Discuss the character of the Femme Fatale both culturally and within the context of Film Noir
...arriage and housewife scenario and the roles in which women were meant to play. It was this change of roles and the growing male insecurities, which was a product of the latter, which brought around the femme fatale. The femme fatale was seen as a threat to normal life and also to industry, society and culture. It was this anxiety about the established gender roles and power, especially of women’s roles since the War ended, that a crisis of masculinity became eminently visible in popular culture, and is nowhere more marked than around the femme fatale. Mass market cinema has the unique ability, over any other medium, to reflect insecurities in the male image, and the fatale figure which combines sadistic and masochistic male fantasies is a powerful lighting rod for male anxieties. The femme fatal was in the forties and fifties far more dominant, more masculine in her ways and above all used her sexuality as a lure and weapon in order to get what she ultimately desired, this was in stark contrast to what her male counterpart was in Film Noir. The male (or hero) in Film Noir was quite simply a fall guy who (unwittingly at first) goes deeper and deeper into a nightmare which the femme fatale has befallen on him and the more he tries to get off this downward spiral the faster he falls into the femme fatales trap. No matter what he does to try and escape from her grip the more she holds onto him. She uses her sexuality to keep a firm clutch on him and also to get him to do as she beckons. This so called relationship between these partners usually ends up in a crime which in turn strengthens the bond between the partners and this even fuels their sexuality. However their relationship was never going to be permanent especially in the femme fatales mind and the male’s attraction to the femme threatens the demise of the hero and in turn the demise of the femme fatale, she seems to be more masculine and dominant than her male partner but still she shows a slight dependence on him to do as she wishes (this usually means a crime or sex). In the forties and fifties the femme fatale was a lot more sexually orientated than the censors would have liked, the Hayes production code was a big factor in this, the Hayes production code were rules and regulations that films were censored by, and since the femme fatale was using her sexuality to get what she wanted in an inappropriate manner, the writers and the films had to be clever on what was said and done especially around the femme fatale. The classic Noir fatale used verbal play and therefore she used words to produce provocative speech and images without actually breaking the Hayes code,(If I was a ranch, they would call me the Bar Nothing”-Gilda) which was a verbal mirror of her visual come on. This usage of words gave the femme fatal of the forties and fifties a slippery and unsettling power over the male gender, however in the Neo-Noirs of late the femme fatal has lost that power and it seems there is a blunt and naked quality to the new fatal which does not have quite the same powerful effect the fatale of old had. The male in film noir, unlike the femme fatale who seems calculating, dreads to look ahead into the future, he instead focuses on trying to survive by the day and if unsuccessful at that, he retreats to the past. This technique which film noir perfected emphasizes loss, nostalgia, lack of clear priorities and most of all the males’ insecurities which the femme fatale herself had bestowed upon him. This weakened male ego then became easily led, foolish willingly vulnerable and his nerve seemed to be just a shadow of the femme fatales, in this state the male was more servant than lover for he was doing as the fatale wished of him, and it is because of this our hero received and earned the title of a Dumb Lug. However in classic film noirs (Forties and fifties) the film industry didn’t akin to or allow a crime to go unpunished so the femme fatal no matter how calculating and precise was always caught in the end and on most of these occasions it was by the hero (Dumb Lug). He had managed to see what the fatale was really like (which was far too late to change anything anyway) so to redeem himself he got his revenge and the femme fatale received her comeuppance. The couples downfall seems located in their individual character rather than merely in their joint action. In classic film noir, the sexes do not complement and complete each other; instead, sexual attraction and the femme fatales power ignite a “destructive combustion”. The male in classic film noirs desire for romantic coupling with the femme fatale usually exceeded that of the fatales who only deployed false promises of romantic permanence to secure his commitment to her crime. Although the male is seen as a loner in noir films, his overall aims eventually include coupling and one of his primary problems was whether to settle with the token good girl, who seemed to be rather boring compared to the fatale, or to end up with the femme fatale, which he usually does to his regret. The fatale however seemed incapable of a permanent coupling and in some cases, of love, presumably because she loved only herself and money in which would guarantee a secure and comfortable future for her. At the time of classic film noir, and even today, the American dream was to have a home, family and security, and it is the security that the femme fatale is interested in, it seems that she unlike her opposite in the film intended to elude a family and a permanent relationship for it would have spelled (especially in the forties and fifties) the loss of her independence. The complete power of the femme fatal was only by seeing the complete contrast she had to the so called normal, feminine good girl who always seemed passive in the film. The good girl was the complete opposite of the femme fatale being that she was portrayed as a virgin and very feminine meanwhile the femme fatale was portrayed as a whore and masculine, even more so than the male who featured in the film. This contrast highlighted the fact that the male viewer should couple with the good girl for she will settle with a family and will also fit in to that scenario she also more than likely will be the passive half of t...