Lightning Strikes Twice (1951) - King Vidor

 A solid mystery/melodrama which follows Shelly, a young actress on vacation.  On her arrival in a small town, she finds herself in the middle of a murder mystery where a man, Richard Trevelyan, has just been acquitted for  the murder of his wife, much to the dismay of the townspeople.  Lighting Strikes Twice uses Shelly as a window into this world, slowly revealing more and more details about the character- relationship dynamics of the town.  Up until the last 20 minutes or so of the film, we are still learning new, important details about characters, including Shelly, which add mystery and intrigue to who was ultimately responsible for the death of this Richard Trevelyan's wife.  While I didn't completely buy the relationship which quickly forms between Shelly and the acquitted man, it serves its purpose and in the end and doesn't hurt the film.  Visually the film has a few stand out scenes like when Shelly first arrives on a stormy night and is met through the window by the acquitted man, with a beautifully haunting composition.  Another sequence later, where Shelly talks with Mrs. Nolan, a woman who was a mother-figure to the acquitted, has a great visual composition as well, where we see the paternity which exists between these two characters with a strategically placed self portrait of Richard Trevelyan.  In the end the film is far from perfect, but it has a nice tone of ambiguity as we the viewer really have no idea who is responsible for the death of Richard Trevelyan's wife up until the very end. 
7.5/10

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