Crime film
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The beginning of the 20th century saw the arrival of film as a new medium. By and large, what people wanted to watch on the screen did not differ from what they expected to see on the stage or read in short stories and novels: the good and the bad things in life (clearly separated from each other); virtue and vice; human prowess and human weakness; sin and redemption; and, probably more than anything else, poetic justice, or iustitia commutativa, as it is called according to Aristotle, with everyone getting what they deserve. In this respect, the cinema has always served as a means of escape from real life, though a temporary one. This escapist function of both literature and film did not change substantially in the course of the 20th century: One still feels uncomfortable if at the end of a film the "bad guy" gets away with all his evil doings, if order is not restored, if justice does not succeed in the end. Subconsciously, an average human feels that if the wicked character is not punished, the film comes too close to reality and makes the person remember, rather than forget his inadequate life. The crime film has thus been a popular genre in the 20th century. Crime films have been generally adapted from other forms of literature rather than written directly for the screen.
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Adaptation of fiction into films
The problems
When film producers turned to novelists in their search for material to be filmed, they were soon faced with the difficulties inherent in adapting fiction for the big screen. The underlying problem is that two distinct literary genres clash if a narrative is to be made into a movie. It is comparatively easy to film a stage play because the dialogues are already there, whereas turning a piece of fiction into a film requires a complete rewriting of the material, a process referred to as dramatization or the writing of a screenplay. (But again, this is not our topic here.) Many fiction writers, among them authors of crime novels, went to Hollywood, stopped writing novels and short stories (some of them altogether) and started producing screenplays instead.
Compromised adaptation
In addition, thematic changes had to be made if a piece of fiction was to be turned into a film. As already mentioned, the public, with few exceptions, wanted their screen heroes to succeed. Financially speaking, a lot of money was at stake: A novel is relatively cheap to produce when compared to a movie. Those few authors who had written experimental novels in which the evil forces are not brought to justice were left with two practical options:
- They could refuse to rewrite their stories (or sell the film rights and have them rewritten) and disregard potential monetary benefits and fame.
- They could meet the requirements of the big producers, alter the storyline, include a happy ending and reap financial success and fame.
Several famous examples of tampering with the plot exist. One of them is Alfred Hitchcock's (1899 - 1980) film Suspicion (U.S., 1941), which is based on Francis Iles's novel Before the Fact (1932). Alterations of the plot are often due to external factors such as a particular actor's previous roles. While director Howard Hawks was filming The Big Sleep (1946) -- a classic example of film noir --, Humphrey Bogart and his leading lady, Lauren Bacall, got married, which resulted in the studio exploiting -- and cashing in on -- their off-screen relationship by adding several scenes featuring the couple which are not based on Chandler's novel. Eric Ambler's (1909 - 1998) spy thriller Journey into Fear (1940) clearly lacked a female part -- which would not have appealed to an average male audience --, so when the novel was filmed in 1942 the protagonist's wife accompanied her husband on his dangerous trip, whereas in Ambler's novel she stays at home and is only present in his thoughts (and heart). What is more, screen villain Orson Welles, who co-authored the script and co-produced and co-directed the movie, was given a role as Colonel Haki, the sinister police chief of Istanbul, which was larger than Ambler had originally intended it to be. Again, for some strange reason, the ending -- but not the outcome -- of the film is wildly different from the novel.
Faithful adaptations of crime novels
However, there are also straightforward adaptations of crime and mystery novels. Sir Peter Ustinov is seen by many as the definitive Hercule Poirot in several films based on Agatha Christie's novels such as Death on the Nile (1978; novel first published in 1937), Evil Under the Sun (1982; based on a 1941 novel), and Dead Man's Folly (1986; novel first published in 1956). As far as Miss Marple is concerned, the early films starring Margaret Rutherford were disappointing to Christie purists because a lot had been changed and Rutherford looked and behaved very differently from how Christie had sketched her Miss Marple. On the other hand, these old black and white films -- starting with Murder, She Said (1962; based on the 1957 novel 4.50 from Paddington) -- are good entertainment in their own right. Later Miss Marples, including Joan Hickson, who appeared in made-for-TV films, were truer to the original.
Crime fiction in television
The ever-increasing popularity of TV brought about the emergence of lots and lots of TV series featuring all sorts of detectives, investigators, special agents, lawyers, and, of course, the police. In Britain, The Avengers (1960s) about the adventures of gentleman agent John Steed and his partner, Emma Peel, achieved cult status. U.S. TV stations produced series such as 77 Sunset Strip (1958-1963); The Streets of San Francisco (1972-1977), starring Karl Malden and a young Michael Douglas; Kojak (1973-1978), with Telly Savalas playing the lolly-addicted police lieutenant; Charlie's Angels (1976-1981); Murder, She Wrote (starting in 1984), about the adventures of Cabot Cove-based mystery writer Jessica Fletcher, played by Angela Lansbury. In Germany, Derrick became a household word. And there were many many more. Hardly any of these series has novels or short stories as its literary basis; they are just fun to watch, however mediocre many of them are. One of the outstanding achievements of TV in this field though was the creation of Columbo, inseparably linked to actor Peter Falk. Just like in the novels of Francis Iles or, say, Patricia Highsmith (1921 - 1995), the perpetrator, convinced that he or she has committed the perfect murder, is known to the audience right from the start. However, Lieutenant Columbo's "just one more question" approach, his watchful eyes, and his careful investigation of all the clues available to him guarantee 90 minutes of suspense per episode. Columbo is the antithesis of a whodunnit: The thrill solely lies in the question, unanswered to the very end, how on earth Columbo will be able to prove the murderer's guilt.
