Shadow of a Woman

...or maybe I should say it was a low priority rather than low budget noir, at least for Warner Brothers. WWII has just ended and Warner's A list stars have not yet returned from war, so the B list actors got a chance from 1942-1947 to take the lead.

This starts out as many a noir starts out - a lovely but lonely gal marries in haste to a dashing stranger - a doctor at that!. But beginning on their honeymoon it seems like someone is trying to kill her new husband and not being the least bit subtle about it. Also, there are strange people following the new couple around and taking pictures. Oh, and hubby forgot to mention he's been married before, has a son, and is in a nasty custody fight with his ex-wife.

The art design is cleverly done. The surroundings start out bright and cheery - on the beach at a seaside resort. As the new bride encounters layer after layer of suspense and uncertainty, the environment becomes as gloomy as her potential future as she ends up living in her husband's creaky old home with two sour looking servants that don't seem to like her any more than she trusts them.

I say that this seems like a low priority film to WB because there are some plot holes and goofs that just look silly in retrospect. The police consider the deceased an accidental death because he has fallen from a balcony although he carries clear marks and bruises from a beating? The police chief has the picture of the President on his wall, but it happens to be the President that died the year before (FDR)?? The new bride writes letters to a trusted friend about people she doesn't trust and then gives those letters to those untrusted people to mail?? The new husband has a distinct European accent but his sister does not??

The script is great overall, the atmosphere perfect, and the acting adequate, in particular I have to give kudos to Helmut Dantine as the creepy acting new husband. I'm sure in 1946, with memories of the war in Europe still fresh in everyone's minds, the rather Germanic accent of Helmut Dantine added just the right amount of suspicion and mystery to his character. Plus, note the subtle undercurrents of the coming cold war and red scares in the rising element of suspicion against anyone who is "different" - in this case Helmut Dantine's character who dares to question conventional medicine and even uses hypnotism on his patients - oh the horror! He MUST be a Communist! (Tongue in cheek here folks, this film is not about politics!)

I caught this movie on Saturday Night Noir. I wasn't planning on watching it, but it came on after NIAGARA and I left the television on while I was cleaning and getting ready for bed. It sucked me in! I really liked the atmosphere of the movie and the spooky old house. I liked the characters. I especially liked Andrea King and the little boy.

During the commercials I looked up the movie and saw that it wasn't much of a success when it came out. I was surprised because I didn't think it was that bad. I watch a lot of old movies (seldom ever watch anything new to be honest.) and I am sort of a hyper person who constantly keeps busy. I often half watch movies while doing another task like working (I work from home online) cleaning, cooking etc. A movie has to be pretty good to get me to actually sit down. I sat down for this movie. Was it the best acting I have ever seen? No, but the main character was likable enough and the story good enough, that I didn't care. It wasn't Oscar worthy, but most of the movies I like aren't. I liked this movie very much. It kept my attention and kept me entertained to the end.

Andrea King makes a mistake when she marries sinister alternative-medicine doctor Helmut Dantine. She realizes it pretty quickly, as we see in a story told from her point of view in flashback.

He seems like a truly loathsome person. It's hard, though, not to wonder if this movie was unwritten by the AMA. After all, not ALL people practicing alternative therapies, even back then are/were evil and/or quacks.

The most poignant part is the man's son, who is being held captive and being given a horrifyingly Spartan diet, ostensibly for his health.

That part will send chills up your spine. (If it knocks your spine out of quack, call a chiropractor.)

Okay slice of psychodrama and woman-in-danger flick. Still the script remains a rather uneasy mix of several elements. There're shadowy elements of noir, just emerging in '46, but mostly it's whether wife Brooke (King) can undo husband Eric's (Dantine) evil schemes and still survive. Can't say the plot's too original since Brooke marries Eric on short notice, not realizing his dark past. He poses as a doctor with unconventional methods, but just how "unconventional" is he. King looks good in 40's outfits, still I wish she (or director Santley) could have worked up more emotion. That would have heightened tension as the story winds down. But then the showdown is not what is ordinarily expected in this type movie. There's a good twist concerning the characters that I didn't see coming. So there are some surprises. Too bad that culminating fist-fight is none too plausible given Carl's (Alvin) gimpy leg. But dig that all- night diner that Joe (Erdman) presides over. It can compete with any of noir's many iconic diners.

All in all, the flick's an okay time-passer, but doesn't really pack the tension that's waiting there in the concept.

A Film-Noir that is the type that uses psychological persuasion and medical methods to subtly terrorize and control victims with sheer will and a charming personality. There are no guns or physical attacks, it is all done with romance and power. It is one of the few, if any, films that dealt with naturalistic or holistic medicine and focus on diet and exercise to cure, that is used as a sure sign of villainy because of the dated belief of inherent quackery.

This has a creepy feel and an unnerving atmosphere of a small budget that can work to its advantage and an unknown cast that also adds to character maladies and a sense of losing one's footing.

A really effective story of forced proximity and family tie downs. A little sleeper that is only let down by a take no chance happy ending that is used in so many otherwise edgy films of the era, even in the Noir genre, that end it all with a period and more times than not would be more progressive with three dots...