“Don’t take everything at face value” is a common warning suggesting what is seen on the surface is not enough to ascertain the truth. Distrust, suspiciousness, and cynicism mirror the disillusioned and alienated humanity amid postwar America—motifs and themes that typify the noir genre. More specifically, Delmar Daves’ classic film noir Dark Passage (1947) chronicles the journey of a wrongfully convicted wife killer, Vincent Parry (Humphrey Bogart), whose face does not appear in the mise en scène for the first hour of the film until he receives plastic surgery to change his appearance. Consequently, a firsthand peripheral vision of Parry’s inner and exterior journey to clear his name coincides with the film’s unique narrative in which the events are told literally from the shifting first (i.e., Parry’s) point of view and objective point of view. His quest begins with his escape from a moving truck leaving the San Quentin prison. Not only does the camera lens become the actual lens of Vincent Parry, but it also provides a “third eye” for the spectators in resolving and unraveling the mystery behind Parry’s wrongful conviction as he runs away from the law and corrupt people. Through this, spectators are able to navigate inside the mind of Vincent Parry and the dark urban world that surrounds him. As a result, it allows for a suspenseful and realistic noir film that is unprecedented in its method of storytelling or narrative discourse, that is, how the story is told.
Suspense is immediate from the start of the film where Parry’s journey is predominantly told from first person point of view with some objective shots to clarify the setting. Through this, the antihero is literally unseen in the camera’s mise en scène and field of shot. The frame itself offers an eye-like vision of the world. The camera kinetics or camera movements emulate the visual movement of how Parry envisions the world—literally and figuratively. The narrative’s shifting point of view (especially through camera kinetics) in Dark Passage coincides with the Greek term mimesis or imitation, that is, narrative arts relating to “the observation and accurate representation of the contemporary world,” which enhances the film’s realism (Stam 15). In addition to this “imitative” narrative technique, Parry’s voiceover is used to help clarify what he is thinking and seeing.
For instance, the opening sequence of the film begins with his escape from a moving truck leaving San Francisco’s San Quentin prison. The sequence consists of a series of pans, horizontal shifts, and close up shots of objects that eventually function as unspoken language from Parry’s point of view. The narrative pattern begins with a carefully coordinated balance between objective and first point of view: an objective shot of a barrel labeled San Quentin with visible fingers gripping the barrel (an indication that Parry is hiding inside the barrel); first person point of view shot from inside the barrel rolling after falling out of the truck where spectators see a dizzying glimpse of the outside plains as it rolls down the hill; an objective point of view shot of the barrel making its way to a sparsely bushy region and then a cut to a silhouette of Parry removing his prisoner shirt; another cut to an objective point of view shot of Parry burying his shirt in the bushes; and a final first person point of view shot of Parry surveying his surroundings as the camera pans around the hilly region. The sequence ends finally with a close up shot of a wooden fence, which indicates Parry’s position behind the fence. This puts him at a vantage point where he can see a distant shot of the San Quentin prison and the police making their way around the bend.
Along with the sounds of the sirens signaling the police’s frantic search for Parry, Parry’s voiceover enters the sequence to ascertain his successful escape and to voice his next plan of action. He states: “In fifteen minutes I’ve got to start taking chances.” He needs to get out of the San Quentin vicinity and hitchhike his way back to San Francisco; however, this task is not going to be easy. From this opening sequence, spectators are clued into the film’s noir antihero: a “criminal” prototype “characterized by pessimism, self-doubt” and having a “cold, detached view of the world” (Thompson and Bordwell 234). They recognize his fear as the camera/eyes frantically follows Parry’s vision and it begins when he immediately jumps off the truck. When he makes it to an open road, he knows he must make his way back to the city, but he is faced with self-doubt and feelings of uneasiness. As an escaped convict, whom can he trust? What chances can he take? With these questions, the setting and suspenseful narrative are firmly in place for spectators to draw inferences and make predictions.
The framing along with camera movement sets the stage for Parry’s alienation and trepidation and, thereby, providing more insight into Parry’s apprehensive thoughts and feelings while using the first person point of view narration. Because Parry’s face is not in the field of shot, especially in the very beginning of the film, it helps spectators experience his doubts and fears as the camera focuses on the faces of the people Parry meets rather than Parry himself. Therefore, the new faces that come into frame, some altruistic and some deceptive, heighten the suspense, as spectators too have to discern whether or not they can be trustworthy. This is clearly illustrated when a driver picks up Parry on the side of the road soon after he escapes. The camera’s swift move from the radio announcing his escape and his description of having dark shoes, to a close up of Parry’s dark, soiled shoes, and then to the driver’s face filled with fear, doubt, and suspicion indicates a heightened tension. The language of the shots together, that is, the radio, the shoes, and the driver suggests danger and distrust. This prompts Parry to take action by punching the driver in the face until he is knocked unconscious.
