dougdoepke One of a handful of low budget films from pioneering woman film-maker Ida Lupino. Known mainly for her soulful screen portrayals in the 1940's of downtrodden women, she managed this career turn in the early 50's, a remarkable feat given a production industry so thoroughly dominated by men.Her best known feature is the chilling and critically acclaimed account of serial killer Emmet Myers, called "The Hitchhiker". But all her films are marked by an earnest concern for the lives of ordinary people, whether menaced in extreme circumstance or in more ordinary circumstance by the unwed pregnancy of "The Outrage". Moreover, at a time when studios were fending off small screen television with big budget Technicolor, she gamely persisted with the small, the intimate and the unglamorous."The Bigamist" remains an oddity, very much an artifact of its time, but worth viewing for its sensitive handling of male loneliness, a topic for which macho Hollywood has never had much time. The acting is first-rate from a trio of de-glamorized Hollywood professionals, including the poignant Lupino; there's also Edmond O'Brien in a low-key, nuanced portrayal of a man trapped by emotions, showing once again what a fine, intelligent performer he was. Notice how elliptically the pregnancy is presented, and how subtly Fontaine's career woman is projected into the breakup. Both are very much signs of that time. Although the subject matter may have tempted, the results never descend into bathos or soap-opera, even if final courtroom scene appears stagy and anti-climatic. All in all, it's a very well wrought balancing act.Lupino's reputation should not rest on gender. This film as well as so many of her others demonstrate what a versatile and unusual talent she was, whether in front of the camera or behind. Too bad, she never got the recognition from an industry to which she contributed so much.

Spikeopath The Bigamist is directed by Ida Lupino and adapted to screenplay by Collier Young from a story by Larry Marcus and Lou Schor. It stars Lupino herself with Edmund O'Brien, Joan Fontaine, Edmund Gwenn and Kenneth Tobey. Music is scored by Leith Stevens and cinematography by George Diskant.Harry Graham (O'Brien) tells adoption agency inspector Mr. Jordan (Gwenn) how he came to have two wives. One in Los Angeles (Lupino), the other in San Francisco (Fontaine).Initially released as part a double bill with Lupino's The Hitch-Hiker, The Bigamist is the lesser known film and the lesser thought of picture at that. Where The Hitch-Hiker is a more aggressive and claustrophobic noir picture, The Bigamist is more a Sirkian melodrama with noir touches. What transpires in the gifted hands of noir darling Lupino is a film examining a complex male protagonist, a guy suffering desperately from loneliness and alienation, his only moments of happiness comes in the arms of two women. If this sounds like Lupino is taking a sympathetic approach to Harry Graham? Then yes that is true, but he is portrayed as being morally ambiguous and weak, with the deft insertion of fate's deadly hand into the story as Harry tries on occasions to do the legal and right thing."I can't figure out my feelings towards you, I despise you, and I pity you. I don't even want to shake your hand, and yet I almost wish you luck." Once the story reaches the pinnacle, female parties are left dislocated, hurt and confused about their emotions, Harry is crushed, and we believe his pain because he is not a selfish bastard. Some of the most telling passages of dialogue come from other men, Gwenn's agency inspector and the Judge (John Maxwell) presiding over the court case, these helping to not stereotype the Graham character. The finale also refuses to take an easy way out, it's left deliberately ambiguous, the final shot open ended. Shot at real L.A. and Frisco locations, film has some nice visual touches. Harry in shadowy hotel rooms, his lonely walks down town, while venetian blinds feature and a shadowed bathed staircase banister showcases the talents of Diskant (On Dangerous Ground/The Narrow Margin/Kansas City Confidential). It's not an overtly film noir picture visually, but there are snatches in the mix. Cast are bang on form, with O'Brien particularly impressive when portraying conflicted emotions.It's not perfect, strong characters the lead trio may be, but they are all so nice, there's no edge there. There's an inside joke that comes off as flat and misplaced, while Stevens' score is often intrusive in desperately trying to set up emotional impact. But these are small complaints that don't stop the picture's great strengths from storming through to hold the attention. It's an interesting picture, a cautionary tale choosing to analyse rather than point the finger. It deserves to be more well known these days and certainly shouldn't be viewed as an apology for Bigamy. 7.5/10

