Nightmare

Another one of those "wrongfully accused man and woman on the run" thrillers, notable only as one of the few starring vehicles for John Barrymore's daughter Diana. Brian Donlevy is slightly miscast as a down-on-his-luck gambler who inexplicably gets involved with a woman who may have killed someone. Also Nazis because 1942. It's all rather muddled and hard to follow or care. Donlevy's dialogue makes me think his part was written with Humphrey Bogart or maybe Alan Ladd in mind. For her part Diana Barrymore has a bland screen presence and spits out her lines like they taste as bad as they sound. Supporting cast is ok. Slow pace with no memorable scenes. Not a particularly good picture.

This is a splendid early wartime thriller, with the wonderful plot twist that a corpse with a knife in his back is found and disposed of, but then reappears the next day in the same place with another knife in his back. A Nazi spy code-named SI-10 turns out to be identical with the license plate of his Lagonda, in which a secret microphone/speaker is disguised as a dashboard cigarette lighter. This is the only film ever produced by Dwight Taylor, the well known screenwriter who also scripted this. The main appeal of this film however is the powerful presence of the intensely disturbed Diana Barrymore, who combines womanly charm and fascination with a violent streak so terrifying and uncontrollable that it has rarely been encountered so unequivocally on screen. So powerful is this unsettling violence in her nature, that her tragic life story and suicide all too amply confirm that it was not just acting. As an actress, she was a natural. What a pity that she was so self-destructively mixed up, since a major talent was lost to the screen. She could have been the greatest Barrymore of them all if she could have held herself together. Brian Donlevy does very well as the whimsical American who gets mixed up in this story because he has been 'bombed-out' in the London Blitz while dressed in his dinner jacket. There are no gag lines in this script. It is a dark and brooding work, made darker by the London Blackout of course. There are many highly tense moments, and this thriller really works.

Brian Donleavy is broke and at loose ends until his ship leaves for America, so he enters a private home to make himself some ham and eggs. The owner, Diana Barrymore, discovers him, and he's about to leave without a fuss, when she asks him to remove the body of her husband from his office. He's got a knife in his back. Donleavy disposes of it, but when he returns, Miss Barrymore high-hats him... until she asks him to remove the body, which is back where it had been. At this point, the police break in the front door, and the two flee the premises.

It's a great start to the movie from a story by Phillip MacDonald, but it soon turns into a retread of THE 39 STEPS, with a trip to Scottish mansion. Donleavy offers a solid performance as usual, but Miss Barrymore seems more confused and withdrawn than her role calls for... and that seems inconsistently written. She does photograph beautifully with George Barnes handling the cameras.

Diana Barrymore and Brian Donlevy star in "Nightmare" from 1942.

Daniel Shane (Brian Donlevy) roams the streets of London, having lost his business in an air raid. He overhears a couple talking about putting a key under the mat as they leave; he lets himself in, finds some eggs, cooks them, and eats.

A young woman, Leslie Stafford (Barrymore) enters, and Daniel explains his predicament. She doesn't want him to leave. He explains he's sailing to America with the shirt on his back to join the war effort. She promises him money and a new suit if he will do her a favor.

She takes him upstairs, and inside a room is a man, head on a desk, knife in his back. She asks Daniel to get rid of the body. It's her husband; she claims she didn't kill him.

Daniel does what she asks. Only one problem - the body shows up again in exactly the same place! Now they get out, heading for her cousin's in a car that each thinks belongs to the other. It doesn't.

A likeable cast enlivens this film, which has some witty dialogue. Donlevy is terrific as he tries to sort out what he's gotten himself into - unafraid, relaxed, and seeing it all as a challenge.

Diana Barrymore is very good; she was a lovely actress. Unfortunately, her personal problems got in the way, and she was dead by the age of 38. When she was down on her luck, Tyrone Power gave her money. A sad life.

I immediately recognized Hans Conried, Uncle Tonoose from the Danny Thomas Show, in a small role. I'm not sure why I recognized him.

Entertaining film.

Nightmare is one of those routine noir films with a wartime era plot from Universal that Alfred Hitchcock might have been able to put over. I saw elements of Saboteur, The 39 Steps and the later North By Northwest in the story.

What Nightmare does give us is a chance to look at Diana Barrymore in one of the few films she made. She certainly had the classical training that enabled her to cast as an Englishwoman who has just had her husband murdered. The husband is played by Henry Daniell and sadly he's on ever so briefly.

Daniell is working on discovering a 5th columnist in the wartime United Kingdom and he turns out to be in the family and titled. Brian Donlevy like any Hitchcockian hero sort of stumbles into the situation.

Nightmare is a good, but routine wartime espionage story. It's a no frills product from Universal which would not have afforded those added Hitchcock like touches to make it truly great.