The character played by Humphrey Bogart is not driven by an idealistic approach, but by the financial motivations that different characters will offer him throughout the movie.
At the same time, the main female character is usually the femme fatale type, dangerous, yet attractive, with whom the main male character tends to bond. This is not, however, the usual Hollywood type love story: the characters have a non-committal relationships and, like the other characters, are ready to betray one another if the situation imposes this.
In my opinion, following the definitions of genre and style and the discussion previously presented on this topic, as well as the main assumptions related to the film noir, we can argue that the film noir is a film genre rather than a film style. The main reason for this is the fact that there are several common characteristics of film noirs that group this type of movies into the respective category. It is not the particular way in which the director decides to express himself artistically or a certain particular interpretation of one of the artists that denote the film noir style. It is a whole category of such movies reuniting common characteristics as the ones mentioned in the previous paragraphs.
Further more, the film noirs are not a limited expression in the context of movies. There was a period of time when this type of movies was created on an extended scale and when this mean of expression was characteristic for many of the movies during the period...
The film noir was thus more than a style, much like a category and genre.
The common characteristics of the film noir are structured around those elements that form the common denominator for classifying movies, namely elements such as setting,
theme or
mood. All film noirs share similar styles in the approaches of all these categories. Following all the arguments presented, film noir is definitely a film genre.
Bibliography
1. Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. On the Internet at http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/genre.Last retrieved on October 22, 2008
2. Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. On the Internet at http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/style[1].Last retrieved on October 22, 2008
3. Characteristics of Film Noir. On the Internet at http://history.sandiego.edu/GEN/filmnotes/filmnoir.html.Last retrieved on October 22, 2008
Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. On the Internet at http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/genre.Last retrieved on October 22, 2008
Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. On the Internet at http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/style[1].Last retrieved on October 22, 2008
Characteristics of Film Noir. On the Internet at http://history.sandiego.edu/GEN/filmnotes/filmnoir.html.Last retrieved on October 22, 2008
