Saturday, September 8, 2012
Women in Noir
From what we've seen in Double Indemnity so far, I'd like to make a generalization about women in noir. It seems that women are portrayed as femme fatales who lead the protagonist man astray. Such as, Phyllis has lead Walter astray because she wishes to kill her husband and collect life insurance money from his death. Walter wouldn't have planned to kill Phyllis' husband on his own without Phyllis' hints that she'd like her husband dead, in addition to Walter's own obvious attraction to Phyllis. It seems that in this genre, the women lead the men astray with their flirtatiousness along with their ill-intentions. In the film genre course I'm taking, one of our readings stated that the main female character is generally dangerous and has some sort of interaction along the same lines as Phyllis and Walter's interaction. Any other observations about female portrayal?
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The femme fatale is a major trope, yes. But remember there's another woman in the story!
ReplyDeleteDietrichson's daughter, Lola, is a character whom Phyllis does not like very much at all. She goes behind her father's back to see her boyfriend, who doesn't even treat her well, and Neff sees that. We see Lola waiting alone in Neff's car, anticipating a ride to the "rollerskating rink" to hang out with her friend until we realize she is, in fact, going to meet up with her boyfriend. I feel as though Lola could be a witness to the upcoming murder, or be in some way discovers the truth about the murder of her father. Lola has no control or stand in her life, for both her father and her boyfriend don't treat her well at all. Men are controlling over her, and though she seems to be a young adult, she has no ability to do what she wants to because of her over-controlling father. She is innocent (or so we think) and pretty helpless to a point. Like Phyllis, she is manipulated, weak, and a damsel in distress. Since Lola is Mr. Dietrichson's daughter, wouldn't he want to leave most of his belongings and money to her when she died? I missed the part about what he was leaving to whom, so this may have been mentioned.
ReplyDeleteI think Phyllis played the role of the damsel in distress very well. As we learned by the end of the film, however she was actually using Walter the entire time. I found this a bit shocking but it absolutely fits the idea of women leading men astray. It is also learned that this might not be her first murder. Lola seems to believe that Phyllis killed her mother as well. (Which I totally believe).
ReplyDeleteAs for Lola herself, she clearly was not leading anyone astray. I don't think she was completely helpless, however. I also think many of her boyfriend issues stemmed from Phyllis meddling. Lola was the only innocent character in the movie but also quite smart for figuring out that Phyllis is a murderer.
I've been thinking about this as I read "Rendezvous in Black" because most of the time the women are helpless, and are always so easily manipulated. Johnny is always able to control them any way he wants and none of them are able to escape him. Women always tend to be blinded by love, as if it is their only downfall. No girl can resist a man that gives her love and will do anything to have that. Phyllis goes against this in some way because she is not fooled by love (unless of course you believe her in the end when she claims to be in love) but love is her game and she uses it as a manipulative tool, yet loses control. It seems to me women in noir can't win when it comes to love.
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