Remade crime fiction movies
As a rule, remakes are a particularly annoying viewing experience. It is not easy to fathom why film-makers should want to film the same material all over again, especially if the first version is already good or, worse, perfect. When the talkies came up at the end of the 1920s, it was understandable that people wanted to watch a sound film instead of a seemingly antiquated silent movie, even if it were only a few years old. But there is no point really in remaking a film which has already become a renowned classic. This, however, is being done ever so often. A recent example is Hitchcock's 1954 thriller Rear Window starring Grace Kelly and James Stewart as the photographer with a broken leg who, confined to his small apartment, keeps staring out of his window and, gradually having metamorphosed into a Peeping Tom, thinks he has witnessed a murder in the building across the yard. The screenplay is based on Cornell Woolrich's (1903 - 1968) short story "It Had to Be Murder" (1942). Recently, the film was remade starring ex-Superman Christopher Reeve, himself completely paralysed after a riding accident. The remake, only loosely based on Woolrich's story, added some electronic gadgetry but no suspense.
In almost all cases, the remake is considered far less interesting than the original. The series of disastrous remakes is endless: Suspicion (1941; remade in 1987); The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946; remade in 1981, starring Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange; first filmed -- without permission -- in Italy in 1942 by Luchino Visconti under the title Ossessione); The Big Sleep (1946; remade in 1978, with the setting relocated to London [!]); etc. etc. One of the few notable exceptions to the rule is Kenneth Fearing's novel The Big Clock (1947), which has also been filmed twice. Compared to the first movie version (1948), the remake -- entitled No Way Out (1987) -- has nothing in common with Fearing's novel except the storyline. The time, the setting, even the characters' names have been changed. As under these circumstances the original title did not make any sense any more, it was changed, too. Still the film is a good thriller, with Kevin Costner finding himself trapped in an unlikely but dangerous situation from which there is no escape -- until the very last minute, that is.
Crime fiction adapted from films
Apart from remakes, maybe one of the few important things to remember about film and literature in connection with crime fiction is that novelisations are usually of inferior quality. The idea of writing a novel based on a film and its screenplay (rather than the other way round) is a stupid one and can only be explained with some unknown author or even the film studio itself trying to cash in on a successful movie. Anyway, if you have seen the film, there is nothing whatsoever to be gained by reading the novelisation afterwards (as it is based on the film you already know). If you have not seen the film, go and see it. Why should you want to consume the novelised version of the movie rather than the real thing? A case in point seems to be Basic Instinct (1992), a film starring Michael Douglas as a San Francisco cop and Sharon Stone as the seductive young lady with a penchant for ice-picks. Why would you want to read about Sharon Stone if you can watch her in action?
Other genre made into crime films
Crime in literature is of course not restricted to fiction alone. As far as films are concerned, there are innumerable original screenplays dealing with crime and its consequences. An example is U.S. playwright David Mamet's (born 1947) screenplay for the film Homicide (1991), which he also directed. Gold, an assimilated Jew, is a member of the homicide squad of an anonymous big city somewhere in the U.S.A. One day he is assigned to investigate the death of the owner of a grocery store. While on the job, he gets to know all the members of a family of orthodox Jews -- whose attitudes to the case, to life in general, and to God, make him reconsider his own place in the universe. Gold also has to deal with a group of militant neo-Nazis. A parallel, action-packed, thread of the plot revolves around a dangerous drug addict who is threatening to do harm to his own mother.
Crime plays and films
Generally, lots of films dealing with crime and its detection are based on plays rather than novels. Agatha Christie's stage play Witness For the Prosecution (1953; based on her own short story, published in 1933) was adapted for the big screen by director Billy Wilder in 1957. The film starred Marlene Dietrich and Charles Laughton and is a classic example of a "courtroom drama". In a courtroom drama, a charge is brought against one of the main characters, who says that they are innocent. Another major part is played by the lawyer (in Britain a barrister) representing the defendant in court and battling with the public prosecutor. He or she may enlist the services of a private investigator to find out what really happened and who the real perpetrator is. But in most cases it is not clear at all whether the accused is guilty of the crime or not -- this is how suspense is created. Very often, the private investigator storms into the courtroom at the very last minute in order to bring a new and crucial piece of information to the attention of the court. For obvious reasons, this type of literature lends itself to the literary genre of drama: There is a lot of dialogue (the opening and closing statements, the witnesses' testimonies, etc.) and little or no necessity for a shift in scenery: The auditorium of the theatre becomes an extension of the courtroom. When a courtroom drama is filmed, the traditional device employed by screenwriters and directors is the frequent use of flashbacks, in which the crime and everything that led up to it is narrated and reconstructed from different angles.
In Witness for the Prosecution, Leonard Vole, a young American living in England, is accused of murdering a middle-aged lady he met in the street while shopping. His wife (played by Marlene Dietrich) hires the best lawyer available (Charles Laughton) because she is convinced, or rather she knows, that her husband is innocent. Another classic courtroom drama is U.S. playwright Reginald Rose's Twelve Angry Men (1955), which is set in the jury deliberation room of a New York Court of Law. Eleven members of the jury, aiming at a unanimous verdict of "guilty", try to get it over with as quickly as possible. And they would really succeed in achieving their common aim if it were not for the twelfth juror (played by Henry Fonda in the 1957 movie adaptation), who, on second thoughts, considers it his duty to convince his colleagues that the defendant may be innocent after all, and who, by doing so, triggers a lot of discussion, confusion, and anger.