Here we are again for another noir, this time the 1957 movie Crime of Passion, starring Barbara Stanwyck, Sterling Hayden and Raymond Burr.
Barbara Stanwyck plays Kathy Ferguson, a San Francisco newspaper advice columnist, who helps police from Los Angeles to catch a woman who killed her husband. One of the policemen is Bill Doyle (Sterling Hayden), who falls for Kathy. They are soon married, and she leaves the newspaper business to become an average housewife. She finds it hard to take, and decides to use the skills she had learned to advance in the newspaper world to try to help her husband advance, with unintended consequences.
In some respects, this movie has managed to maintain a modern feel, as we can feel some of the sexism of the times, since we can plainly hear Bill’s police captain tell Kathy when he first meets her that she shouldn’t be doing her work as a columnist and should instead be trying to make sure supper is ready for her husband. Not to mention, we can see how maddening life as a suburban housewife is for her, with the men and women separating themselves (and I can’t say as I blame her, considering some of the conversations she had to endure).
Honestly, this is one of those movies I had never heard of, until it was released on Blu-ray and DVD in 2017. I tried it, because I had seen a few of Barbara Stanwyck’s movies (although none of her noirs), but most of all, I tried it because it was released by Classicflix. I had seen many reviews for their releases indicating they had taken it upon themselves to try to restore a number of lesser-known movies and give them well-done releases on disc at a time when most companies would have advised against it. I have enjoyed a number of their quality releases (and I’m speaking mostly to the film transfers on that), and it makes it easier for me to try a lot of them. This is a movie I enjoyed, and one that I would recommend trying.
Film Length: 1 hour, 26 minutes
My Rating: 7/10
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List Of Actor/Actress Filmographies/Collections
Titanic (1953) – Barbara Stanwyck
The Asphalt Jungle (1950) – Sterling Hayden – Five Steps To Danger (1957)
Great Day In The Morning (1956) – Raymond Burr
Thoughts From The Music(al) Man 