No longer was she merely the dancing-girl who extorts a cry of lust and concupiscence from an old man by the lascivious contortions of her body; who breaks the will, masters the mind of a King by the spectacle of her quivering bosoms, heaving belly and tossing thighs; she was now revealed in a sense as the symbolic incarnation of world-old Vice, the goddess of immortal Hysteria, the Curse of Beauty supreme above all other beauties by the cataleptic spasm that stirs her flesh and steels her muscles,–a monstrous Beast of the Apocalypse, indifferent, irresponsible, insensible, poisoning.[註 1]
在1940年代和1950年代的經典黑色電影時代,蛇蠍美人在美國電影中蓬勃發展。蛇蠍美人的原型是1944年電影《雙重賠償》中由芭芭拉·史坦威( Barbara Stanwyck) 飾演的菲利斯·迪特里克森(Phyllis Dietrichson)(她因該角色獲得奧斯卡最佳女主角獎提名)。這個角色被認為是黑色電影史上最好的蛇蠍美人角色之一[32]。該角色被美國電影學會在《AFI百年百大英雄與反派》中評為美國電影第8名電影反派[33]。在一個經典的黑色電影比喻中,她操縱一個男人殺死她的丈夫以獲取經濟利益。
^Mario Praz, The Romantic Agony, ch. IV, p. 199: La Belle Dame sans Merci (The Beautiful Lady without Mercy). London/New York, 1933–1951–1970 (Oxford University Press).
^Mario Praz (1970) The Romantic Agony. Oxford University Press: 199, 213–216, 222, 250, 258, 259, 272, 277, 282, 377
^Per the Oxford English Dictionary, vamp is originally English, used first by G. K. Chesterton, but popularized in the American silent film The Vamp, starring Enid Bennett
^Le Roy, Félix. " Babylon " : Hollywood et ses fantômes. La Règle du Jeu. 2023-01-31 [2023-04-03]. (原始内容存档于2024-06-13). Margot Robbie […] in the role of the incendiary blonde Nellie LaRoy, dancing like Salomé, plays a femme fatale who dreams of seeing her name rise, in letters of fire, at the top of the bill.
Julie Grossman (2020) The Femme Fatale, ISBN9780813598246. A brief history of the femme fatale in cinema and TV.
Toni Bentley (2002) Sisters of Salome, ISBN9780803262416. Salome considered as an archetype of female desire and transgression and as the ultimate femme fatale.
布拉姆·迪傑斯特拉 (1986) Idols of Perversity: Fantasies of Feminine Evil in Fin-De-Siecle Culture, ISBN0195056523. Discusses the Femme fatale-stereotype.
Bram Dijkstra (1996) Evil Sisters: The Threat of Female Sexuality in Twentieth-Century Culture, ISBN0805055495.
Elizabeth K. Mix Evil By Design: The Creation and Marketing of the Femme Fatale, ISBN9780252073236. Discusses the origin of the Femme fatale in 19th-century French popular culture.
馬里歐·普拉茲 (1933) The Romantic Agony, ISBN9780192810618. See chapters four, 'La Belle Dame Sans Merci', and five, 'Byzantium'.
Julie Grossman (2009) Rethinking the Femme Fatale in film noir: Ready for her close-up, ISBN9781349313341. Tries to bring about a more nuanced and sympathetic reading of the "femme fatale" in film criticism and popular culture commentary.