Dear Film Noir Fans,

Our latest update must begin on a sad note, as we observe the passing of two men important to the legacy of film noir.

The first is Richard Widmark, who died last month after 93 years of wonderful accomplishments.
Widmark was one of those actors whose emergence heralded something entirely new in the movies, something emblematic of noir but distilled into one performer--the guilty thrill of finding "badness" both sexy and sinister. Widmark allowed audiences to delight in his villainy, and American movies grew up a bit when he showed that a character could be simultaneously attractive and repulsive. That dichotomy was, and remains, an essential aspect of noir's allure.

Secondly, Much harder to take was news of the death of our friend Arthur Lyons, one of the great modern writers of crime fiction, who for the past seven years was the producer of the Palm Springs Film Noir Festival. Art came from a Hollywood family (his father was a well-known restaurateur) and he knew and loved show business, exemplified by the incredible amount of time and energy he devoted to bringing old-school stars to his annual summer festival.