Uploaded October 2021 | Updated September 2026, 2 hours ago

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Very loosely based on the novel by James Gould Cozzens and directed by John Sturges, this film focuses on lawyers and their families in a Massachusetts town, and their love lives - are they by love possessed or by lust possessed? Although Lana Turner is top-billed (which not only indicates her star power but also that this was an attempt to cash in on her previous successes, "Peyton Place" and "Imitation Of Life"), it's very much an ensemble piece. Turner's husband attorney Jason Robards is crippled but won't give her a divorce, so she falls into an affair with his fellow attorney, Efrem Zimbalist Jr, who has his own problems, namely his distant relationship with his wife, Barbara Bel Geddes, and his rebellious son, George Hamilton, who is expected to wed an orphan heiress (Susan Kohner, Hamilton's fiancee at the time in real life), but he doesn't love her and gets bored with the relationship. He has a fling with the local bad girl, Yvonne Craig, which gets him in hot water when she accuses him of rape after he declines to have more intimate time with her. Tragedy happens along the way, but the film ends on a hopeful note. Not the best of its kind, but enjoyable enough, with decent performances and music by Elmer Bernstein.