Robert J. Maxwell The "rules" of the title aren't enumerated, as in "Rule Number One: Have Your Villains Smoke Cigars." The presentation is more intuitive but the connections between the sections are logical and linear.It's about the best documentary I've seen on the genre. The developmental approach pins down the origins of the moody, cynical, black-and-white films noir. They begin with the flight of German directors, technicians, and composers from Nazi Germany in the thirties, who brought with them some of the conventions of expressionism -- the stark lighting, the shadows, the sense of pervasive evil. And they borrowed their narratives from the plug-ugly pulp fiction of the time that appeared in magazines with names like "The Black Mask," where writers were paid by the word. It was hardly art. ("Somewhere behind me a .45 chugged and the bullet whizzed past my ear.") According to this production, film noir more or less began with "The Maltese Falcon" and ended with "Touch of Evil." Excerpts are plentiful and, with the help of expert talking heads, they illustrate the use of lighting techniques, directorial tropes, and even the some of the subtleties in the musical scores by émigrés Franz Waxman and Miklos Rozsa, nuances that I'd never noticed before.It cannot, of course, cover all the bases, so that we learn something about shooting on a shoe string from watching a scene from "Gun Crazy" rather than "Detour." Nothing about the French critics who were exposed overnight to American gangster movies and sang paeans to them. And it doesn't explain really the popularity of the genre or what conditions prompted its appearance in the first place. The heads tell us that people were disillusioned after the war. But the victory that followed the war could just as easily justify a string of happy-go-lucky celebratory comedies. In other words, who knows? BBC should be applauded. It's a fine piece of work.

amarv The music in background is the nostalgic classic jazz. Everything is in black & white. Matthew Sweet gets out of a car & says this "Dark, isn't it? You better get used to it. For the next hour, this is how the world is going to be. THIS IS THE WORLD OF FILM NOIR. It's a dark American place with a fancy French name. A place where the sun has died & people get buoy with Neon, where the only pleasures to be had are from bourbon & the satisfaction of knowing that life is a cheap little game in which everyone plays dirty". I immediately knew that the next hour is going to be a superb fun ride & boy! Am I delighted by the end of the programme.This BBC programme, narrated by Matthew Sweet, deals with the wonderful world of film noir. The word film noir invokes different things to different people. If I have to say 3 things that flash in my mind in a nanosecond, they would be unbelievable shadows, tobacco smoke & Put the blame on Mame. Isn't Rita Hayworth ravishing in Gilda? I would love to know the 3 things that come to your mind first when you hear the word 'film noir'.In the programme, we get a brief history of film noir & the things that make a film noir unique. Some of the people involved with film noir telling about their understanding & also walking through few of their memorable scenes. You could see the names of the people in the programme here. Matthew Sweet sure loves talking about film noir.Also in the one hour, there are scenes from a minimum of 25 films which makes you completely nostalgic after seeing this. I actually wanted to mention all the names of films in this but saw no point in it because this covers almost all of the classics.Coming to the title of the programme, most of the people have their own rules for film noir. What we have here are the following 5 rules of film noir according to Matthew Sweet.1. Choose a dame with no past and a hero with no future 2. Use no fiction but pulp fiction 3. See America through a stranger's eyes 4. Make it any colour as long as it's black 5. It ain't what you say, it's the way that you say itMatthew Sweet's ending lines for the programme were "In film noir, life seems to get cheaper by the minute. It's every man & woman for themselves and that's horrifying but it's intoxicating too because maybe a little part of us believes that that's how the world really is & that's why we can't tear our eyes from the shadows & why more than half a century later we keep on staring into the dark."This is a must see programme for all film noir connoisseurs. Seeing most of the stars of the film noir in 1 hour is really great. Even if you don't know anything about film noir, you could learn a few things about the wonderful style of film-making that is film noir.Warning: Since the programme contains many clips from so many films, some of the clips may act as spoilers for you if you haven't watched them. In fact I'm yet to see many of these movies. So I skipped when they were showing scenes from the movies that I'm yet to see. So watch with discretion.You know what I'm going to do now? I'm going to watch The Maltese Falcon.