Obsessions

The inevitability of Fate and the mysterious movements of Destiny control our FLESH AND FANTASY.

Director Julien Duvivier, in a follow-up to his previous TALES OF MANHATTAN (1942), crafted this new & intriguing sequential film. The emphasis, this time, is on the supernatural and precognition. In spite of the film's homilies about the ultimate power of personal responsibility, the movie is in reality about nothing more than providing some suspenseful entertainment for its audience.

The three sequences are tied together by Robert Benchley, in his famous character of Doakes, who is shown the stories in a book at his men's club in an attempt to help him get over a case of the jitters.

SEQUENCE ONE A bitter, unattractive seamstress (Betty Field) hopes a Mardi Gras mask will help her attract the affections of a young student (Robert Cummings). Edgar Barrier appears as the mysterious mask maker. Movie mavens will spot Marjorie Lord as a desperate client and Peter Lawford as an inquisitive Pierrot, both unbilled.

The most intriguing moments in this sequence happens in the first few seconds, when demons are shown pulling a corpse out of the water, and in the last few, when the viewer sees what is in the mask shop window. Mr. Barrier's voice, honed by years of stage and radio experience, is put to good effect.

SEQUENCE TWO A London lawyer (Edward G. Robinson) is told by a celebrated palmist (Thomas Mitchell) that he will commit a murder. Anna Lee appears as Robinson's fiancée; Dame May Whitty as her gossipy godmother. Wonderful Sir C. Aubrey Smith makes the most of his short role as a saintly cleric. Doris Lloyd plays a grieved widow, and Ian Wolfe a librarian, both uncredited.

Based on a short story by Oscar Wilde, this is the film's most compelling episode. The acting is especially good, with Robinson topnotch and Mitchell turning in a canny performance. The special effects, in which Robinson discourses with his own reflection, are executed very nicely. Notice the mistake in the credits when they refer to Sir C. Aubrey Smith's character as the Dean of Chichester rather than the Dean of Norwalk.

SEQUENCE THREE A circus aerialist (Charles Boyer) has a frightening dream in which he sees a beautiful woman (Barbara Stanwyck)-- and then he meets her. Charles Winninger plays the concerned owner of the circus. Clarence Muse appears unbilled as Boyer's attendant.

The story is slightly silly, but the stars make a fine effort and the high wire scenes, using a double, are indeed suspenseful.

A charming "anthology" motion picture, of the kind that was briefly popular in the 1940s. This one contains three stories, each of a supernatural bent. None really brilliant, but diverting.

The second piece was the best. This was based on a story by Oscar Wilde (not Noel Coward, as incorrectly stated in another review). Edward G. Robinson plays a lawyer haunted by a prediction that he will murder someone, and the always-watchable Thomas Mitchell is the palm-reader.

The first, with Robert Cummings and Betty Field in a story set in the Mardi Gras, is appealing in a naive way. The third segment, set in a circus, is the weakest. Charles Boyer an acrobat? No way.

This movie suffers somewhat from some of the most unconvincing studio-bound "locations" I have ever seen. I know, this was the 1940s and all that, made in the middle of the war, but puh-lease!

Although not as good as Tales Of Manhattan where some of the anthology episodes leaned toward comedy, Flesh And Fantasy is like three Twilight Zone episodes strung together. Three fair to middle episodes of that show.

By far the best is Edward G. Robinson, a rather self assured gentleman who doesn't believe in any of this supernatural bunk. At a party he gets his palm read by spiritualist Thomas Mitchell who says that his future shows he will commit an act of murder. As the prediction takes over and he gives way to it, his decision than is who to murder that might do him and the world the most good.

The other two are all right and both lean toward romance. Plain girl Betty Field gets a mask of beauty to bolster her self esteem as she meets up with Bob Cummings on Mardi Gras night. A mysterious stranger played by Edgar Barrier in a beard makes it happen for them, but in a most unusual way.

Charles Boyer and Barbara Stanwyck star in the third episode where Boyer is bothered by a persistent dream of falling from the high wire where he does his circus act. He's got an unusual twist in his routine, he plays a man pretending to be drunk on the high wire and his planned stumbling moves make it all the more dangerous. In the dream he meets Barbara Stanwyck who is in the audience. Later on they meet and fall in love. But it ends for them in another unusual way and in fact it might not be the end.

