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Crime of Passion Customer Reviews (1 - 3 of 10 Reviews)

"I know that you can achieve so much more Bill"
Barbara Stanwyck was an actress of formidable talent, she was subtle, and elegant, yet she could bluster and lose control and do it with so much grace and grandeur. In Crime of Passion a 50's noir potboiler, Stanwyck plays a popular San Francisco newspaper columnist named Kathy Ferguson. Fiercely independent, Kathy prides herself on the fact that she's a career girl, and that she hasn't resorted, like most other women of her generation, to settling down to cook and clean for a man.

All this changes however, when she meets and falls in love with hunky detective LA Police detective Bill Doyle (Sterling Hayden). Whisked off to suburban Los Angeles, Kathy finds it hard adjusting to life as a policeman's housewife, and she's frustrated at her husband's lack of ambition. It doesn't take long for the droning petty misery of suburban life and the stifling social puddle of the detective's wives to steadily unbalance her.

Without her husband's knowledge, she uses her feminine wiles to help advance his career - cleverly conspiring to associate with Alice Pope (Fay Wray) so as to get close to Chief of Detectives Tony Pope (Raymond Burr), Bill's boss. Bill remains ignorant of Kathy's dangerous schemes even when they result in him being unfairly pushed ahead of his more-qualified Captain, Charlie Alidos (Royal Dano). Things really spiral out of control when Kathy starts to put the moves on the retiring Chief Pope, in the hope that he will place Bill first on the LAPD's short list for his job.

Although the story isn't remotely believable, and the Lady Macbeth-like themes are indeed quite bizarre, the film is mostly worth watching for Stanwyck's fine performance as Kathy. She starts out as a tough, wisecracking, and no nonsense newspaperwoman, who is quick to put male chauvinist cops in their pace, and then she quietly turns into this macabre, coolly manipulative woman, who will stop at nothing to advance the career of her straight-shooting but unimaginative husband.

Made in 1957 and in a time when there was much discussion over the role of women in the workforce, Crime of Passion brings feminist issues right to the forefront. Kathy's far too cool to be shaken by conservative detective Dano's assertion that she belongs in a home cooking some man's supper. But she's getting on in years and must be feeling the need to marry, because she lands a man of her own almost before she knows what's happened. And it's quite remarkable that she jumps into the role of dutiful wife without so much as taking a breath.

Director Gerd Oswald gives us a tough and uncompromising look at 1950's suburban middle class life. Kathy is forced to live in a wasteland - here's a woman who is used to working with intelligent and creative people, now all she has for company is her doltish but loyal husband - when she can get to see him - and a bunch of gaggling unsophisticated detective wives for company; they're shallow women that seem do little more than praise the big boss and butter up the hen at the top of their pecking order.

To give away much more of the plot would be to destroy the viewer's enjoyment of this compelling film, but suffice to say as Kathy becomes even more unhinged, and her straight-jacketed life becomes too much for her, she resorts to terrible ends to get her way; this intelligent and supposedly sophisticated woman just can't accept a man without ambition. You really believe that a high flier like Kathy could fall in love with a man like Bill and then imprudently push him beyond his limits.

Barbara Stanwyck and Sterling Hayden are terrific together and there's a real chemistry going on here. Bill loves Kathy unconditionally and just wants her to be happy, but Kathy's fatal mistake is that she can't accept her husband for who he is. It is to Barbara's credit that she plays the role straight, without resorting to camp. And Sterling Hayden is a revelation as Bill. He's a sort of a sensitive stalwart, a Mr. nice guy who knows he's just good enough to do his job and is comfortable with that.

Crime of Passion is bleak and cynical in its portrayal of the claustrophobic aspects of suburbia, especially in the way that women were stifled intellectually and creatively. Full of existential angst and fuelled by a sort of quasi-macho misogyny, the film is a powerful and commanding depiction of a middle-class 50's marriage gone terribly wrong. Mike Leonard February 06.


