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Recently I have come across several incidences in which, upon spotting a leading male in a movie wearing a fedora, the waterworks to my movie heart explode, and I swoon. What it is about the fedora that makes it so appealing to me? Perhaps it is the mystery, as the front brim slightly shadows and shrouds the face, the sense of danger that spills from a dark (mostly black) accessory connected to crime and detective wear.

This appeal to a leading male in a fedora, and its subsequent power, can be linked to the Scottish actor, James McAvoy. Upon watching his highly anticipated film, Atonement, I was unmoved by his shorn hair, military headgear and 30s style. Then comes a little film called Penelope in which McAvoy stars. In this role, his character, Johnny, a gambler and musician, constantly dawns a black fedora. His piercing blue eyes — which went unnoticed in his previous and hailed role in Atonement — burned a hole through my chest everytime they looked up from the shadows of that smart fedora.

Is there a connection between a fedora and this attraction?

Fedoras are historically associated with the prohibition era, as they were prominently worn by detectives and the gangsters they were trying to crack (also a time when the genre of “Film Noir” was making its muddy and awkward appearance on celluloid). Perhaps the link to crime is why there is some sort of danger, mystery and thus, attractiveness linked to the hat that was, in its time, considered practical over stylish. The term “Fedora” first appeared in theatre, as it was the name of a play by French dramatist Victorien Sardou — Princess Fedora (the title character apparently wore a hat resembling what we now call the Fedora). And so, because of Fedora tippers like Rocky Balboa, The Phantom of the Opera, Johnny Depp, Freddy Kruger and Humphrey Bogart, the hat is synonymous with crime, drama, and an element of danger — attractive to women all angles and degrees on earth whether we like it or not.

This same on-screen spark happens to Harrison Ford in Indiana Jones. He doesn’t even need the whip or the brains to melt me, just a crooked smile under that dusty brown fedora. Even Justin Timberlake’s leather fedora does wonders for his dance moves. Perhaps Freddy Kruger is the one exception to this rule — I don’t think I would melt for his hat dawning so much as scream — but there is something to this iconic headgear. There is a lurking attraction that may perhaps, upon enlightenment, make fedora sales soar among males in the down-and-outs with the ladies.

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