Club members Robert Benchley and David Hoffman read these stories and discuss the supernatural in between stories. Their parts truly could have been dispensed with.

Not the best anthology movie, but all right and the players acquit themselves well, stars and supporters.

And director Julien Duvivier. In the framing story, a nervous man (Robert Benchley) at a private club is told or reads through a series of tales meant to ease his discomfort. In the first tale, a homely woman (Betty Field) wears a magical mask during Mardi Gras to attract her long-sought lover (Robert Cummings). In the second tale, a man (Edward G. Robinson) has his fortune told by a palm reader (Thomas Mitchell), but he doesn't like what he hears. And in the third tale, a high-wire circus acrobat (Charles Boyer) has reoccurring dreams about a mysterious woman (Barbara Stanwyck) and his own demise. Also featuring Dame May Whitty, C. Aubrey Smith, Charles Winninger, Anna Lee, Edgar Barrier, David Hoffman, Eddie Acuff, Marjorie Lord, Peter Lawford, Ian Wolfe, Hank Worden, and Clarence Muse.

French director Duvivier worked in the U. S. during much of the war years. He had a hit in '42 with another anthology film, Tales of Manhattan over at Fox, so this follow-up seemed like a sure bet. He co-produced it with Boyer, which is ironic since the weakest segment to my mind was the last one which featured Boyer. The first segment had loads of atmosphere, and one can see how the blank mask worn by Field inspired the later Euro-horror classic Eyes Without a Face. The second segment, featuring Robinson and Mitchell, is the most like an episode of The Twilight Zone, and it also has excellent camerawork. The last segment isn't bad, but it seems to be the least inspired, and suffers a bit from dated effects work during the many high-wire scenes.

An interesting story concerns the original version of the film, which did not have the humorous framing story featuring Robert Benchley. Rather it began with another tale, this one focusing on a fugitive murderer (Alan Curtis) who runs into a farmer (Frank Craven) and his blind daughter (Gloria Jean). This segment ended with the killer dead and floating down a river. Preview audiences loved it, but for some reason it was removed from the film and the new framing device added. However, each story bleeds into the next, so even in the released version, the story with Field and Cummings begins with Mardi Gras celebrants finding the dead body of the killer from the deleted story in the river. Universal later used the removed footage, padding out the running time and changing the ending, ultimately releasing it as Destiny in 1944.

1943's "Flesh and Fantasy" is included in the Brunas-Brunas-Weaver book UNIVERSAL HORRORS, and as such gained a distinction it probably never wanted. Unusual for the studio, it's an anthology film comprised of three tales about personal responsibility and shaping one's fate, with slight supernatural overtones. Like 1945's "Dead of Night" and its Amicus offspring, we have a framing story, the delightful Robert Benchley playing off against David Hoffman (the face announcing the 'Inner Sanctum' series). Story one stars Betty Field as a plain-looking woman whose belief in her own unattractiveness has left her lonely and bitter; a chance encounter with a bearded stranger (Edgar Barrier) offers her a mask to disguise her ugliness from the man she's loved from afar, who now recognizes her beauty during an evening of Mardi Gras. This seems a bit overlong even at a mere 27 minutes, but the second story breezes by quickly, top billing Edward G. Robinson as wealthy attorney Marshall Tyler, whose belief in an eccentric palmist (Thomas Mitchell) nets him the woman of his dreams, but an ominous future in discord. Only when pressed further does the prognosticator confess that Tyler is going to kill someone; he becomes so obsessed with who his victim should be that he neglects his beautiful bride-to-be (Anna Lee) and comes to a bad end. Story three pairs Charles Boyer and Barbara Stanwyck, but its drawn out shipboard romance is a letdown coming after the best segment. What was intended to be the first tale in a four-part anthology was excised and reshaped into a 64 minute feature, 1944's "Destiny," which may have been the most dazzling of all; judge for yourself. Unbilled bits come from Peter Lawford, Marjorie Lord, Jacqueline Dalya, Doris Lloyd, Ian Wolfe, Clarence Muse, and Grace McDonald (who played a different character in "Destiny").