out of the past

Out of the Past stars Kirk Douglass and is an example of the film noir genre. It begins with a mysterious dialogue circling around the question "Where is Bailey?" 

The opening scene focuses on a trench-coat adorned, fedora-sporting, cigarette-smoking, tall dark figure who is coarse if word and deed. 

Tourneur utilizes stereotypical and archetypal casts of characters in order to give foreshadowing to the plot line. George Baliley is a tall dark man, who wears rugged clothing and represents a good-natured man who is overtaken by far more dark and evil characters dressed in luxurious clothes and living in penthouses. The heroine of the movie is the bright, innocent  Meta Carlson is the foil to the dark lady love interest Kathy Moffet, who ends up as the succubus that feeds off all the other characters of the story. 

The symbols and characters are extremely Jungian in nature, as illustrated above. But also fed off some strictly stereotypical characters such as the secretary who sleeps with her boss, and other men, being painted as very promiscuous.

The Narrative is circular in nature as it ends up  on the road as it began in a situation that springs  "out of the past."