The Letter (1940)

User Rating:

7.8/10   

Director:

William Wyler

Writers:

W. Somerset Maugham (play)
Howard Koch (screenplay)

Release Date:

23 November 1940 (USA)

Genre:

Crime | Drama | Film-Noir | Mystery

Tagline:

With all my heart I still love the man I killed

Plot:

The wife of a rubber plantation administrator shoots a man to death and claims it was self-defense; a letter in her own hand may prove her undoing.

Plot Keywords:

Letter | Widow | Plantation | Murder | Rubber Plantation

Awards:

Nominated for 7 Oscars.

Cast

Bette Davis	...	Leslie Crosbie
Herbert Marshall	...	Robert Crosbie
James Stephenson	...	Howard Joyce
Frieda Inescort	...	Dorothy Joyce
Gale Sondergaard	...	Mrs. Hammond
Bruce Lester	...	John Withers
Elizabeth Inglis	...	Adele Ainsworth (as Elizabeth Earl)
Cecil Kellaway	...	Prescott
Victor Sen Yung	...	Ong Chi Seng (as Sen Yung)
Doris Lloyd	...	Mrs. Cooper
Willie Fung	...	Chung Hi
Tetsu Komai	...	Head Boy
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Zita Baca	...	Undetermined Role (uncredited)
Brooks Benedict	...	Party Guest (uncredited)
David Bruce	...	Undetermined Role (uncredited)
Roland Got	...	Undetermined Role (uncredited)
Otto Hahn	...	Bartender at Party (uncredited)
Holmes Herbert	...	Bob's Friend (uncredited)
Charles Irwin	...	Bob's Friend (uncredited)
Pete G. Katchenaro	...	Undetermined Role (uncredited)
Crauford Kent	...	Bob's Friend at Bar (uncredited)
Al Lloyd	...	Extra at Trial (uncredited)
Leonard Mudie	...	Fred (uncredited)
David Newell	...	Geoffrey Hammond (uncredited)
Thomas Pogue	...	Juror #10 (uncredited)
John Ridgely	...	Driver (uncredited)
Douglas Walton	...	Well Wisher (uncredited)
Leo White	...	Extra at Trial (uncredited)

Directed by
William Wyler

Writing credits
W. Somerset Maugham		(play)
Howard Koch		(screenplay)

Produced by
Robert Lord	....	associate producer
Hal B. Wallis	....	executive producer
William Wyler	....	producer

Original Music by
Max Steiner

Cinematography by
Tony Gaudio		(director of photography)

Film Editing by
George Amy
Warren Low

Art Direction by
Carl Jules Weyl

Costume Design by
Orry-Kelly		(gowns)

Makeup Department
Perc Westmore	....	makeup artist

Production Management
Jack L. Warner	....	executive in charge of production
Robert Ross	....	unit manager (uncredited)

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Chuck Hansen	....	assistant director (uncredited)
Sherry Shourds	....	assistant director (uncredited)

Sound Department
Dolph Thomas	....	sound

Music Department
Leo F. Forbstein	....	musical director
Hugo Friedhofer	....	orchestral arranger

Other crew
John Villasin	....	technical advisor
Louis Vincenot	....	technical advisor

Production Companies

• Warner Bros. Pictures (A Warner Bros.-First National Picture) (A William Wyler Production)

Distributors

• Warner Bros. Pictures (1940) (USA) (theatrical)
• MGM/UA Home Entertainment (1992) (USA) (video) (laserdisc)
• M.P.E.A. (1949) (West Germany) (theatrical)
• MGM/UA Home Entertainment (????) (USA) (VHS)
• Warner Home Video (2005) (USA) (DVD)

Runtime:

95 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Certification:

Canada:G (Ontario) | USA:TV-PG (TV rating) | Canada:PG (video rating) | West Germany:16 | Argentina:13 | Australia:PG | Finland:K-16 | Sweden:15 | USA:Approved (PCA #6442)

Filming Locations:

Warner Brothers Burbank Studios - 4000 Warner Boulevard, Burbank, California, USA

Company:

Warner Bros. Pictures

Trivia:

Merle Oberon and Walter Huston had starred in a Lux Radio Theatre version two years before.

Goofs:

Continuity: When Betty and her lawyer are in Chinatown to collect the letter from the widow, there is a padlock on the door while they are waiting outside the building. Seconds later, a man unlocks the door from the inside.

Quotes:

Robert Crosbie: If you love a person, you can forgive anything.

Movie Connections:

Spoofed in My Friend Irma Goes West (1950)

My baby, she wrote me a letter

The opening sequence to William Wyler's "The Letter" is arguably the best of his career. A full moon in an exotic location with plantation workers sleeping in hammocks, the camera tracks around the tranquil scene hinting of injustice and oppression. As the camera moves toward the main house, the night is pierced by a gunshot and a man staggers out followed by a woman who continues to fire the weapon. The moving camera zooms in on the act and it sets a vivid picture in the viewer's mind of all the ambiguity that's to follow.

Bette Davis may have never been more convincing as a well-bred woman who must account for a lurid act. First to her husband, then the police and finally to her attorney, James Stephensen who matches Davis scene for scene as the respectable veneer is masterfully peeled off by Somerset Maugham's sensational script. Maugham succeeds in teaching us a lesson on the hypocrisy of privilege and oppression of the Colonial Imperialists, managing to entertain us as well with first rate melodrama that still rivets modern audiences.

Tony Gaudio's masterful cinematography compliments the proceedings and Wyler never misses a step in the pacing of a screen adaptation of a theatrical work. That this doesn't ever feel stagebound may be it's biggest achievement.

As lives are ripped open and relationships and reputations ruined, we never lose sympathy for anyone. And when justice is delivered it comes at the hands of those who are oppressed, and for the time, that's revolutionary.