Generic Deductiveness: Reasoning as Mood in the Stoner Neo-Noir

To theorize the present condition of trans women under unprecedented historical surveillance, this chapter examines the ambivalence and erotic deflation of a “stoner neo-noir” cinema subgenre. This genre’s principles were sketched in 1970s noir revival movies (Chinatown, The Long Goodbye) and became a staple of later output (The Big Lebowski, Inherent Vice, Under the Silver Lake). These movies share a stoned protagonist (a detective, or “dick”) and a Southern Californian location. They also depart from traditional noir by emplotting mysteries that provoke speculations into the nature of suspicion, depicting a lethargic deductiveness that exceeds the mysteries delineated by plot. “Generic deductiveness” aligns the stoned dick, solving both a particular mystery and the mystery of reality, with the curious condition of the trans woman. The chapter also examines echoes and reverberations between the stoned dick and the emergence of a feminist critique of Freud’s abandonment of the seduction theory.