Author Archive: Retro

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The Making and Unmaking of the Femme Fatale

The Maltese Falcon (1941)

Often considered the first American film noir, John Huston’s The Maltese Falcon features the femme fatale figure front and center, but not yet fully formed. The film opens on Jack Spade, P.I., played by a confident and competent Humphrey Bogart. His secretary enters his office and announces a possible client. She assures Spade, “You’ll want to meet her anyways. She’s a knockout.”

In comes Mary Astor, breathless and desperate, sporting one of several fake names her character will try on throughout the course of the film. Astor’s character embroils Spade in a tapestry of lies and deception, the primary structural role of any femme fatale. But Bogart’s no dope. The male hero is not quite ready to give up his privileged agency over the narrative. Their romance is always tempered by Spade’s distrust, knowing this woman’s act is deadly, and he’s not afraid

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