The Car Man (Bourne) opera. I didn't even know it that well, and I still don't know it that well, to be honest. I know there are parallels, but it was more the feeling of the music and the feeling of what we all know Carmen to be." The story is loosely based on the 1934 novel "The Postman Always Rings Twice" by American novelist James M. Cain (1892–1977) and the 1946 and 1981 films of the same name respectively starring John Garfield and Lana Turner, and Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange. In the films, Frank, a drifter, stops at a rural California diner
The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946 film) in his hotel room, where nobody could get him to stop drinking. Concerned about rumours that he was going to be replaced, Garfield and Turner decided to visit him on their own. Garfield could get nowhere with him, but Turner managed to convince him to go back to Los Angeles for treatment. When he returned a week later, the fog lifted, and they all went back to work. The on-set sexual tension between Garfield and Turner was clear to all involved with the film. Their first day together, he called out to her, "Hey, Lana, how's about a little quickie?"