Query: the incompetent hero--multiple responses

From: Leo Enticknap <[email protected]>

Interesting that almost all the responses to this query have cited
comedy films, apart from one which mentioned the Film Noir hero.

As writers from Frank Krutnik to contributors to Ian Cameron's book have
noted, the Noir hero HAS to be incompetent, thanks largely to the
prevailing, censorship-imposed standards of morality that existed when
the genre was at its peak. In fact, one of the striking features of many
examples is that the acts of incompetence that bring down the Noir heros
are often trivial, contrived and even less believable than the schemes
the act of incompetence compromised: I'm thinking Fred McMurray in
'Double Indemnity', Dana Andrews in 'Beyond a Reasonable Doubt', Tom
Neal in 'Detour', Robert Mitchum in 'Out of the Past' and Humphrey
Bogart in 'Dark Passage'. And in 'The Big Sleep' and 'Chinatown', pretty
much the entire persona of the hero is defined by his incompetence and
being out of his depth: both films begin with the detective failing to
realise that he'd been hired for a reason other than the ostensible
one.

Has there ever been a Noir in which the hero and the femme fatale
bump off their target, get clean away with it and drive off into the
sunset? I can't think of one.

The incompetence motif would also explain why feminist critics
have been attracted to write about the genre indisproportionate
numbers - they can't resist the opportunity to gloat
over images of deeply flawed men!

Leo

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Leo Enticknap
Institute of
Communications Studies
2.35, Clothworkers' Building North
University of
Leeds
LS2 9JT
United Kingdom
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From: alincoln.washcity <[email protected]>

*Mr. Roberts* and *Ensign Pulver*. Both have the Ensign Pulver character in
them, as played by two different actors: Jack Lemmon and Robert Walker,
Jr., respectively. . .
* * * *

From: [email protected] <[email protected]>

I believe the Goldie Hawn movie was "Private Benjamin" (1980). Also,
they're more modern examples than your student was looking at, but Michael
Cera (Year One, Juno) has pretty much made a career out of being an
incompetent hero, and Columbus in "Zombieland" (2009) is the quintessence
of the incompetent hero