The iconography of image in film noir
Medea and Lady Macbeth are two impressive dark lady characters in my reading and watching experiences. Medea is betrayed by his husband and revenges to him by killing their two young kids. Lady Macbeth incites her husband to kill the king, however, she becomes crazy and commits suicide after the success of Macbeth. As usual, they are both created by male authors and go to destruction as the punishment of transgression of their own nature roles (mercy mother and static wife).
Film noir is a male fantasy. Thus woman was defined by her sexuality. It is women’s sexuality that seduces men’s desire and then commit crimes. This structure can be found in almost all of film noirs. As induced characters, dark ladies should be designed full of exciting sexuality, which is often expressed visually both in the iconography of the image and the visual style. I will focus on the first element and use Double Indemnity as example to explain. The heroine Phyllis wrapped a towel when she met the hero Walter for first time. The camera shots Phyllis’s golden anklets as she goes downstairs and then move to that pair of sensual legs. These images reflect male’s gaze and regard female as the objects of desire, meanwhile indicates the phallocentric cultural viewpoint. We can also observe that these ladies prefer to wear elegant dresses and makeup very well.
Phyllis successfully persuades Walter to help herself and make him fall in love with her. Even though she was the character who caught the hero, I don’t think we should categorize her as a total dark lady for she also fell in love with Walter at the end of the story. From this point, I would rather say that actually Phyllis represents some kinds of deviations or multidimensional aspects of the dark lady. In contrast with Kathie in Out of the Past, who killed Jeff and never truly loved anybody, Phyllis surrendered to love and losted her own life for this precious real feeling.
In Ryan’s Daughter, the epic and romantic film which I like very much, David Lean also use different costumes to imply the complexity of Lucy’s character. She was put on a red and black dress ( indicative sensual and dangerous) when she dated with British military officer in the forest. She always wear light yellow and sky blue decorated with flowers dress when she performs the duties of a village teacher’s wife.
At last, I notice a common feature in the narrative structures (first-person narrative) of three film noirs I have watched: Double Indemnity, Out of the Past and The lady from Shanghai. The heroes tell us their experiences with all of details, especially their psychological activities.It is interesting that they all know the dangerous if they are induced by those exciting sensual and mysterious ladies. In other words, they are willing to be trapped by mysteries. They throw themselves into the disorder and the fridge of the world with conscious awareness. I would like to say man is a curious creature who loves adventure,rather than the dark lady reflects the hidden anxieties of man.
