Synopsis of Jazz Noir: Listening to Music from Phantom Lady to The Last Seduction

This volume explores the strange and commonly misunderstood relationship between jazz music and the film noire genre. Jazz has been associated with crime and immorality since early forms of the music were heard in the brothels of New Orleans and the ganster-owned clubs of the 1920s. This association encouraged the use of jazz in film noir, a genre preoccupied with tales of anxiety and urban decay, which flourished in American cinema during the postwar period. Making significant use of archival sources and documentation, this book seeks to examine this collaboration , placing the films discussed in their proper historical context and utilizing an interdisciplinary approach that gives equal weight to the films - including such notables as Phantom Lady , I Want to Live! and Taxi Driver - and to the indelible music that accompanied them.