Director: John Brahm
Year: 1942
Rating: 7.0
Unfortunately, this horror film was given a title that reeks of low budget
dross, but it is instead a rather fine B film with great gothic sets and
spooky atmospherics - like Wuthering Heights if Heathcliff was a werewolf.
That can be credited to director John Brahm who was to make some other terrific
B horror films before he was primarily relegated to television later in his
career - his Twilight Zone episode "Time Enough at Last" is a classic of
the show.
It strikes me as a shame that he never really had an opportunity to tackle
a more prestigious film as he creates wonderful visuals and was cracking
good at creating nervous tension in his films - this one was just a prelude
to The Lodger and Hanover House which today are looked on with great respect.
Brahm grew up in Germany where his father was a very respected theater director
and Brahm followed in his footsteps opening his own theater - but he could
see the writing on the wall when Hitler was elected and escaped Germany with
his actress wife, Dolly Haas. He ended up working at Twentieth Century Fox
but Zanuck took a dim view of Brahm after he refused to direct a film - and
threw him on this film almost as a punishment. But it looked so good for
its low budget that when The Lodger needed a director, they remembered Brahm.
Running at only a little over 60 minutes, Brahm has to zip his film along
and he does - introducing the viewer to the cursed Hammond family who have
suffered from tragedy for generations - mysterious deaths and suicides. Living
there now are a brother and sister (played by John Howard and the wonderfully
named Heather Angel who starred together in a number of Bulldog Drummond
films as a romantic couple). In the large gothic built house always shrouded
in fog are two elderly creepy servants (Halliwell Hobbes and Elly Malyon
who you would recognize as character actors in a second) who clearly know
more than they are saying. And as a good scary house needs there is a crypt
in the basement and a secret room that is always kept locked.
One night a woman is ravaged on the cliffs on a frosty night by a beast of
some kind and the brother is hurt trying to protect her. Scotland Yard shows
up in the form of actor James Ellison, best known for being in Westerns.
This is where the film falters - this takes place in England turn of last
century with all the actors speaking with proper English accents except for
Howard and Ellison who are as American as a gunfight and not even trying
to do an English accent. It is jarring in particular with Ellison whose broad
mid-western accent and acting is as subtle as a bulldozer. Still the film
even these many years later generates some nice chills along the way.
