For a politique des auteurs of Crime Films

Crime was among the key film genres leading to the first debates of the politique des auteurs. The high regard of the critics of the Cahiers du cinéma for the work of directors such as Howard Hawks, Alfred Hitchcock and Fritz Lang, including their generic production, generated not only a novel understanding of these figures as auteurs, but also a new appreciation and ‘cultural capital’ for the genre itself. It is significant that the same critics turned directors at the dawn of the nouvelle vague immediately engaged with crime storylines for their first films (Vincendeau Reference Vincendeau and Spicer2006). The influence of American crime films on the nouvelle vague is perhaps clearest in Jean-Luc Godard’s debut À bout de souffle (Breathless, 1960), but its traces can be found in the works of many key French directors of the period, such as Louis Malle’s Ascenseur pour l’échafaud (Elevator to the Gallows, 1958), Truffaut’s Tirez sur le pianiste (Shoot the Piano Player, 1960), Jacques Rivette’s Paris nous appartient (Paris Belongs to Us, 1961), among others (see Vincendeau Reference Vincendeau and Spicer2006 on French Film Noir and its influence).

The fascination of European auteurs with crime narratives predates the emergence of the nouvelle vague, as exemplified by works by Jean Renoir and Luchino Visconti. On the other hand, the long-lasting impact of the nouvelle vague and its politique des auteurs on European cinema established early on a reflection on crime as an integral part of a certain kind of artistically ambitious cinema, linking it to generic narratives. This happened in Italy with the Rashomon-style detection featured in Bertolucci’s La commare secca (The Grim Reaper, 1962), in Czechoslovak new wave, with Ovoce stromů rajských jíme (Fruit of Paradise, 1970), an avant-garde drama film directed by Věra Chytilová, and in Germany with Fassbinder and his gangster trilogy (Liebe ist kälter als der Tod [Love is Colder than Death], 1969; Götter der Pest [Gods of the Plague], 1970; Der amerikanische Soldat [The American Soldier], 1970).

Arguably, the relationship between crime and the European New Waves developed because of three key reasons, which will also characterize more broadly auteur cinema’s engagement with the genre. The first is the urban dimension of crime-associated genres such as noir and gangster films. As Tweedie argued, there is a strong connection between the emergence of new wave cinema and the investigation of the modernization and commercialization that occurred in the city (Tweedie Reference Tweedie2013). The desire of the New Waves to show the Lefevbrian urban revolution (Lefevbre Reference Lefebvre2003) found in the crime tradition the perfect vehicle to reveal the radical changes then occurring in the urban social geography.

Second, and connected to the previous point, is the challenge for the first generation of cinephile directors to tackle the codes and conventions of one of the main international genres. Albeit easily associated with Hollywood, a crime tradition in truth was also present in different national cinematographies within popular frameworks (such as French poetic realism), and the new auteurs used it as a canvas to develop a new idea of cinema, building personal style and vision on a series of well-understood thematic topoi, such as that of detection and investigation (Kovács Reference Kovács2008, 99)

Finally, crime is, along with drama, the genre where realism features most prominently and offers an opportunity to reflect on social issues, ethical dilemmas, and the depth of the human condition. Such realism is, arguably, what separated crime from other genres in relation to ‘quality’ and cultural capital. It is also what made crime narratives so compelling for many protagonists of the European art cinema of the 1960s and 1970s. Films such as Visconti’s Rocco e i suoi fratelli (Rocco and His Brothers, 1960), Antonioni’s Blow Up (1966), Costa Gavras’s Compartiment Tueurs (The Sleeping Car Murders, 1970), Polanski’s Nóż w wodzie (Knife in the Water, 1962) and Repulsion (1965) blend generic features with a clear authorial presence and ‘vision’.

It is also noteworthy how the auteur framework became the main critical framework, pushing to the background matters related to national cinema and genre. As Thomas Leitch succinctly points out, ‘The immediate effect of auteurism was to stifle any systematic analysis of popular genres’ (Leitch Reference Leitch2002, 59). A fragmented approach focusing on the auteurs’ works was given priority over an overarching regrouping by genre belonging and territorial labelling. The already mentioned Fassbinder ‘gangster trilogy’, for instance, was not critically understood in relation to European gangster films or even German crime cinema, as the authorial dimension was considered overwhelmingly present. As we shall discuss more in depth later, the authorial view became so dominant that whenever directors managed to distinguish themselves within a particular genre, their oeuvre became ‘detached’ from the development of the genre in favour of a retroactive authorial understanding.

From an industrial perspective, then, such a tendency corresponds to the paramount role played by the name of the auteur over that of genre as both label and marketing tool. The understanding of the contemporary relationship between auteur cinema and crime narrative is indeed particularly revealing if we approach it from a commercial point of view. In 1990, Timothy Corrigan addressed the need to consider the persistency of the auteur in critical reception by recontextualizing it within ‘industrial and commercial trajectories’ (Corrigan Reference Corrigan1990, 46). In particular, this entailed the consideration of the commercial dimension of the auteur’s name, not unlike that of stardom.

What is interesting in the context of European crime cinema is how the business of being an auteur increasingly functioned as the main vehicle for a film’s reception and cross-border distribution. As such, the importance of the auteur became increasingly detached from the textual analyses of the films and associated with the commercialization of a recognizable directorial figure. The cosmopolitan quality of art cinema became associated with the marketing framework of the auteur/star, which takes place in an extra-textual dimension ‘in which their commercial status as auteurs is their chief function as auteurs’ (Corrigan Reference Corrigan1990, 48).

Arguably, such a cult of the director’s personality worked in two ways: it set a series of expectations for the reception of the films, but also transformed the cultural capital of directors strongly associated within a particular genre (Betz Reference Betz2013), retrospectively problematizing questions of ‘high’ and ‘low’ culture (in European crime cinema, the work of Dario Argento would be a good example). The move toward the extra-textual dimension of the authorial approach also led to a detachment from the stylistic (and arguably cinephilic) reworking of the genre.

The authorial figure became a catalyst for national and transnational public financial support to the production, in particular with respect to ambitious co-productions and cross-border collaborations and prestigious products through programmes such as Creative Europe-MEDIA and Eurimages. From this perspective, the auteurs/stars managed to transcend their national connotation and consequently contributed to the cross-border distribution of European crime cinema, de-contextualizing it from the national labelling (a contemporary example is the authorial figure of Michael Haneke and the crime narratives that dominate films such as Funny Games (1997) and Caché (Hidden 2005)). The role played by the auteur’s name in the cross-border distribution of films is even more significant considering their presence on the festival circuit, which is central to the distribution, promotion, and cultural capital of European cinema.

The Quality Crime Film

The relationship between film genre and auteur cinema is even more fragmented and problematic in the contemporary production landscape, particularly following the changes in cultural policies as a response to the financial crisis of 2008.

While the ubiquitous presence of crime narratives in contemporary European TV productions attracted wide critical attention and scholarly investigations, crime cinema has struggled to get systematically into the cultural spotlight. That does not mean that there isn’t a healthy production of European crime films, but, generally speaking, crime narratives seem to better dwell in the format of TV serializations, which travel across borders and generate the kind of critical debates that make up an important part of the overall DETECt Project.

The absence of crime films at the top of the European box office is conspicuous. In Tim Bergfelder’s recent analyses of the status and understanding of European popular cinema in the 2000s the landscape is still dominated by comedies, grossing well at the local level, and heritage films, including nostalgia and historical films (Bergfelder Reference Bergfelder, Harrod, Liz and Timoshkina2015). Other trends underlined by Bergfelder include the dominant transatlantic co-productions, the new development of parody films, the affirmation of animations and productions aimed at the family market, and the central role played by middlebrow films, thanks in particular to their ability to gather supranational and national financial support.

Therefore, despite the critical and box-office success of films such as Gomorrah (Gomorra, Matteo Garrone, 2008), In Bruges (Martin McDonagh, 2008), Un Prophète (A Prophet, Jacques Audiard, 2009), Snabba Cash (Easy Money, Daniel Espinosa, 2010), Victoria (Sebastian Schipper, 2015), etc., the role of crime films is still marginal and of difficult categorization, underlining rather the permeability between art-house and mainstream (in a way not dissimilar from middlebrow productions such as heritage or historical films) rather than presenting a clear generic identity (on In Bruges, see King Reference King2011). This is even more relevant considering the move away from the national context to consider a European approach. While there are examples of ‘genrefication’ at the national level (from German’s krimis to French polars and Italian mafia films) it is also true that those phenomena are increasingly rare in contemporary European cinema.

Like other popular genres, crime films overall struggle to make a theatrical impact beyond their national markets, in particular when not associated with an established authorial figure. As soon as they manage to cross their national borders their cultural capital changes, entering the realm of specialist cinemas, with their festivals, art-cinema theatres, and late-hour TV broadcasting. From this perspective, I argue that crime cinema is revelatory of some of the most significant tendencies of contemporary European productions, in terms of state support, relations between local representations and global influences, commercial and artistic aspirations, etc. A quick overview of the contemporary crime film production in Europe reveals three interlinked aspects.

