La "femme fatale"del "noir" clásico a la imaginación contemporánea

Resumen

This paper provides an introductory tour to the social anxieties located in the "femme fatale" type, first in its incarnation in 40s and 50s film "noir", and more recently in the contemporary imagination, in genres such as science fiction and the fantastic. The "femme fatale" is simultaneously presented as the receptacle of a series of fears associated to female conquests starting in the 40s, and as an icon (recovered in the 60s by the Second wave of feminism) of female empowerment. In this second approach to the "femme fatale", aspects that were often considered negative when found in a woman (such as independence, intelligence, and the control over one’s own sexuality) are not judged negatively, but rather celebrated. Finally, the article offers some keys to interpret the type, and some examples of the "femme fatale" in contemporary fiction (be it gynoids, hybrids, or AIs, using both films and TV series), which can be analyzed in depth in other articles in this same volume.