Shameless Self Expression

Isabel Jeans is stuck in an abusive marriage with husband Franklin Dyall, who accuses her of an affair with artist Eric Bransby Williams. A violent incident occurs, someone is put on trial, and another commits suicide. The entire mess leaves Jeans divorced but branded a woman of ‘easy virtue’. Fleeing to France she falls for Robin Irvine, but eventually her sordid past and reputation threaten to derail the entire thing. Ian Hunter plays a lawyer.   For this 1927 film, director Alfred Hitchcock ( “The Lodger” , “The 39 Steps” , “Strangers on a Train” ) and screenwriter Eliot Stannard ( “The Lodger” , “The Manxman” ) chose to make a screen adaptation of the Noel Coward play. Mistake. This is boring, static, and the wrong choice of material for a silent film. Perhaps he might’ve gotten more out of it with sound, but as is it’s one of Hitchcock’s worst films. I haven’t any connection to the original material but I suspect this film doesn’t greatly either, because it’s far too borin...

Twenty years ago, Joan Crawford was committed to an asylum after taking an axe to her younger, philandering husband and his mistress. She has now been released and taken in by her grown daughter (Diane Baker). Re-integration doesn’t come easy. Leif Erickson plays Crawford’s brother, while George Kennedy turns up as a dirty-looking farmhand.   A brilliant twist that I didn’t see coming saves this 1964 shocker from schlock filmmaker William Castle ( “The House on Haunted Hill” , “I Saw What You Did” ). Scripted by Robert Bloch ( “Psycho” , “Asylum” , “The House That Dripped Blood” ), this is essentially Castle’s own “Psycho” (with a bit of “Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte” thrown in) there’s some fun moments throughout, but some thumb-twiddling too. Joan Crawford definitely isn’t miscast here, Castle was shrewd enough to use Crawford appropriately in this melodramatic role. She’s a lot of fun. The always underrated Diane Baker is lovely as ever playing Crawford’s long-suffering daugh...