Considering Fundamental Characteristics of Tech-noir Cinema

Tech-noir cinema emerged as the combination of Noir film and science-fiction genre in 1980s. Noir film, which was one of the main currents of American cinema in 1940s, was influenced by detective fiction of American literature and expressionist cinema of Germany in plot and form respectively. In 1970S and 1980s, because of artistic and social currents, there was a ground to return to Noir; so Neo-noir developed with some nuances than noir. The prevalence of postmodernism and postmodern characteristics in art such as referring to past which was common during those years in American cinema, were of those factors that helped the advent of Neo-noir. From the late 70s, concerns and skepticisms towards technology and media as facilities to improve human’s life increased. On the other hand, consequences such as destroying the ecosystem and dominating role of media in people’s life regarding economy and politics emphasized. These opinions also found their way to cinema, which in synchrony with dark and dim world of Noir film resulted in the new generation of Neo-noir called Tech-noir. Tech-noir cinema also is one of the best instances to represent the formal features of postmodern art such as simulation, bricolage, and intersexuality; a cinema in which combination of genres and styles, and merging other arts and media with cinema are common properties. Tech-noir film, in addition to Noir film and science-fiction cinema, has great citations to Cyberpunk literature, Gothic literature, and ancient Greek myths which filmmakers of this subgenre create a new world and a different cinema by combining them. Not only the Tech-noir cinema is a proper example of a combination of genres and styles, but also reflects some of postmodernism key concepts very well. The frequent elements in this sub-genre includes dystopia- the world that is changed into ruins due to fearless advances of science and technology, environmental crisis and vital space, cyborg and concerns for human’s future regarding to increasing developments in genetic engineering , and finally, fragmented identity of human who is surrounded in picture, in the nostalgia for past and future. Accordingly, this study focusing on tech-noir cinema, considers how to reflect the sophisticated theoretical concerns of a society in terms of dramatic films such as fantasy and science-fiction. Specially, because this representation utilizing various artistic styles and forms of the past and present, in order to revive and maintain them along with today’s art currents of that society. To achieve these goals, some explanation about noir film and then its revival which is called neo-noir is given at first. Afterwards, tech-noir cinema and other roots of it including science-fiction genre, gothic literature, and mythological stories, are expressed. In addition, some elements like dystopia, environmental crisis, cyborg and nostalgia, are considered based on the viewpoints of theoreticians like Derrida, Lyotard, Baudrillard and Jameson. The accomplishment method in this research is descriptive-analytical and library data collection. Also, in retrieval of tech-noir cinema characteristics, in addition to refer to books and articles, the films which are named in books and websites are referred.