El extraño caso de Martha Ivers

this movie is one of those lost gems. barbara stanwyck and kirk douglas do a great job but they are not the reason this is a great gem. van heflin (of shane) and lizabeth scott are superb and in some ways overshadow kirk douglas in his screen debut and stanwyck. lizabeth smolders and pouts her way to perfection, what a babe!!. lizabeth should have been a huge star especially in the film noir genre. both van heflin and lizabeth scott are massively underrated and typically not remembered. that is a shame since they both were fine actors, that is the present generations loss. the plot is superb and throws some nice curves that keeps you on your toes.

Lewis Milestone's The Strange Love of Martha Ivers presents a, well, strange case. Much if not most of it fits comfortably into the noir cycle that was just gathering its head of steam. But its look, save some recurrent bus-station shots, suggests lavish and well-lit prestige productions (as does its length), and in its deep-rooted narrative it harks back to sprawling, brooding melodramas such as Kings Row.

That narrative is broken-backed as well, with two disjointed time frames. The movie opens in 1928 in sooty Iverstown, a steel city almost certainly somewhere in Pennsylvania. There we meet, as teenagers, three of the story's principals: Unruly Martha, making yet another attempt to run away from her wealthy, rigid aunt (Judith Anderson); her street-urchin buddy Sammy; and prissy school-teacher's son Walter. On the night Anderson is bludgeoned to death (to the tune of lightning, thunder and crashing rains), Sammy waits for Martha to join him; when she doesn't, he signs up with the circus and blows town.

Fast-forward to 1946, when decorated veteran Sammy (Van Heflin), headed west, cracks up his car and finds himself once more in Iverstown. He meets up with the fourth main character, Lizabeth Scott, who not unlike himself has been knocked about (she's a jailbird). When the police lock her up for violating parole, he pays a visit to his old friend Walter (Kirk Douglas, in his debut), now the district attorney, to secure her release.

Douglas, who rarely draws a sober breath, holds the office thanks to the ambition and power of his wife Martha (Barbara Stanwyck). (The original publicity campaign cautioned `Whisper her name!') When she shows up unexpectedly and warmly greets Heflin, all Douglas' insecurities and jealousies erupt; not only does he suspect that Heflin has always been his wife's first love but he fears that Heflin, privy to the long-buried secret of the aunt's death, can undo his marriage, his success, and the industrial empire Stanwyck has built. He takes heavy-handed measures to defend himself, blackmailing Scott into framing Heflin. But hasn't reckoned with the resourcefulness of his adversary – or with the wilfulness of his wife.

But the story is really plotted along romantic coordinates whose intersections are punctuated by Miklos Rozsa's throbbing score. Douglas loves Stanwyck, who really loves Heflin, while Scott loves Heflin, who loves her back but still has unfinished business with Stanwyck (no wonder Douglas drinks – nobody loves him). And in the rondelay of turnabouts and betrayals (or seeming betrayals), The Strange Love of Martha Ivers slips perilously close to soap opera. Its stately pace and prosperous look give it a dated, ponderous feel, quite unlike the rough sleekness of film noir, though there's an unmistakable echo of Double Indemnity – Stanwyck's performance as Martha Ivers reworks hers as Phyllis Dietrichson, right down to the concluding love-death tableau.

But, while occasionally cumbersome, The Strange Love of Martha Ivers stands on its own as an overwrought, obsessive drama, with a very topical acknowledgment of the insulation that money and power can buy, and of the moral and social corruption that inflexibly comes as part of the package. It's a strange movie, all right, but a haunting one as well.

This is a well-written, well-acted, thoroughly absorbing film noir. The always-great Barbara Stanwyck is at her sultriest as Martha, and Van Heflin is incredibly sexy and masculine as Sam. Watching this movie, you wouldn't think Kirk Douglas, who plays the weak-willed, alcoholic Walter, would soon become a bigger star than Heflin and play the tough, romantic hero parts like Sam Masterson. Douglas excelled at those parts, as he did with a very different type of part in this movie, but I can't help thinking that if Heflin had gotten more of those roles, he would have been just as big a star. Husky-voiced Lizabeth Scott rounds out the star foursome nicely as Toni, a wrong-side-of-the-tracks girl who's been burned by trusting the wrong men. This movie, more than most of its era, trades in shades of gray; the "bad" characters, Martha and Walter, have reasons for the evil they do, while the "good" characters, Sam and Toni, are no angels--he's a decorated war hero, but he makes his living by gambling and once killed a man in self-defense, while she just got out of jail. This complexity adds to the film's interest. The film also provides a believable depiction of small-town life; it's realistic, no Bedford Falls. The flashback portraying several of the characters as teenagers has the spark of reality as well. Highly recommended.

Martha Ivers, a young girl under the guardianship of her grandmother played by Judith Anderson, tries often to run away, but is brought back every time. Grandma is one powerful autocratic and twisted old woman. One night after Grandma kills the girl's cat, she kills her. Her tutor's son sees the deed and now has blackmail power. Young Martha also thinks someone else has seen the deed, young Sam Masterson who she has a yen for. He actually skedaddled before witnessing anything.

Flash forward several years. Now everyone is grown up. Barbara Stanwyck is Martha and she's married the tutor's son played by Kirk Douglas in his film debut. He's also the District Attorney. And the main action of the film begins as grown up Sam Masterson who is played by Van Heflin comes back to his home town. He's treated rather strangely and it takes him a while to figure out why.

Life has a funny way of working out and Stanwyck has essentially turned into Anderson. Heflin is no real hero here either, he's quite willing to engage in some blackmail. But he's redeemed somewhat by the love of another girl from the wrong side of the tracks, Lizabeth Scott.

The film is memorable for two reasons, the power packed performance of Barbara Stanwyck and the debut of Kirk Douglas. This is a choice Barbara Stanwyck role, a powerful ruthless woman who'll do anything to keep and protect what's hers.

It's odd that Kirk Douglas makes his debut as a weakling, but even stranger that the dynamism that is his screen trademark is so well hidden in this portrayal. This part isn't exactly Spartacus. But Kirk is one capable player.

Heflin and Scott do well in their respective parts, but even though she's only on the screen for the first 15 minutes the one you won't forget is Judith Anderson. Seeing Stanwyck with her machinations later on, you wonder what must have made Anderson such a twisted human being.

The Strange Loves of Martha Ivers is a well plotted melodrama that does credit to all involved.

Knowing absolutely NOTHING about this movie (apart from it being the screen debut of Kirk Douglas) I thought it was going to be a potboiler, but I was pleasantly surprised at how good it was. It veers between Noir and melodrama, and I gotta say I was hooked from the get go. I'm not the biggest Barbara Stanwyck fan in the world, but she was well cast as the ruthless matriarch of a small town, and Douglas really pulled off an unusual role for him (basically a drunken wimp). Van Heflin ('Shane') plays the "hero" and holds his own against those two, and I also really liked Lizabeth Scott, an actress I'm not familiar with, who plays Heflin's love interest (sorta). 'The Strange Love Of Martha Ivers' will please fans of 1940s Noir. It deserves to be better known than it is.