It’s been hot here. It’s pushing 100 degrees, and like most people in my neighborhood I don’t have an air conditioner. When night comes, neighbors sit in boxer shorts under their porch lights drinking cold, cheap beer and swatting mosquitoes. Even feral cats move slowly. What’s a girl to do? Descend to the basement with a martini and a stack of film noir DVDs, that’s what. Here in the light of an old swag lamp with the chest freezer kicking in now and then I immerse myself in the black and white world of femme fatales, private eyes, and gangsters. And of course I think, what perfume would they wear?

Let’s start with something easy: the femme fatale. Think of Ava Gardner as Kitty Collins in The Killers. She’s beautiful, unattainable, and just when you think she’s yours she double crosses you. Frédéric Malle Carnal Flower and Robert Piguet Fracas come to mind right away. Lanvin My Sin or Caron Narcisse Noir might be good choices, too. The “corrupt flower” of Penhaligon’s Amaranthine would be a good bet when the femme fatale is settled in a humid, exotic location like Jane Russell in Macao or Bette Davis in The Letter. Rita Hayworth in Gilda is more of a Guerlain Shalimar…

Read the rest of this article »