The Great Lie (1941)

  This is from my Bette Davis collection.  It's a straightforward melodrama and not one of my favorites, though it does give Bette a chance to play sweet and (kinda) innocent.

Pete Van Allen (George Brent) married concert pianist Sandra (Mary Astor) after a drunken party but discovers that her previous divorce hadn't gone through.  This gives him a second chance, of sorts, and he rushes back to his on-again-off-again true love, Maggie (Bette Davis).  She encourages him to quit drinking and put his navigational skills to good use, flying reconnaissance for the government after their wedding.  Unfortunately, Pete's plane goes down in the Amazon and he is presumed killed. Desperate, Maggie reaches out to Sandra, who has claimed to be pregnant with Pete's child, and makes her an offer.  If Sandra gives Maggie the baby, Maggie will ensure Sandra's financial security for the rest of her life.  Sandra agrees and gives up the child.  But then Pete comes back.

All the characters in this are very one-dimensional, but none more so than Sandra.  She is every bad trait a woman can have:  spiteful, snide, selfish, and jealous.  By contrast, Maggie comes across as a saint, bravely putting up with Sandra's moods so she can care for her husband's baby.  It culminates in a showdown where Pete is asked to choose between the woman he married and the woman who bore his child and then sold it to the woman he married.  There's a contest.

I'm going to chalk this up to being a product of its time so I can't hate on it too much, but there aren't really any redeeming features.