6 Great Noir Stories Waiting to be Adapted
iView Author:
Subrat
(Bangalore, India)
EMAIL:
Withheld
With movies like Manorama – SFU, Johnny Gaddar and No Smoking readying for
release, this article suggests 5 classic stories which suit the noir style
and invites PFC readers to suggest their interpretation of these stories in
the context of Hindi cinema.
I have lost count of occasions, while engrossed in a book, I start wondering
how this story would play out on screen. Imagination takes wings as you
start adapting the plot to a context you understand and think of a cast
which will do justice to the storyline. The one cinematic genre that I play
out most often is film noir – whose visual and thematic codes possibly
appeal most to armchair and perennially aspiring film-makers (and may be
simplistic minds). I have been meaning to compile a personal list of books
suited to the noir style for a while now. What hastened the decision to pen
this down was a deeply insightful analysis of bloggers done by Mukul Kesavan
in his column in the Telegraph (Kolkatta). Kesavan mocks a generation of
Indians who show some distinctly common characteristics especially their
love for Hindi cinema and books and their penchant for blogging about them.
Kesavan writes:
“Every English-speaking Indian man between 25 and 60 has written about the
Hindi movies he has seen, the English books he has read, the foreign places
he has traveled to and the curse of communalism.” “..…..these masters of
blah have migrated to the Republic of Blog. . Why did a bunch of grown men,
in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, write about the same movies,
novels, journeys and riots?
“[He]…. begins to see Hindi films as the lost hinterland that connects him
to the Bharat that isn’t India. The Hindi film becomes his passport to des
and his ability to write about Hindi films demonstrates (both to himself and
the world) his authentic connectedness. None of this rules out the
possibility that he actually enjoys Hindi films: it just explains why he
writes about them.”
“He reviews English novels for the opposite reason that he sees Hindi films:
if Hindi films are his umbilical connection to his authentic mofussil self,
reading and writing about English fiction is the open sesame that gives him
entry to a properly metropolitan world. His delight in Hindi films springs
from a precious, nurtured state of innocence whereas his connoisseurship of
English fiction allows him to be knowing in a cosmopolitan way.”
I reckon a majority of visitors to PFC will answer to the above description;
I do and I am most happy to belong to this group atleast when it comes to
Hindi cinema and English novels (and I include English translations here).
So I thought I will bring these two together in a single article and give
Kesavan some real anthropological evidence to support his thesis.
Here’s a list of five stories that I believe are waiting to be adapted in
the noir style in Hindi cinema, especially apposite at this moment when
noir-like movies like Manorama – SFU, Johnny Gaddar and No Smoking are in
the celluloid pipeline. I invite PFC readers to suggest their interpretation
of adapting these stories in the context of Hindi cinema.
1. Chronicle of a Death Foretold (originally in Spanish) – Gabriel Garcia
Marquez
The story of the murder of Santiago Nasar reconstructed by the narrator 27
years after the event in a remarkable non-linear framework (5 descriptions
of the main plot in 5 chapters). On his wedding night, Bayarado, discovers
his wife Angela Vicario is not a virgin and turns her back to her family.
Angela confesses to her twin brothers that it was Santiago who took her
virginity and the Vicario twins set out to avenge her. The murder of
Santiago is then chronicled with views of the narrator, subsequent events
that have happened in the intervening 27 years and a remarkable conspiracy
of silence of the villagers who knew that Vicario twins had set out for the
murder but all had their own reasons for not alerting Santiago. The story
lets us know of what happened to all the key players over time without
letting up the tautness of describing that day. The eventual description of
Santiago’s murder (right outside the front door of his house) and the morbid
fascination of the crowd which had heard the rumors of the impending murder
and came over to watch it make it an ideal choice for me to be captured on
camera. And of course the key question which remains unanswered because of
the contrary views offered through the book – who was the real culprit? Was
it really Santiago or did Angela name him to protect someone else? Marquez
subtly suggests that it possibly was the narrator himself and leaves the
readers to their own interpretation.
