Spoilers.
The complicity of women characters in maintaining the rape culture of mid-twentieth-century white society makes movies like Peyton Place (1957) hard to watch. While the three women protagonists are each strong in their own ways, they refuse to buck the suffocating culture that only places value on women when they are possessed by men. The sexual, emotional, and psychological possession of the three women plays out in the eponymous town "with a seductively beautiful facade that hides a plethora of ills." Scandal, malicious gossip, secrets, rape, child abuse, suicide, and murder fill the plot of this frankly disturbing film (see Wikipedia for the basic plot). Nominated for many academy awards: I guess we know what people want to watch ... sadly. Lana Turner's acting is luminous, and I wanted to watch this film as a North American cultural artifact that has had an enormous influence on white storytelling. The ending highlights a few happy reconciliation moments, and a jury finds the young woman not guilty of murdering her rapist stepfather who had impregnated her; however, I recommend that you save yourself the 2h 42m (!) running time and watch something more edifying and life-affirming.
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