An uncredited adaptation of W. Somerset Maugham’s The Letter, the novel and play that William Wyler, at the same studio, had turned into a brilliant film before the war, The Unfaithful addresses a postwar reality: not so much the infidelity of wives during wartime with which now, postwar, soldiers who had returned to civilian life had to cope, the specific application of the plot here, but, rather, the consequences of hasty marriage and quick abandonment, precipitated by war and its atmosphere of uncertainty, that tested to the limit the capacity of women left behind to cope with their lonely predicament. Society wife Christine Hunter will explain that, while during the day she could volunteer her time to war-related organizations, at nighttime she found herself peculiarly vulnerable. For six weeks routine letters from her spouse, Bob, ceased and Chris took a lover, the brief affair, which she decisively ended, resulting in a heavy baggage of grief for both marital partners. For as long as possible, Chris endeavors to keep Bob in the dark as to her betrayal of their marriage.
The film is set in southern California, in the first flush of the postwar construction boom. Bob Hunter, a builder, has been away on business for ten days—his and Chris’s first separation since his return from war. To all appearances, they are a blissful, devoted couple. The night before his return from Oregon, something seemingly random happens that, as it plays out, will shatter this illusion. Chris returns from a party late at night; an intruder pushes her inside, a struggle ensues and Chris takes his life with a ceremonial Japanese knife—a spoil of the war. The victim’s name is Michael Tanner. Chris tells the police that she has never laid eyes on the man in her life. Tanner was a sculptor, and his outraged widow has in her possession a bust that her husband made of Chris. Lies start tumbling out, and Chris finds herself on trial for murder.
Directing from a fine script by David Goodis, no less, and James Gunn, Vincent Sherman has a deft sense of the melodrama’s priorities; the trial is greatly condensed, not milked, and we only hear about the acquittal. Instead, the scenarists and the director focus on the Hunter marriage (and, to a lesser extent, on the Tanner marriage), in order to reap their thematic rewards. The coordinates of their theme are staked out by two speeches, one angry, the other a considered, humane plea. The first comes from Larry Hannaford, a divorce lawyer who, because he is the Hunters’ friend, is representing Chris against the state’s charge of murder. (A stretch, this.) Hannaford assaults Chris with the identity he feels she shares with all the other mercenary, manipulative women he has been representing in divorce procedures—women who have taken no care with their marriages. It’s a confirmed bachelor’s misogynistic outburst, perhaps indebted, in part, to Uncle Charlie in Alfred Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt (1943)—an unexpected display of temperament from the film’s otherwise most mild-mannered character. Larry’s speech is, also, a projection of the violation of marital trust that he feels sooner than does his close friend, who is as yet ignorant of what his wife has done.
It is the other speech, however, that seals the film’s thematic intent, predicting Bob’s eventual forgiveness of Chris and the salvation of the Hunters’ marriage. Its source is Paula, who explains to Bob, her cousin, that his wife is a human being, not an idol to be smashed. Paula attempts to educate Bob as to Chris’s feelings throughout the ordeal of their separation by war and the ordeal of guilt afterwards. Eve Arden, who plays Paula, gives the film’s best performance.
Hasty marriage, the film implies, does not justify hasty divorce; divorce that doesn’t equally take into account the other party’s feelings and one’s own, the film further implies, is reckless. Bob is determined to divorce Chris, but this is as much a betrayal of their wedding vows as was her adultery. The issue of trust is real, but Bob is employing it to hide a fractured ego. When trust is broken in a marriage, it is the obligation of the marital partners to set themselves to the task of rebuilding that trust. Society does not benefit from their going their separate ways if they are still, as here, in love with one another, especially since both will reap a harvest of endless bitterness and regret should they divorce. Not a jot of this is given didactic voice in the film, but it all naturally arises from the film’s disposition and execution. One may not agree, but one is bound to confront the issues that the film subtly raises. The upshot is this: The Unfaithful is that rare film that gives the viewer a real sense of having a stake in the fictional marriage being portrayed. It matters that the Hunter marriage should survive and prevail.
Ann Sheridan is excellent as Chris, as is Zachary Scott, as Bob, who must convince us of a considerable transformation of character. (And he does. Compare, that same year, Lee Bowman’s failure to do this in Stuart Heisler’s Smash-Up.) Lew Ayres is adequate as Larry, but it doesn’t seem to have dawned on him that his character is likely a repressed homosexual who is unconsciously in love with Bob himself. Marta Mitrovich, looking eerily like Barbara Hershey, is striking as Tanner’s abused wife.
As for the bust, it’s a bust—an illusion-breaker, because when we see it we don’t think “Chris Hunter,” we think “Ann Sheridan.” Wasn’t this inevitable, and shouldn’t the sculpture, therefore, have been tactfully kept out of our view?
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