2. Appointment in Samarra – John O’Hara
Firstly, the title itself refers to one of the best short stories that I
have ever heard. A Baghdad merchant sends his servant, one morning, to the
market to run some errands. The servant bumps against a woman in black in
the market who isn’t pleased at all. The frightened servant runs back home
and in a terribly agitated state tells the merchant that he had seen Death
in the market. He feels he should be out of Baghdad immediately and asks the
merchant for his fastest horse. He lets the reins loose and flees to Samarra
which is some distance away from Baghdad. The merchant goes to market and
meets Death and questions her about the incident in the morning. She replies
that she was not offended by the servant; rather, she was startled to see
him in Baghdad for she had an appointment with him that night at Samarra.
That’s a winning one minute short film!!
Anyway, John O’Hara’s story (set in 1930s) is that of the death-wish of the
central protagonist, Julian English, an owner of a Cadillac dealership. If
you think Devdas (or DevD) is the story of self-destruction or
self-awareness then read this story; this is the Real McCoy. The story spans
three days in his life where he commits three infuriatingly impulsive acts
of self-destruction. In the first event he throws a drink at a person who
had invested in his business, who is well regarded in the society and who
can potentially ruin Julian’s business. In the second, a drunk Julian takes
a scantily clad gangster’s moll into his car while his wife and one of
gangster’s men watch him. What happens in the car is only implied. The
gangster is also an important customer of his dealership and Julian knows
“he was in for it” after the event. In the final act, Julian gets into a
slugfest with an old friend and a few others in a club. Julian goes through
all of these in an almost pre-destined manner and feels he has lost his
business, his wife and his will to live. His first attempt at suicide fails
as he loses his nerve after holding a gun to his head. Eventually, he
succeeds in an apt ending where he dies of carbon monoxide poisoning by
running his car in a closed garage. The irony of it all is you as a reader
know that Julian’s problems are not as bad since each person who he thinks
is out to get him is actually sympathetic towards him. However, it was
inevitable since Julian had to keep his Appointment in Samarra.
3. Red Harvest – Dashiell Hammett
An author who can be considered the father of this genre and one amazing
story which is considered the inspiration for Kurosawa’s Yojimbo, Leone’s A
Fistful of Dollars and Coen Brothers’ Miller’s Crossing. Classic beginning:
a detective known only as the Continental Op (or “the Op”) is called to
Personville by Donald Willson only to find him (Donald) dead when he reaches
there. The Op is then hired by Elihu (Donald’s father) to cleanse city of
four major competing gangs which in many ways were Elihu’s own creations.
Through a mixture of wile, disinformation and treachery, the Op has the four
gangs baying for each other’s blood. In middle of all this, the Op finds
himself accused of the murder of a woman who he was seeing in Personville
and who was the moll of one of the gangsters. By the end, the Op absolves
himself of the crime and also ensures that Elihu has wrested the control of
the city from the gangs. The brutality of the story, its unique argot and
the delineation of gangsters as the products of economic and political
interests makes it a story that is agnostic to time and location where it is
set.
4. The Big Sleep – Raymond Chandler
Death – the big sleep – is in plenty in this defining work of Raymond
Chandler where the detective Philip Marlowe makes his debut. A story so
intricately woven and complex that it would be futile to attempt to
summarize it in a few lines. But as futile attempts go, here is another –
Marlowe is hired by an old General Sternwood to deal with a Geiger (a dealer
in rare books) who has been blackmailing his daughter Carmen. There is a
parallel thread which Marlowe also picks up that of the disappearance of
General’s son-in-law Rusty Regan who was married to his elder daughter
Vivian. From here the pace just doesn’t slack (and I will run out commas
here) – the realization that Geiger’s real business is pornography, Carmen
baring it all for Geiger’s camera, Geiger’s murder, the pursuit to recover
Carmen’s salacious pictures, the death of Sternwood’s chauffeur, Taylor, who
was in love with Carmen, the attempt of Brody and Agnes (Geiger’s friend and
employee respectively) to take over Geiger’s racket, the appearance of
Geiger’s homosexual lover, the death of Brody, the recovery of the pictures,
the start of the second plot of Rusty’s disappearance and the eventual
realization of Marlowe of the truth about Rusty and Carmen. This is a
complete roller coaster ride which Hollywood has attempted twice on screen.
Thankfully, I haven’t seen either of the efforts and I still hold the fond
belief that the definite noir film on The Big Sleep is yet to be made.
