The File on Thelma Jordan

Assistant D.A. and troubled husband Cleve Marshall (Wendell Corey) is in his office avoiding his anniversary party when Thelma Jordon (Barbara Stanwyck) walks in to report an attempted burglary at her wealthy Aunt Vera's home. Already drunk, Marshall talks Thelma into going out for a drink, but it's Thelma who's on the prowl. When she is later charged with robbing and killing Aunt Vera, the love-blinded Marshall conspires with her to take the case and manipulate events so she is acquitted. It is only after the trial that Marshall learns Thelma had been plotting this scheme with another man for some time, but he also learns that Thelma has fallen in love with him. That may not be much compensation for disbarment and the loss of his wife and children, but in the noir world of Robert Siodmak's The File on Thelma Jordon, it will have to suffice.