40's American Horror Part Three

DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE
(1941)
Dir - Victor Flemming
Overall: MEH

Ten years after Paramount's superb Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde adaptation, (which is still the finest all these decades later), MGM adapted the famed Robert Louis Stevenson novel with Spencer Tracy in the title role and Ingrid Bergman as the doomed bar wench Ivy Pearson.  Both Bergman and Tracy do splendid jobs as they generally always did, but the film's nearly two-hour running time, the toned-down appearance of Hyde, and that fact that it was made once the Production Code was enforced, (as opposed to all of the previous film versions of the story), it cannot help but to come off as weak in comparison.  Prestigious director Victor Fleming was hot off of both The Wizard of Oz and Gone with the Wind when he took on Jekyll and Hyde and he does embellish the the film with some flare.  Particularly during some of Hyde's transitions, where instead of using the excellent effect of color filters to reveal more hideous make-up before out eyes, Flemming utilizes lavish, surreal dream sequences, most notably when Hyde appears to be riding a carriage while whipping both Bergman and Lana Turner who act as the horses.

THE CANTERVILLE GHOST
(1944)
Dir - Jules Dassin/Norman Z. McLeod
Overall: MEH

While adapting Oscar Wilde's novella of the same name and taking great liberties in doing so, The Canterville Ghost is an innocent and absurd horror/comedy that is mostly worthwhile for the inclusion of major weights Charles Laughton and famed child star Margaret O'Brien.  The two actors do have a lovely chemistry and while Laughton is left with less screen time, O'Brien gets to charm her way through more of the film.  Story wise, Ghost is rather ridiculous, but its fairytale logic is suitable to how light the materiel is played.  The film switched both directors and cinematographers halfway through production, (supposedly on Laughton's insistence), but it is impossible to tell as it is simply constructed as a competent crowd-pleaser and little more.  There is some relatively successful, spooky dread conveyed early on, but being a comedy, it does not linger on the macabre end of things for very long.  Once the main characters are casually and playfully conversing with Laughton's title specter, there are no traces of horror left on the table at all, which is only slightly to the movie's disadvantage.

THE SPIDER WOMAN STRIKES BACK
(1946)
Dir - Arthur Lubin
Overall: MEH

Though it shares an actor, production studio, and a title that points clearly to it being a sequel to Universal's 1943 Sherlock Holmes film The Spider Woman, The Spider Woman Strikes Back is in fact an unrelated entry.  Gale Sondergaard receives top-billing here as a seemingly pleasant yet diabolical mad scientist who is using the blood of her female secretaries to make plants deadly or something.  Allegedly, this was planned to kick-off a fresh series of horror titles staring the Spider Woman character and though Sondergaard has an icy elegance that could have carried a few more titles through, (plus her hulking and silent henchman Rondo Hattan was born to be in horror movies and ended his brief career with three of them), this was not meant to be.  Such a fate is understandable upon viewing the results which never become ghastly, moody, or interesting enough.  Director Arthur Lubin cranked out a only a few horror titles before this and he went on record as saying that he hated the assignment, giving it the bare minimum of effort to collect his paycheck.  With some style and/or a quirkier script, this could have been a more memorable effort, but such movies were already losing their luster at this point and Universal as well as most studios would soon switch gears to science fiction thrillers in the coming years.