Le livre noir

True film noir, that densely urban, disillusioned body of work characterized by the deep shadows that separate the characters from each other and isolate them from society, was almost always set in contemporary cities... in France before WWII and in America after it. ALMOST... Anthony Mann's THE BLACK BOOK (aka REIGN OF TERROR) is one of its finest examples, a costume thriller set in the French Revolution, and somehow managing to create the visual style and emotional mood of true film noir in a completely atypical setting.

This is a film to watch for its cinematic, visual brilliance... The story is serviceable, but the experience it services is a thrilling piece of movie art. Photographed by the great John Alton (a man who, it is said, could re-light Times Square at high noon, if necessary) the frame consistently dazzles and intrigues. Anthony Mann's taut and claustrophobic work (rather at odds with the usual French Revolution epic, and with Mann's later work in other genuinely epic-scale costume dramas) draws a compelling parallel between the atmosphere of fear in post-revolutionary France and in mid-20th century McCarthyite America.