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to drink” and caused Breen to issue a warning to Wilson regarding the stu-dio’s racy publicity.⁷⁵

An August 20,1945, Life magazine article,“Love at Laguna Beach,” stated that MGM bought Cain’s“tough novel of adultery and murder” in 1934 but thought it was “too hot to handle” and “did not dare make it into a movie. Times changed, however, and so did MGM’s mind.” Citing MGM’s decision to “go ahead” with production of Cain’s “hot story,” Life announced that the studio was “giving it everything, including a sizzling beach scene” where Turner, “wearing a white bathing suit which may become historie, tests the true love” of Garfield, who “helped murder her husband.”⁷⁶ Several steamy, suggestive beach photos of the couple accompanied the piece. The Life item mortified Reverend H. Parr Armstrong of the Oklahoma City Council of Churches.⁷⁷ Surprisingly, though, Breen defended MGM’s production of Cains story—and its potentially scandalous publicity—to national religious organizations. In fact, on September 19,1945, Breen wrote to Dr. Samuel McCrea Cavert of the Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America: “We believe the finished picture will not be offensive to anyone. It is a psy-chological study of two murderers who seek to cheat justice, but who fail in the attempt. I need not tell you that Metro, in its screen production, has madę many drastic changes in the story as told in the novel. I am certain that, while the film story is ‘strong meat,’ it will be an acceptable picture for adults.”⁷⁸

Several sawy production and marketing strategies account for Breen’s about-face in support of the MGM project. After all, Double Indemnity had been nominated for several Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and Stanwyck’s performance was winning accolades. Rather than the Chan-dleresque repartee of Double Indemnity, The Postman Always Rings Twice evaded censors by suggesting innuendo in scenes without the use of dia-logue. Carey Wilson called Postman a “Study in White.”⁷⁹ In a 1946 publicity interview, “ ‘The Postman’ Emerges as Torrid Movie,” Wilson highlights “Miss Turner’s charms,” explaining, “Except for one costume, everything she wears is white... In one scene she wears a bra and shorts. And I’m afraid Miss Turner’s legs are very, very nice.”⁸⁰ (Actually, there are several black costumes—such as a black robę and dress—strategically positioned at the murderous end of the film for dramatic femme fatale effect.) Cain noted that MGM writer Harry Ruskin diffused the erotic steam of his story by dothing Lana Turner in scores of white costumes to suggest purity (and ob-viously appease the PCA).⁸¹ Still, there was theory, and there was practice. As evident in the lurid beach promotion for The Postman Always Rings

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Twice, white could still blaze by way of Turner’s two-piece bathing suit and did not necessarily imply demureness. The MGM production used high-key lighting and a bright set, which countered the shadowy noir visua! design of Double Indemnity. Unlike the stark newsreel style Seitz employed in Double Indemnity, The Postman Always Rings Twice is shot in MGM’s slick, fiat, big-budget, polished style. Conseąuently, Metro’s film is not very dark photographically—certainly not at all as visually black and hard-hitting in cinematography as the earlier Paramount film. An exception is the ominous climax, where Garfield returns to a black-robed Turner, as the classic femme holds a gleaming butcher knife, in a shadowy kitchen just pripr to plotting the murder of her husband.

Ov'erall, however, the film was decidedly sanitized. To appease Breen, many of the graphic references to sex and violence in Cain’s novel were eliminated. Particularly suggestive passages of carnal lust and savagery were supplanted with metaphor and innuendo. Perhaps the best example illus-trating metaphor in Cain’s “red-meat” story is Garnett’s actual cut to ham-burgers sizzling and burning on the grill following Garfield’s introduction to Turner early in the film. The way the seąuence is shot is highly sugges-tive, relative to the PCA-approved screenplay. Garnett’s shooting script references Frank (Garfield) looking over at Córa (Turner) near the kitchen door. Cora’s entrance is precipitated by an “opened lipstick” rolling in from the adjacent room, which Garnett adroitly circled, adding a fairly innocu-ous transition: “Insert lipstick—Pan slowly from lipstick to Córa.” The script then reads: “Standing in the kitchen doorway, almost imperiously... is Córa ... wearing a white playsuit, shorts and a halter, plain white high-heeled pumps.. . looking at Frank impassively.”⁸² What is less obvious from this description—and Garnett’s handwritten directions—is how the scene is actually executed onscreen. Turner’s neckline, bare midriff, and tight, white shorts contradict her mild demeanor. Furthermore, the point of view of Garnett’s (low-angle) pan from the opened lipstick on the floor, up Turner’s legs, added a sexually charged means of introducing the star— while technically complying with the Codę. To this strategy MGM added punitive retribution and compensating morał values—the bad guys get it in the end. Like Cain’s story, although illicit lovers Frank and Córa get away with killing her husband and attempt to flee, rather than the murderous couple going off (or even going down) together, they are fatally separated, Córa being killed in a car accident and Frank arrested for her murder. As the film ends, he awaits the electric chair. As Breen reąuired, if characters commit adultery or crime, they will die or do time. A flashback narration