The Stepmother

A building contractor (Rey) strangles his wife Margo's lover and while burying the body sees a a man beating up a Mexican girl who's later murdered. A cop (Anderson) fits the jigsaw together. Producer/director Avedis (who later answered to the first name Howard) scripted this overheated Southern California thriller: punctuated by ugly freeze shots, the plot trudges in a straight line, while striving to give the impression of twisting in the Chandler manner, and comes to a bloodstained conclusion when Margo (Justice) is discovered in bed (in almost forgotten justification of the come-on title) with her college stepson.