In contrast, the second face Parry must confront is a young starlet who will later be referred to as Irene Jansen (Lauren Bacall). As the camera lingers on a medium shot of her face and body, it suggests that Parry is studying her motives to help him. Thus, the sustained shot indicates interest and his willingness to take her at her word—as she also appears coolheaded and assuring. Since there are no abrupt camera movements between face and object, spectators can infer that he is willing to accept her help. Although he is apprehensive at first, especially when the camera cautiously and slowly moves vertically upward to indicate that Parry is about to run away, she is able to convince Parry to trust her, especially after she surprises him by addressing him by his name. Even Parry wants to know how she knows him.
Thus, the static first person point of view shot reveals Parry’s willingness to trust Irene. For Parry, judgment calls are always in effect—not just for the antihero but also for the spectators as well. Such effect keeps the spectators engaged in Parry’s unsettling and unpredictable predicament, which is clearly illustrated in the narrative relationship between the mise en scène, camera movements, and camera position. Although Parry is not visible in the field of shot or mise en scène, the technique offers a deeper exploration of his challenging predicament in trying to solve his wife’s murder without getting caught. Through this, spectators are left to rely on their understanding of how the first person point of view narrates the story, figuratively and literally, through the combined efforts of Parry’s (voiceover) and the moving camera’s lens that also functions as Parry’s vision. In effect, spectators are able to walk in the character’s shoes, which, again, enhances the film’s realism, as it “relays truthful representations of everyday life” (Stam 72). The meticulous camera work that corresponds to Parry’s thoughts, feelings, and visions authenticate his challenging plight—especially from a spectator’s visual and emotional standpoint.
Suspense continues to heighten when two conflicts correspond with the film’s objective and first person point of view: man versus society conflict and man versus himself. Parry is in a society that is untrustworthy, self-absorbed, and quick to rebuke. Such typical noir plot also underscores Parry’s troubling world filled with emotional anxiety—as he meets people who do not fit into such prototype. For instance, the question still lingers on whether or not Irene is trustworthy. In other words, can he continue to take her altruism at face value? Is she really sincere when she tells him that she wants to help him because he got a “raw deal” when it came to his conviction? The answer to the question is discovered when Irene continues to serve as his accomplice. She eventually invites Parry to her apartment to help hide him from the law. When she leaves him by himself, he is able to figure out what is behind her motives by searching through her belongings. This is where the first person point of view is used to explore character motivation and character traits. When Parry snoops around Irene’s bedroom, the camera pans around her bedroom and then pauses for close up shots of the contents inside her drawers. Parry’s voiceover reveals his thoughts on what he discovers. He notices that she is tidy and neat. He then discovers a scrapbook and inside the scrapbook are article clippings of Irene’s father who died in jail. His incarceration was due to the murder of his father’s wife, Irene’s stepmother. The lingering close up shot of the newspaper article allows the spectators to read along with Parry. From this, it is easy to infer that Irene is no femme fatale, but an honest Samaritan whose motivation to help Parry stems from past sentiments of a family tragedy. Thus, if Irene is not the femme fatale, then who is? This is another suspenseful question that the spectators must find out while they take the journey with Parry.
When Madge (Agnes Moorehead) begins to knock on Irene’s door while Irene leaves Parry alone in the apartment, Parry immediately recognizes the voice, which alarms him—another gripping moment, which is enhanced by the first person point of view narration. Parry states “that is Madge’s voice” in his voiceover. The camera moves towards the door that ends with a close up shot of the peephole. Parry does not peek through it, but the scene cuts to a close up shot of Madge’s face. Behind the door, Parry tells her to go away. Later, the camera partially spins around, moves up the stairs, and then towards the bedroom window. Parry peeps between the venetian blinds and watches Madge go to her car. He states: “take a good look Madge.” From this sequence, the first person point of view reveals Parry and Madge’s strained and hostile relationship. They actually have a history. But what type of history? Although Madge does not have the sexual lure of the femme fatale, she is fatale in her suspicious and untrustworthy nature that threatens Parry’s innocence, which is underscored by the camera’s sustained shot of her eager and intrusive look.
