Dan Hodges is a film writer whose work will be included in the forthcoming 4th Edition of Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference to the American Style.

For Goodis, Hollywood was a radiant lamplight on an otherwise dark road to nowhere. The Unfaithful is his sole memento from his short sojourn in La La Land. Though derided as a remake of the Bette Davis vehicle The Letter, Goodis's rich repurposing puts Ann Sheridan back in her game as a wartime adulteress paying the price once the troops come home. When a past lover accosts her, Sheridan retaliates with a handy Japanese ceremonial knife, undoubtedly spoils of war brought back by her husband (Zachary Scott). An initial denial of mayhem gives way to a torrent of lies. Goodis's sobering script takes on a social ill few would recognize today: the consequences of the martial inspiring the marital in a hasty wartime marriage. Though this dank hanky of a drama is about infidelity at its noir-inflected heart, The Unfaithful stays true to family values-a rare glimpse of Goodis being good.