TOO LATE TO DIE EARLY publishes comprehensive critical reviews. We cover Film Noir, as well as television shows associated with the Noir, Pulp and Hardboiled genres.
Along with the Classic Film Noir Period (roughly 1936-1958), we’re interested in sub-genres like Neo-Noir and Neon Noir, as well as “Noir-adjacent’ genres like Horror and Science Fiction.
Our Story
Beginning as a pandemic-era newsletter, TLTDE became part of Debtford Press in 2023.
Whether you’re browsing the Film Noir canon, or scavenging the internet for something decent to stream, our long form human-written reviews provide expert film analysis and unique critical perspectives.
Our Writers
For more information about TLTDE contributors, click here.
Our Values
At TLTDE, we practice literary formalism. We believe that art and artist can and must be separated. That every work of art is a unique absolute. That every text is a self-contained aesthetic object and should be interpreted as such.
We read closely. We interrogate structure and meaning. Our analysis is based solely on the inherent qualities of a given text.
We don’t concern ourselves with irrelevant externalities or vague moral notions floating in the fickle ether of our cultural present.
We don’t apply contemporary bias to art that was produced decades in the past. If and when we choose to de-construct, we do it with a chisel—not a wrecking ball.
In the words of Robert Pogue Harrison, at TOO LATE TO DIE EARLY, we engage in “the persecuted art of thinking.”