The first person point of view shifts to objective point of view after Parry’s plastic surgery to alter his face, which ironically deepens his trouble with the law. As a result, the shift does not take away from the film’s realism—instead it enhances it—as it sheds more light on Parry’s troubling internal and external conflicts and draws emphasis on the suspense. Parry is now placed in the field of shot as well as mise en scène—although his face is concealed with bandages. Because he cannot speak with the bandages wrapped around his face, his voiceover, again, helps narrate the story. For instance, when he returns to his friend, George’s (Rory Mallinson) home, he sees his body lying on the ground. Spectators must pull together what is happening in the scene and what is actually happening inside Parry’s mind. In the field shot, he examines the body of his friend on the floor next to his trumpet—the murder weapon. Parry immediately realizes that he is in more danger when his best friend is killed since he was the last to see him. He states: “They’ll say I killed you George. Just like they said I killed my wife.” Thus, it would be another murder for Parry, which will eventually exacerbate his trouble with the law.
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When Parry’s new face is revealed, the camera follows Parry in the shadowy, damp streets of San Francisco—a convincing picture of a noir downtrodden world. It “appears” unmanipulated that often looks haphazard and not aesthetically polished (Gianetti 4). In essence, the world imitates real life. The “impressionistic lighting” that typifies the noir genre creates an atmosphere that employs bleak cinematography, more specifically the chiaroscuro lighting, which is described as partially lit scenes and shadows of varied light and dark hues. The technique thematically and narratively is used to “depict crime, intrigue, and mental anxiety . . . . that gradually [gives] way to a bleaker vision of the world [especially from Parry’s perspective] and is considered “more psychologically ‘realistic’” (Schatz 113). Moreover, the objective point of view provides a visually expressionistic narrative style (especially on a cinematographic level). Spectators are no longer limited to what Parry sees. Rather, they are able to see the ominous surroundings—as the cinematography represents a cold, underground, isolating, deviant, and urban world. As Parry is placed within this metaphorical and literal context, it gives the spectator a thorough understanding of Parry’s challenge in endeavoring to survive in this mysterious and hostile environment—the type of world he is constantly up against.
For example, as Parry is in frame, more conflict ensues—especially when he confronts more enemies—thereby creating more suspense and placing the spectator in the same mental anxiety as Parry who must struggle with his decisions to trust the people around him. Spectators are able to survey his surroundings, as Parry makes his way around the ins and outs of a big city. But what makes this more suspenseful is the dramatic irony, that is, spectators know he is being watched, whereas, Parry, at times, is oblivious to this. This is where the objective shot intensifies Parry’s conflict with the world. Two examples illustrate Parry’s mental anxiety in a troubling world where mostly everyone appears to be after him: the first is the police officer who finds him suspicious of not having an overcoat in the rainy streets of San Francisco, and the second is the blackmailer who has been following him all along since he picked up Parry on the side of the road. Indeed, Parry is an intriguing figure to others. Therefore, he must be shrewd, careful, and quick to escape from a dangerous situation.
As a whole, the suspense and realism are enhanced through Parry’s “internal” and “external” journey, which is chronicled through the shifting of first and objective point of views. Parry’s decision to flee to a different country is indicative of his separatist attitude from a world filled with selfishness, corruption, and greed—the typical noir world where justice is rarely served. Although Parry never receives the justice he deserves, the finality is not far from mirroring the genre’s pessimistic and cynical commentary on humanity in general—especially in postwar milieu. And as part of the phenomenology of realism in cinema, “the point was not to invent stories which resembled reality, but rather turn reality into a story” (Stam 73). Indeed, Dark Passage was able to go far and beyond its own noir storytelling threshold that pulls its spectators into a narrative that depicts truth and suspense uncannily and convincingly.
Works Cited
Gianetti, Louis. Understanding Movies. 9th edition. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 2002.
Schatz, Thomas. Hollywood Genres: Formulas, Filmmaking, and the Studio System. New York: McGraw-Hill Inc., 1981.
Stam, Robert. Film Theory. New York: Blackwell Publishers, 2000.
Thompson, Kristin and Bordwell, David. Film History: An Introduction. New York: McGraw-Hill Inc., 2003.
A realist theory application essay written for Film Criticism and Theory course on October 23, 2014
© 2014 by MMReviews—Materials may be used freely for educational purposes, with proper attribution.