Femme Fataleis a 2002 French crime - thriller film directed by Brian De Palma . The film stars Rebecca Romijn as the femme fatale and Antonio Banderas . It was screened out of competition at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival .

In the film, Laure Ash ( Rebecca Romijn ) participates in a diamond heist in Cannes, double-crosses her accomplices and escapes to Paris, where she stumbles across her own doppelgänger (also portrayed by Romijn) who commits suicide, leaving Laure the opportunity to take her identity and leave the country. Seven years later, Laure (now called Lily Watts) re-surfaces in Paris as the wife of the new American ambassador to France ( Peter Coyote ). At this point Spanish photographer Nicolas Bardo ( Antonio Banderas ) takes her picture, prompting Laure to manipulate Bardo in order to conceal her former identity and evade her ex-accomplices who are still after the stolen diamonds. A twist near the end accentuates the artificial nature of the story and brings many familiar motifs of De Palma's into play.^{[citation needed]}