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The portrayal of women in film noir, and more specifically the term “femme fatale”, has been a topic of intrigue and fascination for decades. The subgenre of film has captivated audiences with its dark and enigmatic depiction of women, often casting them as seductive, cunning, and morally ambiguous characters.
- Walter Jones
- Brigid O’Shaughnessy (Mary Astor) in The Maltese Falcon (1941) “You’re good. You’re very good,” remarks cynical private eye Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) to the whimpering Brigid O’Shaughnessy (Mary Astor) in John Huston’s classic 1941 film noir, The Maltese Falcon.
- Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson) in Sunset Boulevard (1950) Gloria Swanson’s Norma Desmond is the ostensible femme fatale of Sunset Boulevard, but, as is fitting for a film that dispenses with many of the conventions of film noir’s classic era, that’s not quite the case.
- Alice Reed (Joan Bennett) in The Woman in the Window (1944) In the spirit of true noir romance, the slaughter in The Woman in the Window begins with a wink and a smile.
- Laura Hunt (Gene Tierney) in Laura (1944) Laura Hunt (Gene Tierney) is at first a pure apparition in 1944’s Laura, a presumed murder victim whose memory haunts the men who loved her, fiancé Shelby Carpenter (Vincent Price), aging libertine Waldo Lydecker (Clifton Webb), and even one who never met her at all—the gruff detective investigating her death, Mark McPherson (Dana Andrews).
The femme fatale is an archetype that appears throughout history in mythology, art, and literature and became a principal character in the hard-boiled detective novels and classic film noir of the 20th century. The femme fatale has been dismissed as a sexist figure of male fantasy but also defended as a subversive character who transgresses ...
- Lead List Editor & Writer
- Amy Dunne - 'Gone Girl' (2014) Is Gone Girl a noir? Not quite. It's a psychological thriller with noir undertones. However, Amy Dunne, superbly played by Rosamund Pike, is an unforgettable femme fatale.
- Phyllis Dietrichson - 'Double Indemnity' (1944) Arguably cinema's most famous and recognizable femme fatale, Barbara Stanwyck's Phyllis Dietrichson is also one of the medium's most celebrated villains.
- Catherine Tramell - 'Basic Instinct' (1992) Film noir evolved into the so-called neo-noir revival of post-70s cinema. The late 80s and 90s provided some of the best examples of neo-noir, with Paul Verhoeven's 1992 erotic thriller Basic Instinct acting as one of the best and most widely-known examples.
- Jane Palmer - 'Too Late for Tears' (1949) Too Late for Tears stars Lizabeth Scott as one of cinema's ultimate femme fatales, the (almost) infallible Jane Palmer.
Dec 5, 2019 · The femme fatale isn’t a trope that originated with film noir—you can make strong arguments for shades of the femme fatale in biblical Eve, Ishtar, the Sirens, Medusa, and Circe. Anywhere a hero needs a test or a scapegoat, you’ll find her. But film noir is where she’s best embodied and remembered.
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Feb 19, 2016 · The 10 Greatest Femmes Fatales in Film Noir. Posted on February 19, 2016 by Fanni Somlyai. Film noir, flourishing in America throughout the 1940’s and 1950’s, is one of the most disturbing of movie genres – is it, in the first place, a distinct genre at all?
