They spy and gossip like women who all love the same soap opera. The allow another life to take over theirs. They put many of their personal problems aside to deal with this other story, and some of the subplots that run with it. Hitch makes great and startling comments about sex for a film so deeply entrenched in 50's sensibilities. The film's most sharp moment comes when a friend of Stewart's visits and sees Kelly's belongings in his apartment.
Looks can be deceiving, the film suggests.
And yet, at the same time, it tells us that what appears as truth probably is truth. Kelly's belongings are there, after all, because she is staying the night. Pretty heady stuff for 1954. Stewart and Kelly also struggle through their relationship, their sexuality, trying to find a path to happiness. It is no accident that the main story of the murder involves a man who has, apparently, murdered his wife.