MovieChat Forums > Tension (1949) Discussion > One of the best of the femme fatales

One of the best of the femme fatales


I speak of Audrey Totter, the main reason I'm anxious to see ths film.


Where am I from, you ask? "Pomona, Glendale, ((Fullerton, La Habra, Anaheim)), whatever."

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I agree. Perfectly cast for the role.

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Audrey Totter gives a phenomenal performance. Top notch as femme fatale.

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She was great as a femme fatale. I'm only familiar with her work in "The Set Up", in which she played down-on-his-luck boxer Robert Ryan's steadfast wife. Quite a change, seeing her in this role.

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Audrey Totter reminded me of Marie Windsor whose in role as the manipulative, double-crossing wife of Elisha Cook Jr. in The Killing (1956) also was that of the scheming seductress. Both portray very very sexy femme fatales whose mysterious and seductive charms ensnare their lovers in bonds of irresistible desires, invariably leading their men into compromising, dangerous, and deadly situations. Their beauty and sexual attraction are so intense that their victims are driven to irrational behavior so overwhelming is their sexual desire for such hot and nasty women. Of course there are myriads of other actresses who achieve the same result through their wanton ways. But Audrey Totter was sexually exciting and irresistible. Kinda like Lana Turner who in real life attracted the unlikeable likes of Johnny Stompanato, the cheap flashy mobster that ended up dead as a result of his doomed relationship with the sexy starlet. The bum got more than he bargained for when he hooked up with a dame like her.

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I think both Windsor in The Killing and Totter here let their malicious flooziness hang out in the open too obviously to be much "mysterious". It really did take a dolt of Elisha Cook Jr's epic proportions (no other guy in Hollywood history has played a total loser and a patsy as often as he did) to make the situation believable. Here, Baseheart seems to intelligent a guy to have gotten stuck with a slut like Totter in the first place; she's not even terribly beautiful - and neither was Windsor.



"facts are stupid things" - Ronald Reagan

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Totter was very beautiful, and so was Windsor. And Reagan, quoting John Adams, made a slip of the tongue, at which he himself laughed. Yet the ignorant make a big deal out of it.

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Yes, Audrey Totter was one overlooked lady!!! always good in whatever she did.........I sort of put her in the same type as Gloria Grahame, another one of my very favorites!!! Yea for them both!!!!!

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Excellent Femme Fatale



When there's no more room in hell, The dead will walk the earth...

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