In this film noir, the classic femme-fatale character (Laraine Day) unravels as her past returns to haunt and overtake her on her wedding day. Innovatively using a series of nesting flashbacks, the film unfolds like a labyrinth, presenting an intense and complex psychological portrait of a troubled woman. 1946, U.S., BW, 35mm, 85 minutes. A book-signing follows.
Norma Barzman was the first woman reporter at the Los Angeles Examiner before she became a screenwriter in Hollywood. In the fearful atmosphere of the first wave of HUAC hearings, she and her husband, screenwriter Ben Barzman, left the United States for France in 1949. Two years later they were blacklisted and from that point were only able to work under assumed names. After almost 30 years in exile, Barzman returned to the U.S. in 1976. She has published the first part of her memoirs, The Red and the Blacklist (2003). The second part, The End of Romance is due out in spring 2006. Her film stories and screenplays also include Never Say Goodbye (1946), Young Man with Ideas (1952), and Luxury Girls (1952).
Transportation for Barzman provided in part by the Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Minnesota.