by Frank Calvillo
“That woman’s a witch. No matter how you spell it.” That’s the best way to categorize Carolyn Ellenson Grant (Marie Windsor), the main character of the little-seen No Man’s Woman, one of the latest of the forgotten noir entries to finally see the light of day on home video.
Art gallery owner Carolyn, the “woman” of the title, is as ruthless and conniving as femme fatales can get. She’s remained married to her current husband Harlow (John Archer), even though they live apart, and refuses to give him a divorce to marry his new sweetheart Louise (Nancy Gates) unless he turns over the vast majority of his fortune. At the same time, Carolyn’s secret alliance with the art critic from the L.A. times has resulted in his firing, while her attempts at seducing her employee’s (Jil Jarmyn) fiance Dick (Richard Crane) only add to her sinister trail. When someone murders Carolyn late one Friday night however, the police have their work cut out for them since virtually everyone in the scheming woman’s life had a reason to kill her.
No Man’s Woman belongs to the crop of genre titles which can be called post-noir, rather than neo-noir. Although the heyday of film noir came to a close at the start of the ’50s, certain writers and producers were determined to not let the genre die and continued to churn out such films, regardless of the fact that their sell-by date had passed. Some of those titles, such as No Man’s Woman, seem out of place even today and almost feel like dinosaurs when they’re out of their respective decade.
At the same time however, films like No Man’s Woman can prove to be some of more interesting entries in the genre due to the fact that they are able to keep so many of the beloved genre tropes, while also incorporating twists into the conventions. In No Man’s Woman, it’s the image of a femme fatale who acts as a fiercely independent woman with her own thriving business in the 1950s. Carolyn may be as evil as any femme fatale ever to hit the screen, but she’s ambitious and business-minded in ways past prototypes never were.
If nothing else, No Man’s Woman works as a showstopping example of how underrated an actress Windsor was and the kind of levels she was capable of reaching. Windsor came into prominence at a time when actresses were pegged into one kind of character, which became their trademark. This is certainly true in Windsor’s case as the actress made her mark in films playing the most conniving kinds of women. However, the beauty of Windsor’s talent is that she plays them like no one else.
Windsor’s most famous role is that of Elisha Cook Jr.’s shady wife in Stanley Kubrick’s incredibly brilliant noir heist film The Killing. In that film, as in No Man’s Woman, the actress is so magnetic to the point that you literally begin to hate the innocent individuals caught in her grasp. Seeing Windsor here as a rich Beverly Hills art dealer with an evil streak that never lets up was certainly a twist on her femme fatale screen persona, and showed how versatile she could be, even within the realm of typecasting.
Admittedly, No Man’s Woman becomes a somewhat weak whodunnit once Windsor leaves the film. Yet there’s enough of a passable story here, not to mention the actress’ great work, which makes No Man’s Woman a pretty decent way to kill some time.