Femmes Fatales and Hommes Fatals – renewing the archetype

By Ian Long

cool girls can be femmes fatales too - Rosamund Pike in 'Gone Girl'

​When I taught my Writing Neo Noir workshop at the London Screenwriters’ Festival last year, I asked the audience what attracts them to the genre.

Almost immediately, someone said, “it’s got femmes fatales.”

Which is true. But by no means all Noirs include this character.

And what is a femme fatale, anyway? How do we write about them in 2025? And more to the point, why would we want to write about them? 

And what about hommes fatals, their male counterparts? Do they exist, and how do they operate in stories?

This article looks at the figure in detail, beginning with examples from Noir's classic era.

At the end I list a range of strategies for renewing the fatale figure, along with examples of films which point the way.

phyllis and walter in 'double indemnity'

It's all about sex. Or is it?

In Double Indemnity (1944), Phyllis Dietrichson seduces Walter Neff into killing her husband so she can collect his insurance. She’s shown to exert a tremendous erotic power over Walter which overrules any scruples which he – himself an insurance salesman – may have.

But like many femmes fatales in classic Noirs, Phyllis doesn’t try too hard to mask her devious and calculating nature. ​

Walter sees himself as a tough-minded careerist, but his blindness to Phyllis’s real character (plain enough to the audience) calls this into question.

Maybe there's some kind of will to destruction in Noir protagonists? And the harmful potential of characters like Phyllis only makes them more attractive?

The lack at the heart of characters like Walter often seems to go beyond any craving for sex, into a kind of existential need.

Their lives are meaningless, hopeless, going nowhere fast. They need something to save them. But they're not clear what that something is, or what salvation looks like. 

In Thief (1981), protagonist Frank opens up to prospective girlfriend Jessie:

“I have run out of time. I have lost it all. I can't work fast enough to catch up. I can't run fast enough to catch up.” 

The fatale figure seems to offer the last chance for a potential future. But they only serve as a short-cut to obliteration.

It takes two to tango

This suggests that a fatale figure can’t exert their influence without a susceptible subject. Their qualities need to key into an existing set of needs and desires, just as a drug can’t work without the correct set of neuroreceptors.

So when framing a fatale figure you are also designing the protagonist - and vice versa. Like all protagonists and antagonists, but maybe even more so, they are reflections of each others' strengths and weaknesses.  

Their intersecting obsessions drive the story forward:

1) The fatale figure's obsession with gaining their (usually materialistic) goals.

2) The victim's obsession with the fatale figure (and, through them, with their own often nebulous objectives).

the seductive smile of the homme fatal - orson welles in 'the third man'

Hommes fatals

If femmes fatales exist, surely there must also be hommes fatals?

We don’t talk about them so much. But they’ve been in Noir since the beginning.

Harry Lime in The Third Man is an object lesson in the toxic application of charm.

Selling tainted penicillin in post-war Vienna – a racket which involves a callous disregard for the deaths of innocent people – he invites his gullible ‘friend’ Holly Martins to the city to put a writerly gloss on the operation.

By the time Holly arrives, Lime is dead. Or so it seems. Holly begins to investigate, but he’s way out of his depth (a typical feature of Neo Noir protagonists) in the corrupt snake-pit of the city.

Lime’s fatal magnetism works equally well on men and women: Holly is as besotted with him as Anna, Lime’s Czech girlfriend, who practically deifies him. Even though he has sold her out to the Soviet authorities.

And it soon becomes clear that Holly’s admiration for Lime is out of all proportion to any regard that Lime has for him. 

'Possessed' - joan crawford checks into the psych ward

​More hommes fatals in classic Noir

• Shadow of a Doubt (1944). Uncle Charlie grooms his entire family into believing that he’s a charming golden boy, not an extreme misogynist and serial killer.
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• Possessed (1947). Detached and scheming, David Sutton exploits Louise Howell's infatuation with him and steers her into a psychological breakdown as terrifying as anything in a David Lynch film.

The traditional femme fatale typically weaponises sexuality and gender dynamics to manipulate men.

The homme fatal employs charm, intelligence, or authority, but often relies less on overt sexuality, more on psychological dominance or trust.