First, the auteur increasingly works as a label. The prestige of the director is very much present within the genre which, in many cases, marks a starting point of their career (this is the case with Danny Boyle and Alejandro Amenábar, for instance). However, we are witnessing a lesser degree of experimentation in terms of textual innovation, with the director’s name working as a marketing tool for distribution deals, festival runs, and to attract financial support.

Second, crime films dwell between national cinema and Hollywood cinema. While crime narratives consistently appear in the work of recognizable European auteurs, significantly more so than other genres, the cultural reference of crime films continues to be Hollywood. This is particularly interesting, on the one hand, because of the persistent association between auteur and national cinema. On the other hand, the Hollywood references underline the struggle to establish a supranational, ‘European’ tradition within the genre.

Third, the emergence of ‘quality crime’. The central role played by national broadcasters in the production of European films arguably led to the offer of ‘quality crime films’, understood here as commercial productions with auteurist ambitions (King Reference King2016).

Quality Crime and New Forms of Authorship within the Genre: Spain

Spanish contemporary cinema represents an excellent example of the shifting relationship between the crime genre and the auteur label in a national context. Such a shift can be understood as a change of policies and state intervention in support of filmmaking, which led to a new generation of directors using the crime genre as a vehicle for authorship, and the consequent focus on ‘quality’ commercial productions.

Critics and scholars have not failed to notice the increasingly prominent role played by crime (and its subgenres) within the contemporary Spanish production landscape and its relationship with matters about the new auteur figures and national cinema. Ann Davies (Reference Davies2005), for instance, engages with contemporary Spanish thriller films by looking for the presence of national features in a genre dominated by Hollywood productions. She maintains that recent crime films and thrillers challenge the persistent separation between a Spanish national cinema critically understood for its artistic merits and the commercial nature of a genre which was critically considered alien in respect to the national production, ‘for the need and value of tackling the thriller when theorizing about national cinema’ (Davies Reference Davies2005, 175). On the one hand this can be obtained by considering markers of Spanishness in the plot and settings. On the other hand, however, it is important also to consider the ‘ability of the Hollywood thriller to enter Spanish national space’ (Davies Reference Davies2005, 177) and how this can lead to its ‘naturalization’. This asks for an approach towards national cinema which focuses on its porosity; on the ability to open up and adapt to external influences more than being crystallized and presented in a vacuum.

In this context, I would argue that matters of territorialization come into play, not only in films that reflect on the liquidity of national borders but also in the representation of different regional contexts and identities. The Hollywood thriller format, therefore, is adapted and localized, while it stresses different tensions between local and global, resulting in ‘an inflexible understanding of the concept of national cinema and how genres operate within a process of continuous transnational cross-fertilisation and evolution’ (Beck and Rodríguez Ortega Reference Beck, Rodríguez Ortega, Beck and Rodríguez Ortega2008, 12).

I would argue that such transnational cross-fertilization is present also at the regional level, embedded in a production system increasingly dominated by the competitiveness of the location markets and the access to regional funding. The contemporary development of Spanish crime cinema allows us also to grasp the ways the art–commerce dichotomy is framed in the context of a national cinema. Carmen Herrero (Reference Herrero2010), for instance, considers from this perspective the recent development in the Spanish subgenre of rural thrillers. Herrero aims to do so by following the critical model on Spanish cinema proposed by Jay Beck and Vicente Rodríguez Ortega, which suggests considering ‘the interrelationships between national cinemas, transnational media flow and genre as discursive frameworks for constructing meaning’ (Beck and Rodríguez Ortega Reference Beck, Rodríguez Ortega, Beck and Rodríguez Ortega2008, 18).

Looking at films from debutant directors, such as La noche de los girasoles (Night of the Sunflowers, Sánchez-Cabezudo, 2006), El rey de la montaña (The King of the Hill, López- Gallego, 2007) and The Backwoods (Koldo Serra, 2007), Herrero points out ‘the different strategies they have used to negotiate their ‘intermediate status’ between genre and European art film as a plausible model’ (Herrero Reference Herrero2010, 125). It can be argued that those strategies occur in the overlapping of different levels, those of text, production, circulation, and cultural capital.