5. Love and Longing in Bombay – Vikram Chandra
There isn’t a way I couldn’t include this as part of this list and I have a
fervent hope (given Vikram Chandra’s movie connections – mom was a writer
and sister Anupama is a film journalist and married to Vinod Chopra) that
someone picks this up for a movie. The five narratives in the book are
inspired from the Vedic guidance on human pursuits – Dharma, Shakti, Kama,
Artha and Shanti (technically, it should have been Moksha instead of Shakti
and Shanti). All the stories are recounted to Ranjit (a young software geek
type) by Subramaniam, a retired civil servant and each story begins with
‘listen’. The story, rather the novella, which is ideal for a noir is Kama –
a police officer, Sartaj Singh, fighting his own marital demons while
solving the murder of rich man found in the gutter during one of Mumbai’s
monsoon downpours. Sartaj’s uncovering of the sleaze in what seems like an
ordinary marriage, the brimming eroticism of the plot and the morally rigid
view of the son (in a reversal of traditional role of a bohemian son and
puritan father) who might be guilty of fratricide makes it a compelling
read. However, the elements that elevate the story to noir classic are the
personal dilemmas and choices that confront Sartaj Singh. Vikram Chandra
brings back Sartaj Singh in his next full length novel ‘Sacred Games’ but it
is ‘Kama’ which fits the bill for a noir fare.
6. Acceptance of Denial – Hobart Mutansy
An unheralded story set in small town India of late eighties. A morally
ambiguous youth, Anish, employed in a music recording store finds purpose as
the local coordinator for collecting bricks for a religious movement
sweeping the country. While the role gives him a sense of self-esteem so
lacking in his existence till then, it places him in direct conflict with
his love interest – Sagufta, the seemingly delusional daughter of the
terminally ill Fatima. A murder of a political figure, Anish’s ignorance of
his past, the disappearance of a cache of sacred bricks at the eleventh hour
and Anish’s discovery of the secret of his birth and his real identity which
places him in a delicious role-reversal of his professional and personal
interests all go into this cauldron. Anish’s struggle for acceptance and
then denial of his identity mirrors the crisis of identity of the last two
decades of 20th century India; all of which made all the more colorful with
references to pop culture of those decades.
While wishing success to the impending noir films mentioned earlier in the
post, I hope it generates enough interest for some of the above stories to
be picked as well. It will quench a long-standing thirst and will reduce a
few stories that I dream about as movies.
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
i did my own take on red harvest once.. it was called ALLWYN KALICHARAN.. no one got it.
great post by the way..
great post boss
by the way anurag, what’s your plan with allwyn…want to take it ahead someday ?
Anurag what exactly happened to ALLWYN KALICHARAN?
Awesome post!!! I can’t help you with your request as to how to adapt these stories in a Hindi context, but I am very interested to see the responses.
I am curious as to your inclusion of Chronicle of a Death Foretold on the list. This seemingly has no noir elements, so I would love to hear your ideas as how to interpret the story in that fashion.
You should see The Humphrey Bogart/Lauren Bacall version of The Big Sleep – there is a reason this is an American classic that shows up on so many best film lists. Part of the reason the film is a classic is the chemistry between Bogart and Bacall. What two actors in India right now do you feel can generate that kind of chemistry?
I would love to see any of Vikram Chandra’s novels adapted by an Indian director before an American one. I am surprised that I haven’t heard of Sacred Games being optioned after all the hype it received here before its release. But, there are few directors here in the US that I think can handle the complexity of multiple threads while working within a different cultural context, and Westernizing the novel in move format would take something away from the characters, IMHO….
Did I mention this was great? Now I feel like staying in bed reading the rest of the day…
Brilliant write up Subrat….
allwyn got shelved because anil kapoor chose musafir over it
sorry to hear that anurag, but on a second thought, how can anil kapoor be the begin all and endall for a film script, that came from a person of your calibre….days might change after no smoking brother…you can still think of giving it another shot….!!!
i was an unreleased filmmaker ..and someone who was looked upon as dark and untouchable..and i wrote it for him then..film was shelved six days before shoot was to begin
Sorry,.. Out of the subject,..
but i really want to see “Dark City” by Alex Proyas
,.. in Retro Mumbai style,..(In Black & White)
Firstly, I’m amazed that Marquez’ ‘Chronicle as a Death Foretold’ should make it to the category of film noire. There is some serious problem with respect to the understanding of the genre. Or so it seems to me.