Some Women Just Aren't Cut Out to Be Housewives.
Kathy Ferguson (Barbara Stanwyck) is a popular advice columnist for a San Francisco newspaper. Career-minded and unmarried, Kathy has a certain disdain for the housewives with whom she professes to sympathize in print. But when a murder suspect confides in her, Kathy is able to turn the woman in to the two Los Angeles police detectives who were on her trail. Her role in capturing a fugitive is a boon to Kathy's career, and she's offered a better job in New York. But Kathy has fallen in love with one of the police detectives on the murder case, Lieutenant Bill Doyle (Sterling Hayden), a steadfast, unassuming man of whom Kathy says, "I don't think you'll get very far, but you're a nice guy." She gives up her career to marry Bill, make him happy, and keep his home in suburban Los Angeles. But she is soon frustrated by the tedium of bourgeois dinner parties and policemen's wives.

"Crime of Passion" is a female melodrama where violence and hysteria invade the idyllic post-war suburbs. What starts out as an advocacy of women leaving their careers to be homemakers, personified in Bill Doyle's chauvinistic partner Captain Charlie Alidos (Royal Dano), doesn't turn out that way. Kathy is an ambitious, self-possessed woman trapped in suburbia with nothing to do but have ambitions for her husband. She becomes obsessive and neurotic, but is as driven as she ever was. Uh oh. It's hard to say if "Crime of Passion" sympathizes with Kathy Ferguson, as a victim of ridiculous and stifling expectations, or makes her out to be an immoral monster because she's selfish and ambitious. Perhaps both.

Barbara Stanwyck gives Kathy the necessary force and hysteria, but it is painfully obvious that she is 15 years too old for the role. Her face is a mass of crow's feet in some scenes, and her neck is always covered. The hideous frosted hairdo doesn't help. Handsome Sterling Hayden looks downright ungroomed and unappealing. Raymond Burr, who is terrific as police Inspector Tony Pope, the one person who understands Kathy's character, appears younger than the film's 2 stars and is supposed to be older. Well, the actors' appearances wouldn't matter if they were not actually distracting. And Stanwyck and Hayden are perfectly cast otherwise. The film's final crime-solving sequence is contrived and implausible, but "Crime of Passion" features a captivating supporting effort from Raymond Burr, a passable performance from Barbara Stanwyck, and some interesting themes. There are no bonus features on the MGM 2003 DVD. Subtitles are available in English, French, and Spanish.

Who says 1950's suburban housewives lived dull and simple lives?
This review is for the 2003 MGM DVD

Barbara Stanwyck stars as Kathy Ferguson, an ambitious, independent woman who writes a relationship advice column for a San Francisco newspaper. While on the job, she gets a different assignment dealing with a Los Angeles police investigation and through some savvy detective work, helps the out of town detectives crack the case. One of the policemen is Bill Doyle (Sterling Hayden) and they quickly fall for each other. But at the same time, Kathy just accepted a job with a prestigious New York paper and is clearly conflicted between going east or continuing a relationship with Bill. On impulse they elope and Kathy becomes a housewife for Bill in suburban Los Angeles. It doesn't take too long for Kathy to realize that she's too ambitious and too liberated to be a stand-by-your-man spouse and quickly devises some schemes to push Bill up the business ladder. This sets up the rest of the film where things go wildly out of control.

The movie is in some ways a slice of life picture of life in the later 1950's. The social gatherings are segregated so that the women calmly chat in one room while the men recreate and discuss business in another room. I'm sure some people viewing this movie today would argue that the Kathy Ferguson character was an oppressed victim rather than a greedy, drunk for power wife. The movie has plenty of good acting, especially from one of my all time favorite actors Raymond Burr. The irony of the movie is that this "relationship coach" turned out to be the most dysfunctional character imaginable. It's overall a very good movie, but not a great one for me. Perhaps its because the ending plays it too much by the book and also it's a bit heavy handed since it portrays housewives in the `50's as shallow, simple minded, and boring.

As for the DVD, the B&W full screen picture was near pristine with minimal graininess or contrast problems. The DVD did not have any bonus material.


Movie: B

DVD Quality: A-

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