Cheap Crime of Passion (DVD) (Barbara Stanwyck, Sterling Hayden) (Gerd Oswald) Price

Related Products

Customer Reviews of Crime of Passion

Marry in Haste.....
"Crime of Passion" is a solid basic film noir. It lacks much of the dark exteriors, night shots, strange camera angles and gloomy interiors of a complete noir film but this is still the real thing. Barbara Stanwyck is a successful newspaper columnist in San Francisco. She impulsively marries an L.A. cop, Sterling Hayden. The suddenness of the marriage might signal some future "problems". The newlyweds settle down to a neat little suburban house, which would appear right at home on an "Ozzie and Harriet" set. Hayden is happy as a clam but not the Mrs! She wants more! She quickly becomes bored with the stilted little dinner parties and catty gossip of the other police wives. Who could blame her! Then Stanwyck over reaches! She has an affair with her hubby's boss. The intent was getting him a promotion. The guy is none other than Raymond Burr, the soon to be Perry Mason of 50s TV fame. Can we imagine Perry getting involved with a hot girl like Barbara? This reviewer is straining not to give away the ending, so I'll just reveal that matters start to unravel. At least one person winds up dead! The gossip columnist is out of her league. Her ploy does not exactly work. The hard-nosed ending is quite satisfying and in line with 40s and 50s cop/noir films. A star is subtracted for the rather sudden "resolution". 2 final notes: True crime fans may be appalled at one especially egregious example of shoddy police work. Does anyone remember the term "protection of evidence"? No wonder O.J. walked 35 years later! Silver and Ward's "Film Noir" states that CP was a prime example of the "malaise infecting suburbia" in the 1950s. While that does not apply to Hayden it certainly does to his conniving spouse. If only she had stayed in San Francisco!

---

"I hope all your socks have holes in them."
In the film "Crime of Passion", tough, successful career woman Kathy Ferguson (Barbara Stanwyck) abandons her newspaper column and a prestigious new job to marry LA police detective Bill Doyle (Sterling Hayden). She imagines a life of domestic bliss, and soon she's living in suburbia--along with all the other detectives' wives. Doyle is happy plodding along in his career, but Kathy really can't stand the life she finds herself in. The Doyle's social life is composed of dreary evenings with Doyle's co-workers. The men play card games, and the women chatter on about inane subjects. While no unpleasant words exit from the mouths of the detectives' wives, it's quite clear that a strict social hierarchy exists. In particular, one wife, Sara Alidos, is all too happy to carry on at length about her intimate friendship with the Police Commissioner Pope (Raymond Burr) and his wife. Kathy really doesn't belong with these other wives. Try as she might, she just doesn't fit in, and her own lack of conformity drives Kathy to the brink of a breakdown.

But then Kathy has an idea. In Kathy's mind, her husband is superior to the other detectives, and she is cleverer than the rest of the wives. And so Kathy sets out to use her brain to promote her dullard of a husband through whatever means are necessary.

Barbara Stanwyck is excellent in the role of Kathy--a woman who gives up her career and lives to regret it. Kathy is hard and tough, but when she meets Bill, she gives into romance, and in her case, this is a big mistake. Bill Doyle is a good, hard-working man, but Kathy doesn't respect him. Raymond Burr as Pope is the man who sees past Kathy's persona and sees the conniving woman underneath.

"Crime of Passion" contains some extremely interesting comments especially about the roles of women in the 50s. Some of the scenes and comments in the beginning of the film were very revealing. However, I don't think the film went quite far enough with Kathy's character, and so, ultimately, the film was a little disappointing. But for film noir fans, this is a film worth watching--displacedhuman

---

WHAT SCHEMES MAY COME....
Neat, tidy little B-picture about a woman who tries to push her husband up the ladder of success only to have it backfire on her. San Francisco newspaper writer Kathy Ferguson (Barbara Stanwyck) meets and quickly marries macho LA detective Bill Doyle (Sterling Hayden) and finds herself plopped down in the middle of suburbia. This is all well and good until she finds her role relegated to the living room with the brainless other wives while the "boys" play poker in the kitchen. Being from a newspaper, she's used to being one of the boys and not one of the "little women". She finally snaps after one too many of these evenings and starts scheming to move her husband up in the department so she can be proud of him and mingle intelligently with the upper crust where she feels they belong. Her plans go beautifully until she runs up against her biggest obstacle, Bill's boss police chief Raymond Burr. They become close and one night he shows up at Kathy's while Bill's away and confides that he needs to retire and is looking for a replacement. Kathy siezes the opportunity to sell Bill as the replacement and commits the ultimate sacrifice via a one-night-stand with Burr thinking she's cinched the "deal" for Bill. But Burr has other plans---leaving Kathy horrified and guilty over what she's done. Her next move will be murder. Stanwyck always excelled at portraying strong, driven, ambitious women and Kathy is no exception. But the film has an obvious feminist slant unusual for the time. The director and Stanwyck make it clear what motivates Kathy and why she she goes over the edge. She loves her husband enough to go all out for him but smart enough to know that she will benefit too. She's too strong a woman to just sit around and mindlessly gossip over dresses, diets and phony aspirations. Her aspirations are real because she knows what she wants for herself and her husband. And it doesn't include cream cheese and olives. For Stanwyck fans, this is an interesting addition to her gallery of headstrong women with an agenda. It's not a "great" film but it's good and worth watching.