Three Husbands

The day before Emlyn Williams' will is read, his lawyer, Jonathan Hale, hands three confidential letters to Howard Da Silva, Sheppard Strudwick, and Robert Karnes. In them, Williams confesses to an affair with each one's wife, to wit Eve Arden, Ruth Warrick, and Vanessa Brown.

They were getting pretty tired of the Production Code in Hollywood, what with the downturn in business, and Vera Caspary wrote this hot and frank story....except the Code was still in effect, so the letters only go so far as naming the women. What could they have been doing? Attending committee meetings? Music recitals? French lessons? The unnamed sin is worse than anything they might have been doing, because it's up to the blue-nosed censor in the movie seat to name what he or she considers the worst sin. It's that sniggering, leering attitude that typifies the worst of the Code era; a little casual fornication would seem wholesome by comparison, and the erotic symbols of screwball comedy erudite.

Sigh. At least they've got some good performers in this one, including Billie Burke and Jane Darwell.