Nicholson plays Jake Gittes, a Marlowe/Spade style gumshoe caught in the middle of a deadly real estate swindle.
  
  
• Bladerunner is an adaptation of SF author Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? from Ridley Scott. Harrison Ford plays a "blade runner', or cop whose job it is to track down sentient androids that have gone rogue. Set in a decaying Los Angeles of the future, the film is nevertheless a classic example of film noir.
  
  
• Devil In a Blue Dress stars Denzel Washington as Mosley's detective Ezekiel "Easy" Rawlins, and the vastly underrated film is rich with stunning period detail, as well as excellent performances.
  
  
• L.A. Confidential is a truly excellent film adaptation of Ellroy's novel, and succeeds for all the same reason the novel does, but in different ways. Brian Helgeland and Curtis Hanson's screenplay clarifies the complex plot lines of the novel, as well as condensing the timeframe, without losing the themes and tone of the novel.
  
  
• Bound² is more than just the film that got The Matrix made. The low-budget debut of the writer/director team the Wachowski Brothers is an exception tale of not one but two femme fatales, mob money, and true love. Stunningly photographed, and superbly acted by Gina Gershon, Jennifer Tilly, and Joe Pantoliano, it will keep you on the edge of your seat.
  
  
• Dark City, like Bladerunner, is a noir Science Fiction epic. However, the story elements (murder, amnesia, a mysterious woman, a gruff cop, love, betrayal, etc), as well as the production design, all mark it as one of the most innovative noir films of the 1990s. A definite must-see for any noir fan who also loves good speculative fiction.

novels

• Simple Art of Murder kicks off with Chandler's essay on the art of detective stories (as well as the difference between the "Golden Age" of British drawing-room sleuth fare, versus the gritty world of Los Angeles crime, and the role of police procedure in crime fiction) and a collection of eight mysteries.
  
  
• Trouble Is My Business is an anthology of four of Chandler's Marlowe short stories and novellas, and is an excellent introduction to the writer's works, as well as a great showcase of the seedier side of Los Angeles.
  
  
• The Big Sleep is one of the very best Marlowe novels, with a complex plot (Chandler was quote as asking studio head Jack Warner, after seeing the film adaptation, "That's great--but whodunit?"), sparkling dialogue, and lush imagery.
  
  
• Crime Wave is a collection of short fiction and essays by James Ellroy originally published in GQ magazine.
  
  
• Hollywood Nocturnes is a collection of a novella and five stories by James Ellroy, set in Los Angeles from 1947-1959.
  
  
• L.A. Confidential is an epic tale of police corruption, and the thin layer of Hollywood glamour barely covering Tinseltown's underworld. Spanning ten years, it's a fascinating look at three cops and the mystery that swallowed all of them whole.
  
  
• Devil In a Blue Dress is the first Easy Rawlins mystery by author Walter Mosley, and a fascinating glimpse into a side of Los Angeles barely touched on by Chandler and Hammett. Like Marlowe, Rawlins is at heart a hero, but not afraid of bloodying a few noses to get answers.
  
  
• A Red Death is the second Easy Rawlins mystery, and is a sprawling tale of love and betrayal amid the Red Scare, as Hollywood reeled from McCarthy and HUAC blacklisting. Like the first novel, Mosley delves into the realities of African-American life in 1950s L.A. and the novel is packed with rich description and strong characterisation.

non-fiction

• Raymond Chandler's Los Angeles is a fantastic collection of photographs of locales used in Chandler's work.
  
  
• Raymond Chandler Speaking is an excellent collection Chandler's letters, essays, and speeches organised by topic.
  
  
• The Big Book of Noir is an excellent collection of articles, essays and critiques spanning all media.
  
  

other authors

• James M. Cain pioneered the American roman noir with novels such as The Postman Always Rings Twice, Double Indemnity, and Mildred Pierce.
  
  
• Former Pinkerton "shadow" Samuel "Dashiell" Hammett practically invented the hard-boiled detective genre with works such as The Glass Key, The Dain Curse and The Maltese Falcon and his influence can be seen in every hard-boiled author who followed in his footsteps.