The Dark Tower

In the 1930s, several major studios opened studios in the UK in order to comply with a British law mandating that a specific percentage of the movies shown in the country be made there as well. So, studios like MGM and Warner Brothers opened up British branches...and "The Dark Tower" is from Warner's British studio.

The story begins at a nearly bankrupt circus. Receipts are poor and so it's not surprising that the manager tells Torg (Herbert Lom) to go away when he comes looking for a job. However, shortly after this a lion breaks loose and Torg miraculously is able to get the animal under control using his hypnotic ways. The circus agrees that Torg is pretty amazing and they hire him. His job is an odd one, however. He coaches a lady trapeze artist to give her the ability to do amazing stunts without a trace of fear. However, he soon has so much control over her that their relationship seems much like Svengali and Trilby. Torg also begins behaving like a nasty jerk--treating everyone in the circus like they are beneath him. Where will all this end?

The best thing about this film is Herbert Lom's wonderful performance. He is well mannered but menacing...almost like a malevolent version of Charles Boyer. The story is good, though VERY similar to the Svengali movies which preceded it...but has enough different about it that both stories are well worth seeing.

By the way, this is an odd film because the war is never mentioned...yet it came out in 1943...during the height of WWII.

A curious little movie that deserves to be better known. Based on "The Dark Tower," a play by George S. Kaufman and Alexander Woolcott, which was also the inspiration for the better-known "The Man With Two Faces," it shares little except for its title and the theme of hypnotism with the boilerplate melodrama by the two celebrated Algonquin Roundtable wits of the 1930s.

Well-acted,well-written, well-shot, and well-lit, this motion picture operates on two levels, both of them terrifying. Superficially, it's a neat horror film starring an excellent Herbert Lom as "Torg," a Peter Lorre-type -- a rather off-putting and unhappy gentleman from some Central European country who, while absolutely loathing people, can mesmerize them to do his bidding. Ingratiating himself into a rundown provincial traveling circus in a pre-war England -- think an anglicized "La Strada" -- he makes himself indispensable, turning around the fortunes of this one-lion show.

On another level, the circus can be interpreted as a metaphor for Nazi Germany, with the Lom character standing in for the master propagandist Dr. Josef Goebbels, sans a limp. Every utterance of his drives home this resemblance, as "Torg," morphs from just plain Torg to Mr. Torg to ... Doctor Torg, using his power "to cloud men's minds" to bully his way into a position of power. To draw attention to this subtext, the circus parade features a platoon of uniformed blondes marching with arms extended (are they Sieg Heiling?), and a Col. Blimpish ringmaster who could be a stand-in for Field Marshal von Hindenburg.

This secondary theme isn't all that obvious,and perhaps it may not even exist (as Sigmund Freud himself said, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar) but for one viewer it does lift this 1943 movie out of the realm of still another film of fright and frisson and instead, with its unspoken chilling and sinister message, places it in Hell.

Financially strapped circus manager Ben Lyon (as Phil Danton) hires hypnotist Herbert Lom (as Stephen Torg) after the latter helps capture an escaped lion. Fortunes turn when Mr. Lom is asked to use his hypnotic prowess to enhance stunts performed by trapeze artist Anne Crawford (as Mary). Her high-flying partner and boyfriend David Farrar (as Tom) becomes an obstacle when Lom wants to control Ms. Crawford. We assume Lom wants to romance Crawford, but the story seems to stall in this area, just as it gets going. Poor Mr. Lyon is easy to control without hypnotism. Perceptive Josephine Wilson (as Dora Shogun) lives up to her name. The characters and production make it an engaging melodrama.

****** The Dark Tower (10/18/43) John Harlow ~ Herbert Lom, Ben Lyon, Anne Crawford, David Farrar

The Trilby&Svengali saga is given another version in The Dark Tower. This is a film made by Warner Brothers at its British studio facilities and it's a well done piece of work.

Ben Lyon is boss of a circus that's hardly the operation of Ringling Brothers. It's a failing small show and at the beginning of the film he can't even meet the payroll. Into his life walks Herbert Lom, a strange and brooding man who has a great gift as a hypnotist. On both animals and people.

The main attraction of the circus is the aerial act that Lyon's brother David Farrar does with Anne Crawford and Crawford has fears that may be insurmountable. With hypnosis not so says Lom and he hypnotizes her to conquer her fears. Pretty soon she's his puppet.

With his mesmerizing methods the show becomes a success. But Lom starts intruding on everything in the show and extorts a partnership out of Lyon. To a person they all hate him in the show save Crawford, but know he's their meal ticket. In the end something is done about Lom.

Lom is the center of this film, he gives a fascinating performance about a brooding and vengeful man. In a key scene with Crawford he tells of being bullied as a child and then discovering his gift made a lot of people bend to his will. A lot of bullied kids and former bullied kids who watch this film will cheer on Herbert Lom.

Don't miss this film if broadcast especially if you are fan of Herbert Lom's work.

An Early British "Horror" Film that was virtually Unseen in America until recently. The Circus really does have a Sleazy, Sinister side and has been Exploited in a number of Films and it usually is quite an Effective Backdrop for Suspense and Quirky Characters. This Movie Displays that Creepy Environs.

Herbert Lom's Uncanny Performance as Torg, a Name that in itself Evokes Shutters, is the Mesmerizing Force behind this Offbeat Penetration into the Mind of a Desperate, Powerful Individual that literally Seduces his way to the (Big) Top. An Allegory of another Master Mind Manipulator.

A Spellbinding Film that is an Unusually Dark and Disturbing War-Time Entry. Made at a Time when Germany was under the Sinister Spell of a Real "Svengali" named Hitler.