Noirvember Fatale Attractions: Bette Davis in The Letter (1940) 💋

 

It begins with gunfire under a velvet moon, a woman in white, a man collapsing on the veranda, and the echo of something far more dangerous than passion. From that first shot, The Letter (1940) wraps us in its silken web of deceit, desire, and moral decay.

 

 

Directed by William Wyler and starring Bette Davis as Leslie Crosbie, this tale traces back to W. Somerset Maugham’s 1927 stage play, which first inspired a 1929 pre-Code version starring Jeanne Eagels (and even earlier, a silent short in 1925). But it was Davis who transformed Leslie into the ultimate study in controlled destruction — every glance measured, every lie delivered like a lullaby.

 

 

 “With all my heart, I still love the man I killed.”

 

That single line tells you everything. Leslie isn’t the raw chaos of Ann Savage’s Vera; she’s the calm storm before it hits. Dressed in white, she cloaks her guilt in gentility, a woman who shoots first and smooths her skirt after. Her power lies not in seduction, but in the way she performs innocence.

 

 

Opposite her is Herbert Marshall as the trusting husband, and James Stephenson as her lawyer, both drawn helplessly into her orbit. Under Wyler’s elegant direction and Tony Gaudio’s luminous cinematography, the lush Malaysian plantation becomes a stage for moral rot, where every shadow whispers guilt.

 

 

Fun Trivia: During filming, Bette Davis insisted that her wardrobe, especially that famous white lace dress she wears in the opening scene, be pure white to contrast with the violence of the murder. She believed the image of a “refined woman committing a brutal act” would be even more shocking against such innocence. Davis later said it was one of her favorite roles because it let her be, in her words, “utterly feminine and completely ruthless.”

 

 

 

Nominated for seven Academy Awards, The Letter remains one of the defining works of noir melodrama, proof that Bette Davis didn’t need a gun to be dangerous; her eyes were weapons enough.

Leslie doesn’t just tell lies. She is the lie.

 

 

Fade to black… until the next Fatale Attraction.