Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #684161 in Books
• Published on: 1994-01-07
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 312 pages

From Booklist
This is an unusual anthology. It contains six hard-to-find stories by six masters of noir and the teleplays for their film adaptations, which will air on cable this fall as a series of half-hour dramas featuring such well-known directors and performers as Steven Soderbergh, Tom Hanks, Laura Dern, and Gary Oldham. Readers will gain rare insight into the process of film adaptation by being able to read both the original stories, which are scorchers, and the cleverly conceived teleplays. The effectiveness of various cinematic devices, such as voice-over and invented flashbacks, becomes apparent, deepening the audience's appreciation for the art and mechanics of transforming literature into video. But even without the teleplays, this would be an invaluable collection. James Ellroy's sizzling preface presents an invigorating synopsis of the hard-boiled genre and its "hot to exploit the apocalypse" practitioners, while the stories, by Raymond Chandler, Jim Thompson, William Campbell Gault, Cornell Woolrich, Jonathan Craig, and Ellroy at the top of their forms, are riveting: tough, edgy, cynical, moody, and poisonous. Donna Seaman

Customer Reviews

Crime stories.
Fallen Angels is an anthology comprised of six short stories. Raymond Chandler, Jim Thompson, William Campbell Gault, Cornell Woolrich, Jonathan Craig and James Ellroy are each represented by one of their works. Also included is a short but hard hitting preface by Mr. Ellroy.

Each of these stories was filmed as a half hour TV show and aired on the cable network Showtime in 1993. Immediately after each story is presented in its original form, it is followed by the teleplay used to adapt it to the TV format. In all cases, there are substantive differences between the original and the adaptation.

The book's subtitle: Six Noir Tales Told for Television is a bit misleading. Story number 2, The Frightening Frammis, was written by the legendary Jim Thompson, one of noir's grandmasters. Now I suppose it could be argued as to what is noir and what isn't. But this particular story (and it happens to be a good one) just does not fit the noir mold. Instead of the brutally stark and gut wrenching take on reality that is noir's stock and trade, The Frightening Frammis is rife with slapstick comedy and other way over the top devices. Interestingly, the accompanying teleplay simplifies the narrative quite a bit and in doing so eliminates much of the over the top material.

The most intriguing short story in this collection is the final one, Since I Don't Have You by James Ellroy. It unfolds over a two day period in the Los Angeles of 1949 and has as supporting characters two real life figures, Howard Hughes and gangster Mickey Cohen.

Fallen Angels is definitely a worthwhile read. It's particularly interesting to see how screenwriters must both add to and subtract from the original work of others to create a final product suitable for TV or film.