Ivy

In Edwardian England, Ivy is bored with her husband, is becoming bored with her lover, and wants to marry a rich man. She decides to remove the obstacles, uses poison, and the crime falls on somebody else. The film is not interested in a murder mystery. It is interested in her arithmetic: Ivy feels no remorse, is not afraid, and tries to solve even the possibility of being caught as though it were a social problem. The film is in no hurry to punish her and does not defend her either. The form joins period design to noir lighting: there is lace, there are hats and carriages, but the shadows and the compositions are pure noir. Sam Wood directed. Around the same time he was making measured melodramas like The Stratton Story with James Stewart; this work is entirely cold. Joan Fontaine plays Ivy, with Patric Knowles and Herbert Marshall in support. Who it is for: viewers who like the woman-centred noir of the forties. Who it is not for: anyone wanting speed. The film moves politely and only gathers its tension in the final stretch.