But all this is up for grabs, and mustn't be seen as a template to follow religiously.

the homme fatal in 'nightcrawler' - jake gyllenghal's lou bloom

The functions of ‘fatale’ figures

To find new variations on the femme fatale and homme fatal we need to be clear about the functions they perform in stories. They . . .

• Have a pre-existing plan. It's concerned with gaining something, usually monetary, and they haven't been able to put it into practice until they meet the protagonist.  
  
  
• Seduce the protagonist. Or otherwise beguile, deceive, entice, persuade, coax, induce, inveigle or mislead them with promises of sex, love, wealth, power, happiness, or something else.
  ​
• Assign the protagonist's quest or task. The protagonist may be lost or aimless before they meet the fatale character, who directly or indirectly gives them their 'quest', which sets their plan in motion.
  
  
• Catalyse action/instigate conflict. By doing this, the fatale figure drives the plot forwards and lures the protagonist into morally or physically dangerous situations.
  
  
• Exploit and betray the protagonist. They finally realise that the fatale figure has no regard for them and is using them as a tool or a means to an end that will likely lead to their death or downfall.
  

evelyn mulwray - not a femme fatale, despite appearances

​New variations on ​​‘fatale’ characters?

Here are some possible narrative strategies, along with examples of films that help point the way.

• Remove the sexual dimension. In Nightcrawler (2014), Lou Bloom manoeuvres his powerless employee into a lethal situation. But there’s no sexual motive. Just an insatiable drive for material success.
  
  
• An 'innocent' fatale figure. 14-year-old Catherine in The Third Secret (1964) doesn’t seem seductive or sinister. Her childlike directness, need for closure on her father’s death and apparent innocence key into the protagonist’s susceptibilities.
  
  
• The fatale figure is already close to the protagonist. In classic noirs we usually observe the first meeting of the protagonist and fatale figure. But in Croupier (1997), Jack is manipulated by someone he’s known all his life: his own father.

 

• An untrustworthy mentor. The fatale figure in Thief is provided by the avuncular crime boss Leo, who exploits Frank’s deep craving for a family, and his need for a father-figure after the loss of his older friend Okla.

 

• The fatale figure is the protagonist. Arguably, some dark identification process happens when we watch sociopathic protagonists in films like Nightcrawler and The Talented Mr Ripley play out our own repressed antisocial tendencies.
  
  
• A femme fatale vs an homme fatal. Gone Girl has elements of this, although Amy is able to go to far greater extremes than Nick. The uneasy ending leaves the final chapter of their deeply conflicted relationship to the viewer's imagination.
  ​ 
• Misdirection. Despite appearances, Evelyn Mulwray in Chinatown is the story’s victim rather than any kind of femme fatale. The person who assigns Jake his initial quest is a woman posing as her, although he later begins to work for the real Evelyn.

And finally...

• Not even human. Eva, the female-adjacent robot in Ex Machina, fulfils all the femme fatale's narrative functions - enticing Caleb, the callow computer programmer protagonist, to ascribe human feelings and motives to a cryptic and unfathomable A.I. entity. 

'ex machina' - the seductive power of A.I.

​Conclusion - why are fatale figures still relevant?

​Fatale figures enable us to write about the mechanisms of fascination, seduction and betrayal in pointed and psychologically meaningful ways.

The femme fatale of classic noir remains iconic, but we don't have to repeat the archetype precisely. In fact we need to find new twists on it to remain relevant.

Luckily, the Noir genre gives us a range of narrative possibilities, enabling us to find creative variations on the figure, elaborating it and bringing it up to date.

The ​fatale figure is just one element of Neo Noir that I analyse in my WRITING NEO NOIR workshop. There are many others. In it, I:

• ​IDENTIFY the most important elements of the genre.
  
  
• WATCH inspiring clips which illustrate each point. 
  
  
• DISCUSS the topics, enabling you to understand them in detail.
  
  
• DO fun and challenging exercises to create the elements of your own Neo Noir story.

The workshop isn’t aimed at reproducing or ‘paying homage’ to past classics.

The idea to zero in on what makes the genre compelling, and which can inspire us to capture its essence in powerful contemporary stories.

We offer concessionary prices to members of BECTU, WFTV, Directors UK, the Society of Authors, and WGGB.

EMAIL ME to find out more about the workshop

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