Document Type : Original Article
Authors
1
M.A. In Cinema, Faculty of Cinema and Theater, University of Art, Tehran, Iran
2
Department of Cinema, Faculty of Cinema and Theater, University of Art, Tehran, Iran
10.30480/dam.2023.5019.1837
Abstract
The femme fatale is one of the important archetypes in art and literature, which has been represented many times in the history of cinema as a character type. A femme fatale is an attractive and seductive woman who, relying on her power of seduction, manipulates the male character and uses him to achieve her goals. Although femme fatales have been identified as a recurring type in world cinema, especially in film noir, traces of them can also be seen in the history of Iranian cinema. The main presence of these characters in Iranian cinema goes back to the 1340s and 1350s, in fact, the era of Filmfarsi, where they tried to captivate the men in a deadly fascination and drag them to the abyss of destruction, mostly in negative roles. In this case, men are mostly unable to resist the temptations of the femme fatale and give in to her demands. These characters presented a new image of Iranian women in public opinion; however, in line with the moral system of the pre-revolutionary cinema, in most cases they did not find a better fate than death and demise. In the history of Iranian cinema, Parvin Ghaffari is known as one of the most important icons of this character in films such as The Midnight Terror (Samuel Khachikian, 1340), Blonde of our City (Abbas Shabaviz, 1344) and Woman and Her Dolls (Esmaeil Riyahi, 1344). The current research tries to identify the different ways of representing the femme fatale in Iran's pre-revolutionary cinema through the historical approach and case studies to identify different patterns in the development of this character and its connection to modernity and the image of the new woman. Examining these different ways of representation and comparing the development process of Iranian femme fatales in comparison with foreign examples, shows how men in Persian films, unlike their Western counterparts, in most cases do not fall into the trap of femme fatales and do not suffer the inevitable fate of film noir men.
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