Secondly, I’m at a loss – my loss entirely? – to understand what it is that makes CODF such a great novel. Marquez remains a highly overrated writer and it is about time we emerged from this unquestioning adulation and blind bhakti-baav for him. In fact, it is about time we called his bluff in inconsequential novels such as CODF. (I do not wish to mix genres – but honestly, is he anywhere near our unsung Phanishwar Renu?)
As for CODF, there is absolutely no drama in the novel for it to make it as a successful film. It lacks a tangible hermeneutic code. For instance, where in the film did you see the ‘conspiracy’ as a ‘conspiracy’ and if it was indeed a ‘conspiracy’, what was so ‘remarkable’ about it? And yes, where did you bump into the ‘morbid fascination of the crowd’ with the murder? In fact the only saving grace of the novel is something that you gloss over completely – the fact that Bayardo San Roman is an outsider; Santiago is almost an outsider; so is the state machinery. CODF is like an onion – all peel and no core. It is not a novelette about any great spiritual anxieties. It comes across as an act of stolid jounalese – dull, boring and even pretentitious.
very good post, thanx… got to catch up on a few
Interesting post, Subrat. Would love to see some of these as films.
Panini, ‘Chronicles’ might be magic realism or whatever but it’s the treatment; interpretation of characters and story as well as the visual style (once made into a film) that could take it into the noir zone.
For that matter, one could do Hammett or Chandler in a non noir manner.
Fab post, Subrat. And great to see Vikram Chandra in there! ‘Kama’ is one of my fave (long)short stories and has huge cinematic potential…the air of suspense (via a murder mystery), the brimming eroticism (as you describe), the darkness behind closed doors (of seemingly ordinary, middle-class folk), personal demons and the like, set against a brooding monsoon are all deliciously noir. And then there’s Sartaj Singh – a very compelling, charismatic, well-fleshed and well-liked character, a cult figure almost with his own fans, so much so that Chandra brought him back in a full length novel. Not sure which director could do justice to this story though…but definitely someone who can paint Mumbai in all it’s murky colours. Will check out the rest of your list – thanks for that.
“i was an unreleased filmmaker ..and someone who was looked upon as dark and untouchable..and i wrote it for him then..film was shelved six days before shoot was to begin”
You’re not an unreleased filmmaker anymore, Anurag, and Anil Kapoor is not the only actor in India. Times are also changing, as you yourself keep saying. And as Raj said, you can try again with someone else. Don’t let one person’s choice affect yours. If nothing else, I have learnt that much this year…
The above shoulda read: “Don’t let one person’s ACTIONS affect yours…”
well today if i make it it will look like a derivative of sin city..what i wanted to do then was based on red harvest to be shot like the sincity graphic novel but in colour..its frustrating ..lets close the topic now..then there wasn’t anybody going there.. i made anil read the graphic novels..when he didn’t get it, i showed him a fistful of dollars to tell him that it’s an adaptation of red harvest and he said he already has done joshilaay..it’s a different story.. today the whole world is doing it..
it’s like paanch..when it was made..there was no dil chahta hai, company, kaante.. nothing..
top film of the year was kya kehna.. kaho na pyar hai..
today it looks like a juvenile derivative film..
it’s all about timing
“it’s all about timing” that’s the bible, sir!
Navdeep,
That was interesting.
I agree that division across genres is possibly no longer tenable. We are living in different times. Anything is possible.
Stalker can be made as a light comedy – in fact a vudeville. After all RGV’s crane swoops down the corrugated tin roof down to a hapless Big B(ee) – sucking Nishabd into the genre of horror films. So you see I agree!
Come now, Panini.
You’re just being facetious.
There are great examples of cross genre film making and I think it’s fertile ground.
Stalker as vaudeville? Hmmm ..Can we have some people in black face?
Anurag –
You can always rewrite the screenplay and the treatment, try something different with Allwyn. The title itself is so bloody interesting. After all, it has ‘win’ and ‘kali’ (goddess) in its name.
