Honestly, this is a pretty crappy film noir. Ossessione was a much better version of this story. The acting is pretty hammy and the dialogue is pretty obvious and blatant with its story beats. The writing kind of hits the nail on the head pretty directly with lines such as, “Yea dead as a doornail!” And other beats where the main character is almost making himself culpable and obviously guilty in front of the police officer. No one acts that revealing of their secret. The film is part of the film noir trope and genre and performs the lighting and story beats as such but it is void of any real feeling or form when compared to the Maltese Falcon or Double Indemnity. I think people honestly came to watch Lana Turner be sexy and murder her husband and try to get away with it. This film hits the same appeal as an airplane book that has cheap sex thrills and a shoddy murder mystery plot that just allows excuses for more soft-core porn scenes.
One shot I will give this film credit for in advancing film storytelling technique is the sequence of Lana's lipstick dropping on the floor and rolling to indicate that she is dead. That like the shot of Rosebud falling in Citizen Kane are these moments of almost anthropomorphizing these props through following them or shooting them in a motion that has a key story beat to it but the beat is only suggested through what happens to the object. In both cases the fact that they fall to the floor suggest death.