The textual level pertains to the presence of an authorial style within the use of genre-based stylistic and narrative features. The production level (which we will discuss later) regards instead the kind of national and transnational support that these crime films receive, showing not only different degrees of ambition (with the employment of internationally recognizable stars, for instance) but also the direct link with the level of circulation; that is, the ability of crime film to reach a global audience, albeit through specialized channels. Herrero argues that the wide film festival presence of the three rural thrillers she analyses led to international distribution. For instance, she underlines how ‘the successful distribution abroad of Koldo Serra’s The Backwoods is linked to its exhibition at international festivals’ (Herrero Reference Herrero2010, 132). However, according to the European Audiovisual Observatory, the film had a limited theatrical run outside of Spain, which is surprising considering it is a tripartite co-production with France and the UK, featuring an international cast. It is also revealing of the position of contemporary crime cinema in the international market, considering that the three films analysed by Herrero met the same fate. Such a position overlaps once again with the authorial ambitions of the films and the ‘commercial’ nature of the genre and, looking at the distribution, manifests itself in three ways.

First, crime films are generally strong within a national market in spite of their international framework of references; it is more important to meet a national audience accustomed to Hollywood crime movies than to appeal to foreign audiences.

Second, the main chance for European crime films to cross national borders is through the festival circuit. When they travel theatrically, they mainly do so through art-cinema networks. The festival run adds prestige and cultural capital to the production, further establishing it as ‘quality cinema’, therefore contributing to the creation of new national auteur figures, which then function as a recognizable label.

Finally, and as previously mentioned, to be successful in international distribution, European crime films need to be associated with a well-established auteur. Such an authorial figure not only works as a catalyst for a transnational production (able to attract regional, national and supranational support) but attributes to the film a cultural, marketable capital supporting a wider international distribution.

Leaving for a moment the Spanish case, we can note comparable examples in other European countries. Italian director Matteo Garrone’s early neo-noir L’imbalsamatore (The Embalmer, 2002), for instance, had a very limited foreign distribution despite its selection by the prestigious Quinzaine des Réalisateurs at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival. However, his later film Dogman (2018), which to some extent recalls the crime narrative development of The Embalmer, was distributed in every European country. Considering that the watershed film for the marketability of Garrone was his global hit Gomorrah (2008), this once again confirms the centrality of the director’s name for a crime film’s ability to cross national borders.

A Spanish Case Study: Marshland

Within the Spanish context, Valeria Camporesi and Jara Fernández Meneses’ (Reference Camporesi and Fernández Meneses2018) work helps us understand the drive toward quality crime films from a production perspective. Looking at three Spanish films by Alberto Rodriguez – Grupo 7 (Group 7, 2012), La isla mínima (Marshland, 2014) and El hombre de las mil caras (Smoke and Mirrors, 2016) – one can say they engage directly with some of the features I have argued so far.

According to Camporesi and Fernández Meneses, the work of the independent production company Atípica Film, in particular in its collaborations with Rodríguez, is revealing of the role played by a certain genre cinema in ‘the overall picture of quality films in the Spanish film industry of the new millennium’ (Camporesi and Fernández Meneses Reference Camporesi and Fernández Meneses2018, 203). Camporesi and Fernández Meneses contextualize Atípica productions against the various changes occurring during the 1990s within the Spanish system of support for the cinema. On the one hand, such changes dictated a shift of the criteria to award state aid from quality to commercial cinema, shrinking the support and leaving the productions to deal with the competition of the global industry. On the other hand, with the law 22/1999 compelling private and public television companies to invest 5–6% of their annual income in film production, they tied the fate of the film industries to the needs of the broadcasters. The legislative and industrial changes of the 1990s therefore led to a new interest in genre cinema as a vehicle for the promotion and affirmation of authorial figures and to offer good production values.

Marshland is a good example of such quality genre production which manages to be commercially viable. Costing slightly under €4 million, Marshland was commercially very successful at the box office, earning €7,800,000 for 1,300,000 viewers in Spain (Camporesi and Fernández Meneses Reference Camporesi and Fernández Meneses2018). According to the European Audiovisual Observatory, it was also widely distributed in Europe, adding a further 576,000 admissions in its theatrical run in 18 countries.