>-
“Love and Longing” is one thing, but what I’d really love to see onscreen is “Sacred Games.” Don’t see how it could be done as a movie of ‘just’ 2 -3 hours, but imagine the possibilities of a miniseries, wow.
Anurag,
I am one of those few who was eagerly looking forward for Allwyn Kaalicharan. Just the first look of it gave so much promise. It is very sad to hear that it wont be possibly made now. I do understand your point when you say that the time at which it was conceptualised is not applicable now.
Anyway, looking forward for No Smoking.
Wow! One day is a long time on PFC.
Anurag – Fascinating background to Allwyn Kalicharan and it’s entirely our loss that it has got shelved. I am sure you have many other stories waiting to be told.
DPac, Raj, suchita, night – I am glad that you liked the post.
t! – Thanks for strongly recommending the Bogart version of The Big Sleep. It is been on my shopping list and I hope I will get around to seeing it sometime soon.
Navdeep – I wish you the best for Manorama – SFU.
Panini – Thanks for your critique and I agree with you that I am not the foremost authority on what constitutes noir. I haven’t claimed that these novels by themselves belong to the category of noir. As I have written in the first paragraph, noir is a cinematic genre that I use most often to imagine these stories as movies. Now why choose CODF, I think (purely personal opinion and open to debate) it has the elements which a film-maker can use for a noir (may be a different post on it) and I guess Navdeep captures it well in his comment.
Regarding your views on Marquez, I hear you when you call CODF as a piece of stolid journalese. It is the oldest bit of criticism of Marquez. Appreciating literature is an indvidual choice so I understand your personal disappointment with him but let some of us remain the ‘blind bhakts’ that we want to be. The one part of your comments that surprised me was the ‘…lacks a tangible hermeneutic code.’ I think appreciating Marquez does require us to have a sense of social and cultural context of the countries and times that he wrote in. We need to have a hermeneutic code too to appreciate him.
Thanks for sharing your passionate views on the topic.
Filmiholic, night and t! – Yes, I agree with you. Sartaj Singh and Sacred Games are ripe movie material. We live in hope
- S
@ anurag..when can we see allwyn kalicharan…had been hearing abt it for long…cnt even recount..the name always wants me to watch..dunno when.
Anurag – I remember you also planned a sequel called Always Kalicharan..It was so trippy…:)
This is 2 assure u there are people are still waiting to watch both.
Brilliant writeup! I would like to suggest some more noir classics for the list namely A Touch of Evil,
The Lady from Shanghai, The Stranger, The Third Man and Journey in to Fear all made by or starring the
genius Orson Welles. Hitchcock’s Shadow of A Doubt and The Wrong Man. These are pure pleasures which
never fail to work.
How I wish Vijay Anand had made more noir films, his Jewel Thief. Johnny Mera Naam and Teesri Manzil
stand out among the best noir films ever made.
great post .. too good…
Anurag, I remember interviewing you on the launch of Allwyn Kalicharan, it was Le’ Meredien in Delhi and the launch was on the top floor, I think u were wearing black dress, and Anil Kapoor told me that he was excited to be in that futuristic movie…. if the stage was so nicely set then why did it didn’t took off? cant u again try to take the movie to floor? I am sure u gonna get few big investors after ‘ No Smoking”
I am all for adapting the sixth story.
Tushar: yes, why not!!
Subrat,
A google on ‘Acceptance of denial’ only brings up this post itself. Who is it published by?
To reading session rakhte hain ek. I would prefer if we keep one hour for brief on the author
Navdeep, its a Noire story of its own.
Navdeep – sorry, didn’t see your comment earlier. I will take this offline with you
That was fantastic! I enjoyed reading all of that… In fact I’ve spent the past few months looking for a short story for a 10min fiction film… I have decided on adapting one by Shashi Deshpande…maybe you could add her to this list!
Waiting to read more!
Cheers:-)
This is a general question…
How can I watch Manorama and No Smoking- they’re both out of the theatres. Piracy at Palika Bazar or something else? Also how do relatively new film makers like us share our films with you guys?
Thought you might enjoy perusing my list of classic novels, perhaps especially the genre ones.
How many times have I thought about this (at Noir Stories Waiting to be Adapted : PassionForCinema)? This is a great article and I appreciate the thought you put into it. Thanks!!