Showing posts with label Hugo Haas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hugo Haas. Show all posts
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| Eleanor Parker and Richard Boone |
Elizabeth (Eleanor Parker of Home for the Holidays) is a timid soul who works in a museum and receives threatening notes from someone named "Lizzie." Then Elizabeth begins hitting the bars at night, wearing sexy clothing and make-up, and affecting a lascivious attitude. A helpful neighbor, Walter (Haas), who is friends with Elizabeth's slatternly Aunt Morgan (Jane Blondell of Advance to the Rear), with whom she lives, suggests she see a psychiatrist named Neal (Richard Boone). Neal is able to determine that Elizabeth has three distinct personalities, but which one will emerge as the dominant one? I'm not certain how Eleanor Parker wound up in this B movie knock-off of The Three Faces of Eve (also released in 1957), but she gives a good performance, and the rest of the cast are all solid. Lizzie equates sexuality with "evil" in some ways, and Parker's least convincing moments are when she turns into a nostril-flaring decadent "Lizzie," eschewing a less subtle way of making each personality distinct. But it works for this movie, which is professionally done but kind of cheap and depressing. Marion Ross and John Reach each make an impression as, respectively, Elizabeth's co-worker and a man she dates as Lizzie. Johnny Mathis also makes an impression playing a pianist/singer in a saloon; he has no dialogue. As an actor, Haas also appeared in Summer Storm and others.
Verdict: Entertaining enough but lurid and unpleasant. **1/2.
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| George Sanders and Linda Darnell |
Based on Anton Chekhov's novel "The Shooting Party" this features George Sanders as a Russian judge and Linda Darnell as a Russian peasant! Despite this miscasting, the two actors play well together in the story of Fedor Petroff (Sanders), who neglects his fiancee, Nadena (Anna Lee), after he meets the beautiful Olga (Darnell), whom he knows is "beneath" him but whom he must possess come hell or highwater. An added complication is Olga's unhappy marriage to Anton (Hugo Haas), whose tragedy this chiefly becomes. Darnell is fine, and Sanders offers his usual good performance, but this is an actor whose forte is coolness, not passion, so he never really gets across his passionate feelings for Olga nor anything else. Haas, who also directed such "B" movies as One Girl's Confession, arguably offers the best performance as the likable but tormented Anton. Edward Everett Horton [Lady on a Train] is as good and as much fun as ever, although he, too, seems highly miscast as a womanizing nobleman of ill repute. Anna Lee [The Crimson Kimono] and Laurie Lane as the maid Clara both make a good impression. The whole sordid business comes to a very satisfactory conclusion, although the ultimate fate of one unhappy character is never disclosed.
Verdict: Intriguing romantic drama with interesting cast. ***.