Liminal Space, Film Noir, and the Production of the (American) Suburb

Abstract

This chapter considers popular cultural representations and re-representations of suburbs as liminal spaces within film and television series. Such mediated (re)presentations of suburbia have a cultural impact on how people perceive, understand, and experience real suburbs. The focus here is on film noir and neo-noir, popular genres from the 1940s to the early 2000s, which constitute a geography of the imagination that have had a particular impact on perceptions of the suburbs. Over time, film noir/neo-noir directors shifted their gaze away from cities to the suburbs which were cast as spaces of transit in that people travelled between them and the city via road and/or rail. These everyday transit spaces stand as liminal spaces betwixt and between the city and suburbia. Drawing on a mix of classic and more contemporary examples of film noir/neo-noir – The Maltese Falcon, Out of the Past, Detour, Mad Man, and The Americans – liminal suburban spaces are central to modernity and the experience of modern life, more so in fact than the city itself.