As we watched Laura in class on Tuesday, I personally had much difficulty not getting caught up in the plot. I had to keep reminding myself that I'm watching this for a class, I need to pay attention to detail, mechanics, I need to analyze these characters. It was just so easy to let the images flood my mind and let the story take me.
But as I continually forced myself back into analysis mode I took some interest in the character of Laura. Before we started the movie we talked a little in class about the femme fatale and that in this particular movie the femme fatale wasn't especially traditional. The only femme fatale characteristic I could really apply to Laura was the infatuation others developed for her, even when she was thought to be dead. Her portrait had an overwhelming effect and was often strategically placed in the background of camera angles.
After I read the femme fatale article No Place For a Woman I forced myself to notice a couple more ways Laura would fall into the catagory. She had a strong career, and the film showed her with the power to grant jobs, as she did with Carpenter. Also perhaps at the end when we assume that she chooses to be with McPherson, which will most likely lead her to a domestic life.
Although I did see a few ways to support Laura as the femme fatale woman, I still don't believe it is strong support. It just seems to me to accidentally fall into this catagory. After I read No Place For a Woman I imagined this kind of woman to be strong, independant, and self-assured. I imagined her to be above all opposed to marriage and opposed to all other means of depending on men. Laura was impassive and couldn't make up her mind. And finally when it seemed that she had made up her mind, she changed it.
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I can't agree with you more that Laura seems to just have accidently fallen into the category of a femme fatale. She is not a strong, independent, or self-assured woman. Instead she is made out to seem innocent, indecisive, and unstable. Yes, she has a strong career but this is overlooked as a personal quality in the film. Instead she is only presented and viewed by others as an object of male obsessions.
ReplyDeleteI also agree that she has just fallen within the category. Her lack of decision making skills, dependence on men, and lack of personality all prove to me that she was just thrown in the category. She does seem to have a decent job, but we see so little of her job that that by the end of the movie I almost forgot she even had a job.
ReplyDeleteYour right in observing Laura as not being the archetype of a femme fatale. To us, she doesn't seem to have characteristics you listed: strong, independant, and self-assured. The men in the film imagine her to have alluring qualities; sophistication, beauty, money ext. Through their eyes, she becomes a femme fatale to these three men, leading them to rash action and conflict. These men create their own obsessions of her based on constructed images they all have of who she is. So in a way, she does act as a femme fatal in this film even if she is going out directly trying to case these men to fall in love with her.
ReplyDeleteI like how you felt that she didn't really fit the femme fatale category. I think the reason she's seen that way is that she has a similar effect as one. And I agree with your closing thought that she couldn't make up her mind. I still don't think she chose McPherson, we're just led to believe that because he constantly puts himself in a spot that looks like she did when we have no way to confirm that she specifically chose to be with him.
ReplyDeleteIt might have been useful to focus on the other reading, which is specifically about this movie, and talks about the relationships between the men in it. As I mentioned in class, I chose this movie deliberately, because Laura _doesn't_ fit the formula, and the fact that she doesn't makes us force ourselves to observe our own expectations of female characters in movies. You might find it more useful to consider how the men view her, and each other, rather than trying to make sense of what Laura does or what she causes.
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