For the production of Rodríguez’s films, Atípica relied on collaboration with television partners by teaming up with Canal Sur and Atresmedia Cine (the film production branch of the multimedia conglomerate Atresmedia, which also owns the private television companies Antena 3 and La Sexta), which provided 50% of the budget, designed the marketing campaign, and guaranteed national and international distribution (Bronte Reference Bronte2015). In Spain, the film was distributed by Warner Brothers España, which again features as a recurring partner in collaboration with Atípicafilm. However, it is noteworthy that, unsurprisingly, Marshland also received national and regional support, amounting respectively to 30% of the budget through the Instituto de la Cinematografía y de las Artes Audiovisuales (ICAA) and 5% through the Andalusia film commission. The film gained a plethora of national and international awards (including the European Film Academy People’s Choice Award for Best European Film in 2015), participation in the film festival circuits, and authorial recognition for its director (with critics underlining thematic and stylistic features).

What I would like to draw attention to is the marketing shift occurring in such generic productions. Arguably, European generic productions crossing borders tend to experience a change in their cultural value, even simply because subtitled films are mainly screened in art-cinema circuits, thus promoting a different reception, audience expectations and understanding of the product itself. Therefore, the marketing strategy usually changes from a primary objective of a target audience attracted by the genre to an audience of cinephiles, with crossing borders as a secondary objective.

However, for a case like Marshland, the marketing strategy moved differently. As Cristina Sutherland of Atípica films explains:

From its conception, the marketing strategy of the film did not prioritize the crime element and the genre to which the film belonged. The authorial art-house dimension of the film was a marketing vehicle, leaving the generic nature of the film to be exploited at a second stage, aiming at a younger audience, once the film established itself in the media.

What is particularly relevant, considering both the genre and the vast portfolio of films supported by the Andalusia film commission, is that Marshland is the only contemporary film present on the Andalusia tourist board website to directly promote tourism in the area, with a dedicated map of a route featuring the film locations.

While discourses about the territory underline the national belonging of the film and, again, link it to a national cinema of quality, critics in and out of Spain did not fail to make connections between the film and foreign influences. Spanish reviewers tend to apply an authorship approach to the film while international reviews focus mainly on the historical setting; there is consistent reference to HBO series True Detective, both in the choice of characters and the ‘Deep South’ location.

What is interesting here is again the need to reframe a European production within American references, virtually moving from very regional and national contextualization to a global cultural horizon that completely bypasses Europe and its long tradition of auteur-crime production/‘quality crime’. This is particularly important as the critical failure to do so means a missed opportunity to create the kind of links, connections and transnational influences that would allow for an understanding and a conceptualization of crime film as part of a European popular cinema. In this way, again crime is understood within an authorial framework and against the backdrop of global/North American influences.

Crime Film and a Small Nation Cinema: Northern Ireland

The production shift witnessed in Spain can be also seen, to different degrees, across European cinematographies, following the increased involvement of broadcasters in film production and the renewed centrality of film festivals as a way to access foreign markets. Germany, Denmark, Italy, Belgium and France, among others, have shown similarities with the production and cultural context described in relation to Spain. Crime not only frequently recurs in the transnational work of established auteurs (Claire Denis, Lars von Trier, Michael Haneke, etc.) but is also a commercially conscious first step in the career of promising debutants. The crucial involvement of broadcasters at the early production stage, alongside pre-sales agreements and the reliance on soft money (in particular at national and regional levels), makes the genre the most viable encounter between commercial sustainability and artistic ambition, reshaping some of the debates surrounding an understanding of national cinema (on the Hollywood influence on the understanding of national cinema, see Schlesinger Reference Schlesinger, Hjort and MacKenzie2000).

In this scenario, I would argue that the case of Northern Irish Cinema is noteworthy as it offers a different perspective on such debates, in particular in relation to Spain. Very different in size of population and cinematic output, the Northern Ireland screen industries experienced a quick development thanks to the country’s ability to attract inward investment and runaway productions. Within a few years, the small country hosted a series of productions such as City of Ember (Gil Kenan, 2007) and HBO’s Game of Thrones (2009–2019), which allowed the expansion or creation of studio facilities, the showcasing of a wide array of locations, and the possibility of training local crews to meet the skill-set demands of the globalized industry.

The national film commission (Northern Ireland Screen) managed, through a series of ambitious strategic plans, to put the small country on the global production map by offering a series of pull factors based on locations, studio space, and funding. As John Hill argues, the Northern Ireland Film Commission 2001 strategy document entitled, ‘The most powerful industry in the world’, made clear that the core policy objectives were industrial in character (Hill Reference Hill2006, 182) aiming at creating new jobs, attracting investments and shaping a positive image for Northern Ireland in a way that can contribute to building confidence in all sectors. These production policies work alongside the 2007 introduction of a Cultural Test for British films to access the generous tax relief scheme. Such a test, according to Hill, arguably marked the shift from cultural to economic objectives as its definition of ‘national’ (based on a point system, looking at the crew, story, settings, language, etc.) encourages the presence in the territory of transnational Hollywood productions.

