Crime of Passion (1957)

That was an excellent one.

Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Fantastic!

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Mistitled, the Crime here is not one of Passion but of other Things. Frustration Mostly, an Inability to Escape the Confines of Conservatism and a Predetermined Place that Society has Set Up for a Woman in Postwar America. Barbara Stanwyck is a Thoroughbred asked to drive a Buggy. It is this Predicament that the Film Exploits but while it is an Edgy and Topical Story for the Late Fifties, the Execution and Exposition is None too Smooth. A Good Cast tries Nobly to make it all Say Something Worthy, it is just too Thin a Story and Most of it is Forced into its Many Turns as Stanwyck comes Unglued.The Abruptions that the Movie takes from the Beginning are Stark and Strain Credulity. There are some Unintentionally Funny Moments (darning socks) and some of the Melodrama is Murky and the Result is a Somewhat Haphazard Film with a Good Story to Tell and some Sociological Comments to Make, but it isn't Told Very Well and the Statements are more Thrown Out There than Realized.Overall it is a Mediocre Attempt at a Very Interesting Take on a Situation that Needed some Exploration and Examining. The Housewife's Plight and a Women's Place in the Man's World of the 1950's was a Target Worth Shooting Towards. This One Came Close to the Mark but Missed.

In San Francisco, lovelorn newspaper columnist Barbara Stanwyck (as Kathy Ferguson) helps visiting Los Angeles lieutenant Sterling Hayden (as William "Bill" Doyle) and fellow detective Royal Dano (as Charles "Charlie" Alidos) capture a woman who has murdered her husband. Never married, Ms. Stanwyck changes her outlook when Mr. Hayden invites her out for dinner and drinks. Offered a better job in New York, Stanwyck gives up her career when Hayden asks her to dinner in Los Angeles. They get married and move to the Valley. "I just want to be a good wife and do things for you," Stanwyck tells Hayden, "I just hope all your socks have holes in them, and I can sit for hours and hours darning them!" Smoking intermittently, Stanwyck pours coffee for Hayden and his poker pals while chatting with the girls about chiffon. She becomes interested in furthering her husband's career, insisting he move to the more upscale Beverly Hills police beat. Needing a release, Stanwyck gets it in the form of police inspector Raymond Burr (as Anthony "Tony" Pope) after a fender-bender with wife Fay Wray (as Alice Pope). Watching Stanwyck as an increasingly hysterical suburban housewife is unbelievably amusing.***** Crime of Passion (1/9/57) Gerd Oswald ~ Barbara Stanwyck, Sterling Hayden, Raymond Burr, Fay Wray

Barbara Stanwyck delivers an outstanding performance as a hysterical woman who pulls every string ethically and then eventually unethically in "Brass Legend" director Gerd Oswald's hidden gem of a crime noir "Crime of Passion" that qualifies as a sociological expose of the displaced women in the late 1950s that anticipated the feminist movement. Since this movie was under the aegis of the Production Code, the savvy viewer will know that crime doesn't pay and it doesn't pay in this sharp sage. The Stanwyck protagonist is the epitome of an independent woman who doesn't believe in marriage but she turns around and marries a veteran Los Angeles detective who lacks ambition. Compensating for his lack of ambition and her lack of a job, she pours her energy into getting her husband promotions, even if it means 'playing dirty' and relying on underhanded schemes, finally she embraces murder as a means to an end. Sterling Hayden is perfectly cast as the level-headed cop, while Raymond Burr makes his presence felt even when he is not on screen as Hayden's superior and Stanwyck's illicit lover. "Crime of Passion" qualifies as a film noir and the low-budget and concise direction by Oswald adds a luster to it. The last quarter hour is a clincher. Look for Stuart Whitman as a police lab technician. Atmospheric and edgy material, "Crime of Passion" depicts a headstrong woman's collapse in a contemporary society when she has no outlet for herself. The moral of this movie is that the Stanwyck character should never have quit her job as a manipulative newspaper advice columnist.

The successful columnist of The San Francisco Post Kathy Ferguson (Barbara Stanwyck) is an independent woman that has the intention of never getting married. However, when she meets the LAPD Detective Lt. Bill Doyle (Sterling Hayden) during the investigation of Dana Case that is resolved with her support, they immediately fall in love for each other and get married. Kathy quits her job and moves to Los Angeles to be a housewife. Bill is very close to his colleagues and their wives, and they have frequent dinner parties at his home, and the boredom of the conversation with other wives and the lack of ambition of Bill in the Police Department make Kathy to plot a scheme to push Bill's career to a higher position. Kathy forces the encounter with his superior Police Inspector Anthony Pope (Raymond Burr) and his wife Alice Pope (Fay Wray) and destroys the friendship of Bill with his immediate superior Police Capt. Charlie Alidos (Royal Dano); then she has one night stand with Tony to get the promise that he will recommend Bill to his position since he is planning to retire. When Kathy realizes that Tony's promise was just pillow talk, the ambitious woman takes a decision with no return.The film-noir "Crime of Passion" is quite dated today but I believe that it was ahead of time in 1957 with an engaging and amoral story of ambition and murder. Barbara Stanwyck plays Kathy Ferguson Doyle, an ambitious woman in the 50's not tailored to be a conventional housewife that loves her husband that is a man that prioritizes his family over his career. The emptiness of her life associated to the lack of interest of her beloved husband in his career drives Kathy insane and capable of committing a murder and destroy her family and certainly Bill's career. Just as a curiosity, the wife of Police Inspector Tony Pope is Fay Wray, the unforgettable Ann Darrow from "King Kong". My vote is seven.Title (Brazil): "Da Ambição ao Crime" ("From the Ambition to Crime")Note: On 24 Jul 2018, I saw this film again.