'The Bigamist'

I failed to initially see the signficance of this film. A simple black-and-white picture about a man that almost absentmindedly falls in love and begins taking care of two women. He marries both and his life is unraveled after trying to adopt a child with Joan Fontaine's character.

It's marginally acted, hokey 1950s storytelling (where the protagonist tells how he got in the pickle he's currently in), no huge names and you can find films made in the 1940s with better production.

Why this film is important is the director. It was directed by Ida Lupino. She not only plays Phyllis Martin, the so-called other woman, but it was directed by her. (Also, it was written by Collier Young, who had been married to Lupino and was currently married to Fontaine. But not at the same time.)

By the early 1950s, the "poor man's Bette Davis" quit the studio scene in Hollywood and became a free agent. When work dried up, she became a director. She didn't direct many films. In fact The Bigamist was her final motion picture before making the huge leap to TV where she directed a ton of stuff, including being the only woman to direct an episode of "The Twilight Zone." Also, she was the second woman inducted into the Director's Guild.

Sometimes, the film is inconsequential.