BOOK (1934)

The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain (Orion)

For many, The Postman Always Rings Twice will be forever associated with the sight of Jack Nicholson's hairy backside while he is doing all manner of unmentionables to Jessica Lange on a flour-strewn kitchen table.

Directed by Bob Rafelson in 1981, this was the third film adaptation of James M. Cain's classic work of crime fiction: Luchino Visconti released Ossessione in 1943, starring Clara Calamai and Massimo Girotti; and Tay Garnett was behind the first Hollywood film noir version starring Lana Turner and John Garfield in 1946.

Whether any of these capture the heat of Cain's original is open to debate.

Sex and violence hang heavy in the air from the moment ex-con Frank Chambers drifts up at the Twin Oak Tavern and into the lives of Nick Papadakis and his wife Cora.

Initially, it seems an unlikely love (and death) triangle. Frank's first glimpse of Cora convinces him that 'except for the shape, she really wasn't any raving beauty'.

Indeed, he goes on to say Cora's sulky look and pouting lips 'made me want to smash them in for her'. In fact, Cora is a typical Cain heroine: an amoral, scheming sex bomb (think Iago with curves), she provides a template for Phyllis Nirdlinger in Cain's other masterpiece, Double Indemnity.