Devil In A Blue Dress

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Carl Franklin’s Devil in a Blue Dress (1995) is a neo-noir film that tells the story of Easy Rawlins (Denzel Washington) and his mix up in a dangerous plot wrapped around finding a woman, Daphne Monet (Jennifer Beals.) This film shares similarities with classic noirs: the use of smoking, voice overs, flashbacks, and deception. However, there are evident differences between them as well: the presence of a stable home, the femme fatale plays a smaller role, and a happy ending. The film adapts noir plots, themes, and style and is set in the classical noir period. This can be seen by the old cars and telephones within the film, as well as the way the races interact. Devil in a Blue Dress includes the use of voice overs and flashbacks to tell the story, which is a common aspect of classic noirs. …show more content…
Within the classic noir films, characters are very mobile and do not have a home setting. However, Easy owns his own home and is proud of this; he enjoys the fact that he is able to settle down. Only when Dewitt Albright (Tom Sizemore) and his henchmen break in and interrogate Easy, does the home become a house and not a home. By the end of them film, however, it becomes a home again. Daphne is very different from the femme fatale in classic noir. She is the reason one of her friends Coretta James (Lisa Carson) died and she leaves Easy at the house of Richard McGee (Scott Lincoln) after they find him dead. These events cause Easy to be attached to two murders, which were held over his head forcing, him to keep doing what is being asked of him. However, Daphne was not the typical femme fatale as she did not lead to her own demise or Easy’s in terms of death. Her demise was that she was not able to marry the man she loved and she was the reason behind many other people’s deaths. However, the film ended on a happy note for Easy, he got to keep the money and his house, which is unusual in classic