Dark Waters
                             
Director: Andre De Toth
Year: 1944
Rating: 7.0
Deep in the Bayou where mosquitos are the size of pigeons, the heat makes you wilt by noon and all the fetid plants smell of death and decay. Nothing good ever happens in the Bayou except perhaps Southern Gothic novels and movies. Most of the film is set in an old southern mansion that feels like it is the keeper of secrets hidden in the dark shadows, you can nearly smell the mildew in the air, the perspiration on the people around you. Wander out for a moonlit night and try to avoid the quicksand that will swallow you up without a trace that you ever were. Not a place for someone with brittle nerves and shattered memories. This is where Leslie Calvin winds up after being one of four survivors of a ship sunk by a U-Boat. Her parents were not so lucky.

 

She wakes up in a hospital in New Orleans and after recovering she needs a place to go. Her mother had a sister and she writes to her and is welcomed to stay with them. She has never met them and is happy to have a family to go to after her ordeal. The first sign that something is amiss is when they don't meet her at the train station and she passes out. Dr. Grover (Franchot Tone) helps her up and immediately falls in love. Probably not a lot of beauties in the bayou and played by Merle Oberon she is entrancing. Of course, after seeing Tone in Phantom Lady I will never entirely trust him again. He drives her to the sugar plantation where she meets her aunt (Fay Bainter) and uncle (John Qualen, without his usual Swedish accent). They have two friends staying with them, Sydney (Thomas Mitchell) and Cleve (Elisha Cook Jr.) who seem to do nothing but cling to Leslie like glue on a stamp.

 

It is obvious to the audience that something is not right here. But it takes the heroine a bit longer to figure that out. Cleve keeps trying to flirt with her like one of the irritating mosquitos, buzzing around and Sydney keeps bringing up the war which grinds on her fraught nerves. The Uncle stays in his workshop all the time and the aunt seems swell. But something is wrong. Nicely directed by André De Toth, who keeps it moving and injects enough mystery to keep it tense. Nina Mae McKinney plays the maid in a small part. Called the Black Garbo after her great performance as the seductress in Hallelujah and success in Paris. And another black actor, Rex Ingram, plays a field hand. He was the Djinn in The Thief of Bagdad and Jim in Huckleberry Finn. A solid suspenseful film with a set of great actors.