The Plastic Coat in Film and Fantasy

[randy_byers]

This one's for kdotdammit, who posted some screencaps of Joan Bennett wearing a plastic coat in Fritz Lang's Scarlet Street (1945). Behold Michèle Morgan in Marcel Carné's Port of Shadows (1938). This theme of femme fatales in plastic coats was picked up by Ridley Scott in Blade Runner (1982). Any others?


Port of Shadows (Le quai des brumes, 1938)

Comments

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

Errr... minor quibble. I think it's "femmes fatales" ("agreeing in number, gender, and case", as per Dr. William C. D. (Seedy Bill) Carr, my (marginally-sane, but Brilliant) instructor in French at Glendale Jr. College, c. 1949). Mind you, whatever French (and Spanish) I might speak probably has an old-line aristocratic Virginian accent.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

My take is that it's okay to pluralize it "femme fatales" within an English-language context. Likewise "film noirs" rather than "films noirs". (Although this issue is one reason why I tend to reduce it to "noir" rather than using "film noir".) When you use the correct French form within an English-language context I think you end up sounding pretentious. But I know some people disagree and feel you should stick with the correct French form in all contexts.

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

Good point. If you don't italicize, you really don't need the original language specifics.