Film Noir Conventions in The Maltese Falcon

One of the most influential film movements in the 1940's was a genre that is known today as film noir. French film critics who noticed the trend of how dark and black films appeared coined the term "film noir." The criminal, violence or greed elements in film noir were a metaphoric symptom of society's evils, with a strong undercurrent of moral conflict. It is a style of American films that first evolved in the 1940s, became prominent in the post-war era, and lasted in a classic period until about 1960. Film noir often tackled subjects that dealt with common underlying themes: corruption,…