The key figure of the femme fatale was introduced by John Huston in '' The Maltese Falcon '' ( 1941 ) and further developed by Otto Preminger in '' Laura '' ( 1944 ) , but it is probably in Wilder 's film that the archetype comes most sharply into focus : Barbara Stanwyck 's Phyllis Dietrichson seems a pure product of hallucination , a shapely California blonde -LRB- with a memorable anklet -RRB- who claims to have been born and bred in Los Angeles but has not shaken her Brooklyn accent .