Opening up the mailbag for a venerable plot device

In Jim Jarmusch’s new film, “Broken Flowers,” which opens Friday, an aging Lothario (Bill Murray) receives an anonymous letter from an old girlfriend, informing him that he is the father of her 19-year-old son. As he sets out to visit his former flames to discover who sent the letter, the missive forces the lonely Don Juan to confront his failed relationships with women.

Letters have long been an important plot point in movies whether they be love letters, poison-pen notes, blackmail attempts -- or letters that get crossed in the mail.

One of the best films in which correspondence is a catalyst is the sultry 1940 tropical melodrama “The Letter.” Based on the hit play by Somerset Maugham, “The Letter” opens with Bette Davis emptying her pistol into the body of a man. She tells her dull but earnest husband (Herbert Marshall) that she shot him in self-defense. But when Davis learns that the murdered man’s wife has an incriminating letter revealing that Davis asked the man to meet her that fateful night, she must use her clueless husband’s savings to buy the letter. Directed by William Wyler, “The Letter” was nominated for several Oscars including best actress for Davis.

Henri-Georges Clouzot’s claustrophobic 1943 thriller “Le Corbeau” examines the effect of poison-pen letters on a French village. Rumors -- the town’s doctor is accused of having affairs and performing abortions -- fear, backstabbing and suspicion grip the community as the villagers’ secrets are revealed in anonymous letters. Otto Preminger turned “Le Corbeau” into “The 13th Letter” (1951), starring Linda Darnell, Michael Rennie and Charles Boyer.

In the haunting 1948 “Letter From an Unknown Woman,” a roguish pianist (Louis Jourdan) is attempting to flee Vienna to avoid a duel with a woman’s husband when he is given a letter from a woman (Joan Fontaine) of whom he has no memory. But he learns from the letter how pivotal she has been in his life.

Joseph L. Mankiewicz won Academy Awards for best director and screenplay for his delicious 1949 comedy drama “A Letter to Three Wives.” The wives (Linda Darnell, Ann Sothern, Jeanne Crain) of the title are waiting to board a boat with their children when they are handed a letter. The elegantly written note is from their friend Addie Ross (the voice of Celeste Holm) who informs the trio she’s run off with one of their husbands -- but doesn’t reveal which one. Paul Douglas, Kirk Douglas and Jeffrey Lynn play the spouses.