185. The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946)

Directed By Tay Garnett

Synopsis

See Visconti's Ossessione... except the husband is a nice guy.

Review

Actually I think this film should be a companion piece to Visconti's Ossessione just in historical terms, in order to make a comparison between 1940's European and American cinema. And this film really is a triumph of style over substance when compared with Visconti's contribution.

Yes, the girl is prettier, the people are happier, there is more sunshine and the moral at the end is incredibly explicit. There are also a couple more courtroom scenes which weren't in Ossessione. But this film misses all the gritty realism that made Visconti's such a great film. And that is a pretty big sacrifice.

I don't necessarily blame film directors or American artists as in any way inferior to European ones, but there are two things I blame here and they are the making of films thinking about the bottom line, therefore they can never be too challenging or the studio won't take it on afraid to lose money and the prudish morals that led to the introduction of the Production code.

American cinema is so good during this time that I can only imagine what it would have been like without the incredible consumerism and prudishness attached to the film industry. This is still a good film, but I can't help thinking that I've seen it before, made better.

Final Grade

7/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The film was referenced in an episode of Charmed. In, "Charmed Noir", one of the protagonists, Paige Matthews is magically sent to a fictional world set in the 1920s or 1930s. Upon arrival she decides to change her clothing to that typically worn in this era. Her new look is complemented by a fellow character who believes she looks like Lana Turner "straight out of The Postman Always Rings Twice, the good version" (i.e., the 1940s film). Paige later calls herself Lana, in the episode, to disguise her real name.

Here ya go: