Our society today calls for total commitment to ourselves. Ultimate devotion to goals of wealth, luxury and power. In a world where people are counted as figures, on how much they cost or not, femme fatale will survive. And that ' s because she knows how to get anything she wants to. That ' s why contemporary world is the revenge of this specific stereotype. She can exist in cinema- let alone in everyday life- as a totally desirable character, no matter how lethal she may be. That intriguing characteristic is the paradox and, simultaneously, the explanation of the stereotype of femme fatale. And that ' s probably why people love and hate her so much … .
In addition, the last period of film noir movies, and especially the nineties , totally permitted to the femme fatale stereotype to go in front, to move to the fore of the story. Strong women do exist in reality but in cinema they are not that fascinating if they don ' t have an exciting but always mysterious past.
Masculine Side
Living in a man ' s world it was inexplicable for them to be something less than a woman. It's not socially racial, but more of a human reaction when loosing power. In the same sense, a man could never just admit that he is the victim and he can surrender to a woman, even if she is a femme fatale. The male protagonist is provoked to solve the mystery that she carries and that ' s exactly why he lets himself been allured so easily. Men are supposed to be the strong sex and when this power is being threatened, they have to find a way to get it back. The only way is to follow the femme fatale and reveal her. In fact the only way is to “ read ” her, to be able to make her " easy " to be understood, simple just like other women.
The paradox in the man ' s case is that even though they love the mystery a femme fatale bares, still under no circumstances can they tolerate it, at least consciously. They want to be able to “ solve ” this game, that they play, but in the same time they are in a constant battle inside them. When the evil and the good “ crush ” onto each other , it ' s the time when the femme fatale appears.
But the question is why do real men feel so weak though ready to enslave this untouchable dream of femme fatale? My though is that men love power and feel really victimised when they realize that they can just not have it all. The femme fatale is in fact the enemy, and the man ' s nature calls for constant winning. Being unable to be caught and in a way “untouchable ” makes men want her more.
To sum up, maybe it ' s a goal that men need to have in order to move on. My thought is like, if they succeed in captivating her soul that would automatically mean the end of an era. And if they did that, what would be the next to captivate? On the thought that a femme fatale - even though for sure would lead them to a disastrous path- is the ultimate “genre ” of feminine. It may sound peculiar but the utopia of enslaving a woman that was “made ” never to be enslaved for, is men ' s untouchable dream of always wondering “what if? ” . Subconsciously they would never want to make her theirs just because they would be afraid of the consequence that after a femme fatale there is nothing. To cut a long way short, it ' s like a vicious circle with no beginning and no end. Or even though as an excuse to always look for something. I would compare it with those who always travel around in a constant hunting of gold, even though they know that the possibility to find it is minor. They just need a new challenge, and a femme fatale is always a challenge.
Feminine Side
The stereotype of femme fatale has been more than a challenge though. The minute men think about femme fatales as a “ potential ” trophy of their strangle to gain them, the exact same time all the non- femme fatales wants to became one of those.
By the women emancipation and, especially, sexual and social liberation, the so- called “weak sex ” stormed into a world that was ready for them to just take it. The stereotype of femme fatale bears all these contradictive feelings. Femme fatales are not afraid of going and get what they want, and that " s the feeling that contemporary women curve for. They want this power, or even better they need it. Maybe it " s relics from the past, back at eras when men used to have the power and now women need to feel that they can do it on their own. But in a weird way. The most possible, at least for me, thing is that the femme fatale represents all these women who never had the guts or the methods, or even the chance, to make their lives better, so this mysterious, deadly, almost sadistic woman embodies their frustrated hopes and dreams.