The result of pull factors and production policies in Northern Ireland creates a general uncertainty around the development of indigenous productions and the definition of a Northern Irish cinema. On the one hand, the inward investments and economic returns lead to political support for the industry, considered as an economic driver. Moreover, the unprecedented development of infrastructures and local-crew skill-sets is surely attributable to the successful establishment of the country as a production hub. On the other hand, the presence of runaway international productions represents an impossible competition that indigenous independent productions face in their access to crews and resources.

The strategy of Northern Ireland Screen (NIS), in this regard, seems to be to build an industry on top of a national cinema. To do this, development funds are crucial to foster local writers and directors who, according to the Head of Production, Andrew Reid, is what national cinema is really about (Reid Reference Reid2015). In this context, it is interesting to address the presence of crime narratives as a strategic basis for the establishment of a viable national cinema. Among the projects awarded by the NIS development fund, two crime films in particular have been supported by the film commission from the early inception up to the final stages of production. These, I argue, set the tone of the kind of indigenous cinema the small country can aspire to.

Bad Day for the Cut (2017), directed by Chris Baugh, is based on a screenplay written by Chris Baugh and Brendan Mullin with the support of Northern Ireland Screen, which also contributed financially to the production. The low-budget film tells the story of a farmer living a peaceful life with his mother until she is savagely murdered. Shot in Northern Ireland with a local crew, Bad Day for the Cut had an international film-festival run and was picked up by Netflix at the Sundance Film Festival. Arguably, it is now one of the more easily accessible Northern Irish films around the world. The universal ‘revenge’ story, alongside the Irish setting, allowed the film to strike a balance between a production able to transcend the national borders (albeit giving up theatrical distribution ambition) and quickly recouping its small budget.

While Bad Day for the Cut establishes a standard for a successful indigenous production, A Patch of Fog (2015) represents a clearer ambitious attempt to promote a marketable auteur. Written by John Cairns and Michael McCartney and developed thanks to the support of NIS (which again was involved in the production), the thriller is the first feature film directed by Michael Lennox. Lennox can be considered to be one of the most promising Northern Irish directors, following his Oscar-nominated short film Boogaloo and Graham (2014) which won an award as best short film at the BAFTAs (British Academy of Film and Television Arts). A Patch of Fog tells the story of an acclaimed Northern Irish novelist who is blackmailed into an unwanted friendship by a security guard. A true indigenous production (written and directed by local talents, shot with mainly local crew), A Patch of Fog premiered at the 2015 Toronto Film Festival and enjoyed limited theatrical release. It was mainly shot in Belfast, in less than a month, between 21 November and 19 December 2014, showcasing a series of key cityscape landmarks, mixing the modern and ‘traditional’ sides of the city.

What is noteworthy is that both films are set in contemporary times and move away from storylines dominated by the Troubles, the prolonged period of violence and tension caused by religious differences in Northern Ireland.

Albeit in this case the production was not financially aided by broadcasters or significant pre-sale agreements, these films present a similar trajectory to the Spanish case: ‘quality’ films, showcasing a degree of national features and international influences, able to travel mainly through festival circuits or broadcasters.

Conclusion: ‘Europe’ in European Crime Cinema

The difficulty in defining film noir according to textual and extratextual connotations can easily be applied to the more general crime category, in particular in the European context (Spicer Reference Spicer and Spicer2006). A definition of ‘crime film’ can rather follow that proposed by Naremore for film noir, inviting us to consider it as an intellectual category (Naremore Reference Naremore1998, 276–277). A category that in the European film landscape manages to be ubiquitous and absent at the same time, its presence being constantly overshadowed by matters regarding Art and commerce, Hollywood and Nation.

However, crime film’s presence at the centre of such debates makes it a crucial element in textual generic innovations and production and distribution practices. The European dimension is visible only in the art-cinema framework when the genre is associated with a well-established auteur able to transcend national connotations and to find an international theatrical distribution beyond the festival circuits. What is increasingly missing is a European and ‘popular’ designation of the genre. While scholarly works have generally focused on the need for auteur cinema to ‘adapt’ to commercial rules to become sustainable, little attention has been given to the genre’s requirement to aim for a ‘quality’ status to travel. The result is a problematic ‘genrefication’ of European crime cinema away from its ‘popular’ nature, a change in cultural capital that occurs even at the production stage and contributes to the difficult definition of the genre in a European context.