Episode 88 · Film year 1960
Shoot the Piano Player (1960)
Show notes
Edouard Saroyan plays piano in a rinky dink honky tonk in Paris when he used to tickle the ivories in the best concert halls. We see his fall from grace and into the icy hands of fate in this adaptation of David Goodis's Down There by François Truffaut.
Joining us from the streets of Philadelphia this week is Professor Richard Edwards who discusses the French New Wave, Goodis, and the nature of film noir.
Joining us from the streets of Philadelphia this week is Professor Richard Edwards who discusses the French New Wave, Goodis, and the nature of film noir.
Labels: David Goodis François Truffaut French New Wave Noircon Noirvember Richard Edwards
Watch
Links & resources
- Buy The Maltese Touch of Evil by Shannon Clute and Richard Edwards (opens in a new tab)
- Listen to Clute & Edwards's podcast, Out of the Past (opens in a new tab)
- Buy David Goodis's Shoot the Piano Player (opens in a new tab)
- Buy François Truffaut's Shoot the Piano Player (opens in a new tab)
- Buy Larry Withers's David Goodis: To A Pulp (opens in a new tab)
- Find out more about Noircon (opens in a new tab)
Related episodes
Episodes that share keywords with this one.
Alphaville (1965)
Shared: Cinematographer Raoul Coutard, French New Wave, Noirvember
David Sterritt, Cullen Gallagher
Day of the Jackal (1973)
Shared: Composer Georges Delerue, Richard Edwards
Ian Brownell, Richard Edwards
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
Shared: François Truffaut
Joe Alves, Matthew Robbins, Jim Bloom, Douglas Trumbull and others
Elevator to the Gallows (1958)
Shared: French New Wave, Noirvember
Nathan Southern, Jack Chambers, Jedidiah Ayres
Comments (1)
Anonymous Truffaut's sophomore effort was a New Wave riff on the film noir genre and an adaption of the David Goodis novel Down There. I saw the film nearly twenty years ago on 35mm during a Truffaut retrospective at the Cinematheque Ontario but it didn't leave an incredible impression on me, largely because I was being bombarded by too many films in too concentrated a period but also because I lacking in sufficient background information to properly appreciate what I was seeing. After listening to this episode though, I'm looking forward to revisiting the film eventually with a much better understanding of its context. Mike's guest on this show is a brilliant film noir aficionado from Philadelphia who seems equally adept at discussing Truffaut as he is with Goodis. Apparently, there's more episodes of the Projection Booth featuring Professor Edwards so I'm looking forward to hearing him again on the show. He also hosted his own podcast, Out of the Past, which I'll eventually dive into to check out an episode or two. Truth is, I need another podcast in my queue like I need a shard of glass in my epididymus but Goodis is too compelling a character to dismiss for such spurious reasoning. I'm also told this show didn't seem to generate a great many responses which is a shame because it's one of the better episodes of the Projection Booth to date. If you're a fan of film noir, the French New Wave, or both, or you're just open to listening to impassioned, articulate and knowledgeable characters discussing topics they understand extremely well, you should definitely give this one a slooshy.