The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981)

Synopsis

Itinerant troublemaker Frank Chambers (Jack Nicholson) has a meal at a roadside restaurant and meets devastating femme fatale Cora Papadakis (Jessica Lange).

As it turns out, Cora is married to the restaurant's owner, Nick (John Colicos). Happy to have a visitor, Papadakis offers Chambers a job.

Chambers stays on and begins to help himself to whatever he likes -- including Cora. The two dive headlong into a torrid romance and begin to plot the perfect murder.



Cast: Jack Nicholson, Jessica Lange, John Colicos, Michael Lerner, John P. Ryan, Anjelica Huston, William Traylor, Ron Flagge, William Newman, Chuck Liddell, Albert Henderson, Christopher Lloyd


The star of the 1946 version, Lana Turner, did not watch the remake, but said she had seen advertisements and blurbs on television that made her sick: she resented how the studio "turned it into such pornographic trash".

The film was screened out of competition at the 1981 Cannes Film Festival. Upon release, the film was poorly received by many critics, who felt that the remake of the 1946 film of the same name was wasted. They also believed the ending was "very weak" compared to the original film. They also criticized that the meaning of the title is not explained in the remake, which led to confusion among viewers.

Jack Nicholson later said "If you ran a question through this industry about The Postman Always Rings Twice, most people would surmise that it wasn't successful. That is not true. I know it made money, because I received overages, so it must've grossed about as much as Chinatown and much more than Carnal Knowledge. But people are anxious to disqualify it."

Read about this film

Country: West Germany | United States
Language: English
Color: Color
Runtime: 122 min.