John Garfield of the last film, based on the life of Al Schmid, a war hero blinded in combat. In preparing for the role, Garfield lived for several weeks with Schmid and his wife in Philadelphia and would blindfold himself for hours at a time. After the war, Garfield starred in a series of successful films such as "The Postman Always Rings Twice" (1946) with Lana Turner, "Humoresque" (1946) with Joan Crawford, and the Oscar-winning Best Picture "Gentleman's Agreement" (1947). In "Gentleman's Agreement", Garfield took a featured, but supporting, part because he believed deeply in the film's exposé of antisemitism in America.
Portrayal of women in film noir Cora in "The Postman Always Rings Twice", 1946, she “exhibits a remarkable series of unmotivated character switches and roles.” In her introductory shot she is seen as a sex bomb, a desired sex object through the narrators eyes, yet she juxtaposes this vision as a hard working woman, then a “loving playmate in an adulterous relationship; a fearful girl in need of protection, [a] victim of male power; [a] hard, ruthless murderess; [a] mother-to-be;” then following that she is a sacrifice to the judicial system. This inconsistency can be seen as a parallel to the unsureness of the hero’s trajectory,