calvinnme This film is unique among production code era dramas in that everyone is painted in shades of gray. It is not unique among production code dramas in that it displays some very old fashioned ideas, primarily that a woman will go somewhat bonkers if she finds out she cannot have children, and a symptom of a married woman gone bonkers is for her to take a deep interest in big business.In this film Eve Graham (Joan Fontaine) discovers about six years into her marriage to Harry Graham (Edmond OBrien) that she cannot have children. As a result she plunges herself into her husband's business and is always telling him that she trusts him completely while he is on the road in Los Angeles - something Harry actually takes as a bit of a rebuke. While on one of his many long business trips in L.A. Harry meets waitress Phyllis Martin (Ida Lupino). Harry intends just to keep it friendly between the two of them, but on the road and alone on his birthday things go too far and Phyllis becomes pregnant as a result. Phyllis is alone in the world, and having a rather difficult pregnancy, so Harry feels needed by her. He decides to call Eve, make a clean breast of it, and ask for a divorce so he can marry Phyllis. Unfortunately, the recent death of Eve's father has shocked her out of big business mode and the conversation Harry was going to have with Eve that was going to end it between them winds up being a conversation about adoption. So his new plan is this - marry Phyllis - who does not know Harry is already married - and stay married to Eve long enough for the adoption to go through because he doesn't want to leave Eve with nothing.The film paints Harry as a sympathetic albeit a somewhat weak character. He is torn between the sweetheart of his youth and the mother of his child, who, unfortunately, are two different people. In more simplistic directorial production code era hands Phyllis would have conveniently died in childbirth after producing Harry the son he always wanted, Harry would have confessed all to Eve who would have forgiven him, and the two would have lived happily ever after raising Harry's biological child. In this film things don't work out that tidily and how Harry, society - and the wives for that matter -handle this situation and its complete resolution are left somewhat up in the air.

Boba_Fett1138 Considering its resources and it's rather small budget, this is a pretty good movie, from director/actress Ida Lupino. It was made without the backing of any big studios but yet it starred some capable and big name actors in it, no doubt thanks to Lupino's connections in Hollywood. Ida Lupino was quite a big name actress at the time, thanks to roles she played in "High Sierra", "They Drive by Night" and "The Sea Wolf", among others. But due to her age good acting roles were becoming more hard and hard to get by. She then decided to do a not so common thing for a female at the time; she decided to direct and also write movies on her own. Not that she ever became much successful with it though but that seems hardly her fault. There were simply no big studios or producers at the time who dared to back a female director up at time, despite of her good reputation as an established actress. Therefor she got mostly stuck to directing low budget films that never got big releases. This is a real shame, since she definitely had some directing qualities and knew how to bring a good story to the screen.Perhaps with this movie Lupino also tried to make a social statement and address the issue of bigamy, which supposedly was happening on quite a large scale at the time but was of course not much talked about. So seems to me that this movie was handling a quite delicate matter, though the movie doesn't ever try to make a big issue out of it, or try to be preachy about it. You don't really know whether you should hate or care for this man and the situation that he got into, as the Edmund Gwenn character also says in the movie. You don't like him at first or what he is doing but yet you can also grow some understanding for him and hope things will work out for the good of him in the long run.It's pretty obvious that this movie was low budget, especially when you compare it to the other stuff that got done in 1953. It has a simplistic and cheap look over it but the movie sort of overcomes this all, thanks to its good story and the overall handling of it, by the director and actor.This movie has quite some big names in it, next to Ida Lupino herself of course. Edmond O'Brien plays the real main and not so grateful role of the movie. He does handle his character and manages to be unlikeable in the beginning but likely toward the end. Joan Fontaine also stars, as does her mother Lillian Fontaine, in a much smaller role. Definitely a good movie, also especially when consider its limited resources and the fact that a female directed it, in a time when this wasn't really socially accepted in Hollywood.7/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/