Nightmare Alley-Hot Take

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 Nightmare Alley (2021 US) A grifter steals a "magic" act and makes money off of it. Based on the novel of the same name from 1946. Guillermo Del Toro writes and directs this Best Picture nominee. It is classified as neo-noir and that would be fair since the 1947 film is solidly noir. I liked it but...I'm a noir fan and prefer the 1947 version. Don't get me wrong the 2021 version is very well shot, the color is lovely. It has the traditional high contrast and deep shadows of noir but I really saw little of the German Expressionism typical of noir. German Expressionism cares little of lovely aesthetic and more about expressing anxiety. The lines are incongruent and misaligned. Where is the order? There is none and that's the point. The lines in this film for the most part were too symmetrical for that and even the color wheel De Toro used was too symmetrical harkening back to Wes Anderson films that are so symmetrical its like ASMR.  Yeah it had contrast but overall was too pretty and not anxiety inducing enough. Cool, but not noir. My opinion of noir films using bright lovely colors and blacks for contrast is that its way too happy for that. Noir dances on the border of horror and drama not comedy and drama.  I enjoyed the film as the actors really went all in on these characters. I liked the Femme Fatale. Although, I think I disliked only one Femme Fatale ever. It did lose Best Picture to Coda. If it were me voting I would have marked this film down for not doing noir as it should be. Yeah I know. I'm one of those annoying purists that way. Find Del Toro's version on HBO and the 1947 version on YouTube. 

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