(1942)
Dir - Jacques Tourneur
Overall: MEH
One of the most overrated of all horror films is Val Lewton and Jacques Tourneur's first creative work together Cat People. While all of the focus seems to be on its symbolism and influence on the horror genre, (the use of shadows and suggestion, the Lewton buss which begat the "boo scare"), many ignore the film's many architectural flaws. The script by DeWitt Bodeen was based of one of Lewton's own short stories, Lewton himself being a journalist, writer, and script editor before RKO hired him to produce a number of horror films on a modest budget. Yet there are a number of inconsistent details in it. The lauded swimming pool scene for one is rather preposterous. Why would a woman terrified that something is about to catch her proceed to jump into a pool completely by herself with all of the lights off? The scene does look nice, but its lack of logic undermines it. Kent Smith is overly stiff as Simone Simon's husband and the later addition to the plot where Tom Conway's psychiatrist character also falls for her seems quite silly. These and a few other distractions are enough to diminish the things that are indeed admirable about Cat People unfortunately and for that reason it honestly falls short as a masterpiece.
(1943)
Dir - Jacques Tourneur
Overall: MEH
Still loaded with symbolism and supernatural suggestion above anything else, Val Lewton and Jacques Tourneur's follow up to Cat People was I Waled with a Zombie, a title thrust upon Lewton by one of RKO's executives. While it is not as unevenly structured as Cat People, the story which borrows heavily from Jane Eyre is rather dull and undercooked. Its themes of "what's in the mind and what's real" have not aged particularly well, more because of how much influence these films had on the genre which countless other movies have borrowed from. Said themes are also too on the nose and some of the dialog and performances, (particularly that of Tom Conway who was equally bland in Cat People), do not really help anyone's situation seem either that believable or dire enough. Though it is deliberately structured as a low-key chiller, Zombie actually could benefit from a little more excitement and a different kind of nuance where we do not need a local musician to literally sing a song to give us expository information. It is high on atmosphere yet too low on menace and ultimately not as memorable as it could have been.
(1943)
Dir - Jacques Tourneur
Overall: MEH
The third RKO go-round with Jacques Tourneur and Val Lewton teaming up is almost disastrously flawed. The Leopard Man is very fittingly a companion piece to the two previous entries by the same studio and creative team, (particularly Cat People which even utilized the exact same real life leopard in both), but it exaggerates all of the flaws of what came before. Nearly every scene is ruined by sloppy scripting. All deaths in the movie are easily, easily avoidable, the emphasis is jarringly switched between characters, and the twist is remarkably dumb and unsatisfying. At only sixty-six minutes, the film suffers a lot by brushing past too many things and it appears highly unfocused by doing so. Just as in Cat People and I Walked with a Zombie, the leads fall very flat, this time both Dennis O'Keefe and Jean Brooks being as uninteresting as can be. There are still some engaging themes being explored here and Robert De Grasse's cinematography is top notch, but even more problems get in the way this time than in Cat People. The Leopard Man ends up being just another in a steady stream of over-appreciated horror films from the studio.
(1943)
Dir - Mark Robson
Overall: MEH
Amping up the disorganization, The Seventh Victim brought in Citizen Kane assistant Mark Robson, (who would go on to make several for RKO), for his directorial debut, still with Val Lewton planning out a detailed blueprint for him to follow. This time though, post-production interference became the film's undoing as several key scenes were taken out. Because of this, it is the most incomprehensible of the studio's stream of horror movies. This is a shame as the premise of a posh, secret Satanic cult operating in Greenwich Village seems as idiot proof as any, but the mangled editing makes the film both aggravatingly difficult to follow and buy into. Some of the dialog and character motivation appears downright ridiculous and the ending is particularly absurd. It is almost impossible to decipher what the fate is of one of the film's main protagonists who more than half of the movie spends desperately looking for. There is a scene where a psychiatrist, (Tom Conway again), says some words from a bible to the cult who generally seem to be moved by them that just comes off as laughable. The whole movie really is so underwritten that it is difficult to follow anyone's logic or lack thereof and this would mark the forth time in a row that RKO botched up one of their properties far, far too much.
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