Alfred L. Werker

Watching movies of the same ilk as Shock asks a lot out of some viewers. The reasons why such films can be so testing is not because they partake in deep, psychological horror or invite viewers to ponder complex queries about themselves and life itself, but rather because the scripts and delightful direction embellish the ludicrousness of the concept.

He Walked by Night can lumped into a very special category of film noir. As elaborated in their simply title book, Film Noir (Alain Silver, James Ursini, Film Noir, Taschen, 2004), there exists a sub-movement within noir recognized as docu-noir, wherein the filmmakers go about telling stories based on real life events (as well have German expressionism marry Italian neo-realism, but that is another discussion for another article)