Review of Crime of Passion

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.