The Kiss Before the Mirror

With a very serious and leading role by Frank Morgan. Not a trace of the harmless blithering bumbler he played over at MGM in the 30s and 40s.

Morgan plays Viennese attorney, Paul Held. Paul is called to be defense attorney to his good friend, Walter (Paul Lukas) who has shot his wife to death when he finds out she is having an affair. More than this, his wife was undressing in her lover's home in preparation for some passion when Walter sent her to her maker under most embarrassing circumstances. Paul tries to get out of Walter exactly what made him suspect his wife. Walter says it was how she was admiring herself in her mirror in a way that only a woman meeting a lover would do. So he followed her, and when he actually saw her infidelity he killed her.

Paul returns home and finds his wife (Nancy Carroll) doing the exact same thing - saying she is going out with girlfriends, but dressing and admiring herself in her big vanity mirror in a way a woman would only do for another man. Paul follows her just as Walter followed his wife, and discovers that his wife Maria is meeting another man.

Paul returns to Walter, says that he now knows what Walter feels and that he intends to use every argument available to get Walter out of jail. If he is a successful and Walter is acquitted, then he knows the argument works and he will kill Maria and know that he too can be acquitted. Lukas plays this well as the tortured killer. Paul's mistake is to think that the fact that they both have cheating wives gives them comradery, when in fact Walter is consumed by guilt.

It is so odd to see Frank Morgan playing such a dark vengeful character, tormenting Maria by wanting her in court each day, to tell her that death is the just fate of all such unfaithful wives. She knows he knows, she knows he might kill her, and yet he hasn't come out and threatened her or accused her.. It's all very Hitchcockian a decade before many people knew about Hitch.

There is a really interesting attorney who works for Paul - Jean Dixon as Hilda Frey. She has a kind of tough exterior with a wise cracking and confident persona that matches Eve Arden. She is somebody I would have liked to see more of, but she has a very small part. It seems like the film is hinting that she could be gay, but that was all you could do at this point in history was hint.

There is a very good score and art design in this one. Even Walter's prison cell is interesting to look at with excellent cinematography by Karl Freund.

What did I not like? The commentary on the Kino Blu talks of absolutely nothing but how the women characters in the film are such victims! OK, Walter's wife and her bullet riddled corpse - maybe some room for argument there. But both Paul's wife and Walter's wife seem to have married money and taken lovers because they were bored. But they had no intention of leaving their walking paychecks. To me this film was more about the strong connection between obsession and love. I guess I should be glad that Kino actually put a commentary track on this rather obscure film.

The only other James Whale movie that I have seen, except for his classics, "Frankenstein," "Bride of Frankenstein" and "Invisible Man," was "the Old Dark House." I liked "the Old Dark House," but it wasn't a masterpiece like the other three.

I have never seen "Wizard of Oz" title character Frank Morgan in a leading role, so I always assumed he was a character actor, but he easily carries the film in this case. His wife is played by Nancy Carroll who starred in some 35 films from 1928 to 1935. She is quite fine. Gloria Stuart, famous for the Titanic (1997) has appears briefly in the film. Jean Dixon, as a very sharp statuesque woman lawyer nearly steals the picture with a sharp sense of humor.

The movie is about obsession, love and murder. Whale does a wonderful job of balancing comedy with tense scary moments as he did in "Bride" and "Invisible Man." The movie is very humanist and really solidifies the idea of him being a great auteur director. There's an hilarious scene of two gay newspaper men commenting on the trial. The movie is tight and short, barely over an hour, so it can't be called a masterpiece, but it does manage a lot of emotional intensity for a film of this length and this time period.

This racy pre code courtroom drama is not very good,but it is well acted by a good cast. Frank Morgan plays a Viennese lawyer who defends his friend, Paul Lukas, who has murdered his wife played by an absolutely beautiful, Gloria Stuart(who has a brief,surprising nude scene-we see her back as she strips).Morgan finds himself suspecting his own wife, played by Nancy Carroll,of infidelity. The film is wonderfully photographed and does a good job showing us the life of these wealthy Austrians.The boyfriend,played by an early Walter Pidgeon,is shown in the opening scene in a magnificent home which is sumptuously decorated.The visual style as in many Whale movies is striking.Unfortunately,the original play that this is based on,seems unbelievable and rather florid, although the infidelity elements are not that dissimilar from Kubricks,Eyes Wide Shut, also based on a Viennese original.

James Whale, the director of FRANKENSTEIN and BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN already proved that he was not only a horror and fantasy film maker, but also a solid director in any domain. This tremendous little and short film offers, proposes a very unusual and unpredictable plot which the scheme has not been used much since. I have rarely, if not never, seen this before. Maybe I am wrong. Anyway, the much talking is unavoidable for a 1931 and it is the only flaw of this feature. The quality of the copy I just saw was excellent and this enhances the great photography of this film. Unfortunately the last part, last reel, smashes the whole material. The ending is awful, I expected far more. But this film remains a gem.

Though Universal had acquired prestige with the Oscar-winning ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT (1930), it was still not regarded as a major studio at the time; consequently, most of their productions were allotted a B-movie budget and barely lasted over an hour and a quarter (this one, in fact, clocks in at 68 minutes) – even those made by their top director of the era, Whale! In fact, this one is partly filmed on the memorable Expressionist sets from his first great success FRANKENSTEIN (1931) – notably the forest, laboratory and university auditorium, converted here to a private garden, prison cell and courtroom – which lends the whole added texture and renders it fascinating viewing for horror buffs!

Even so, this proves a melodrama with a uniquely tense and compelling premise: a lawyer defending his best friend, accused of killing his faithless wife, begins to suspect that his own spouse is cheating on him – so that his impassioned (and sensationalistic) speech, tinged with personal angst, results in the acquittal of the murderer! Marked by elaborate camera-work (courtesy of the renowned Karl Freund), the film also features constant mirror imagery (playing on the all-important theme of duplicity). The acting often resorts to histrionics (Paul Lukas, in his first of 3 roles for the director, as the defendant virtually spends the whole trial with face buried in his hands!) but is nonetheless impressive – especially Frank Morgan's protagonist lawyer, since he is mostly known for befuddled comedy roles!; also on hand are Gloria Stuart (appearing as the murder victim and, thus, killed off in the very first scene!: she also worked 3 times with Whale, including 2 of his horror classics), Walter Pidgeon (an early role as her lover) and Charley Grapewin (as Morgan's assistant, who is something of a frustrated philosopher!).

Interestingly, Whale felt he could improve upon the film and remade it just 5 years later as WIVES UNDER SUSPICION (in which Morgan's brother Ralph played the accused!); however, though I recall liking it quite a bit when I watched it 5 years ago {sic}, I feel this is the superior version (if still some way behind his seminal horror work)...since, by then, the director's career was already in decline and, so, the resources were even more meager!