Femme Fatale (3½ Stars)

If you saw the future in a crystal ball, in a palm reading or in a dream, would you change it?

If you knew what would happen, would you try to do things differently?

That's an interesting question. The question is more interesting than the answer. Almost everyone would answer Yes, though for different reasons, most of them selfish. If a person knew that his life choices would cause himself or his family harm he would act differently in order to avoid it. If a person knew that his life choices would bring him success he would still act differently in order to be even more successful. I can relate to this. Looking back on my own life I have made a series of wrong decisions that have wrecked my life. If I could make the decisions over again I would choose differently. But would this save me or lead to even bigger catastrophes? Maybe I needed my life to crash in order to be where I am now.

Brian De Palma's film gives no answers, but it asks a lot of questions.

Laure is part of a gang planning an elaborate jewel robbery at the Cannes Film Festival. She double-crosses her partners and keeps the diamonds for herself. She goes on the run to hide from her partners. While in Paris she's mistaken for a missing woman called Lily. After a fall she's carried unconscious into Lily's house. As if in a dream she sees the events that will unfold. She will take Lily's place and travel to America, where she will marry a politician who goes on to become the American ambassador to France. She will scheme and plot to take her husband's money so that she can leave France without him. But her past will catch up with her, with tragic consequences. She sees all of this. So she makes noble selfless decisions to avoid it.

But are the decisions so selfless? She only decides to do good because she sees that doing bad will harm her. In the same way, if she had seen that good deeds would lead to harm she would have done bad things in order to avoid them. It's a Biblical principle that a person reaps what he sows (Galatians 6:7). In the following verses this is expounded upon, in particular verse 9: "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up". That's the reward doctrine of Christianity, which appealed to me when I was younger. "Do good, because you'll be rewarded for it". Variations of this teaching exist in a multitude of religions. It's a paraphrase of the law of karma. I'm not saying that people shouldn't do good. What I'm saying is that seeking rewards in this life or the next is inherently selfish. I should do good with no expectation of a reward. This is a higher morality than Christianity.

To put it another way: If a person needs a reward as an incentive for doing good, he doesn't deserve the reward.