The Portrait Of Dorian Gray 1945 Based on the novel of the same name by Oscar Wilde, screenplay and direction by Albert Lewin.
I saw this picture back in 2006 but haven't seen it since. I recently got the DVD and decided tonight's the night to put it on. You probably know the story, man stays young while a painting of him ages. You can click the paintings for a larger size image. The picture on the left was painted by Henrique Medina and the one on the right was painted by Ivan Le Lorraine Albright. The Medina painting is shown in color in a brief scene in the B&W film. It's believed to be in a private collection. The Albright painting is in the collection of The Art Institute of Chicago. Ivan's identical twin Malvin was hired to paint the good Dorian painting but it wasn't used in the film. Ivan made changes to both the good and bad paintings while the film was being shot.
Hurd Hatfield lays Dorian. I knew nothing about Hurd, even though his IMDb listing says I've seen him in a few TV shows and movies. He worked steadily from 1944 until 1991, he passed away in 1998 at the age of 81. The other fellow is George Sanders playing Lord Henry Wotton. I'm more familiar with George's work and a big fan of him as The Saint and The Falcon. He's a bit of a rotter here and he convinces Dorian that a lifestyle of pleasure and hedonism is the way to go. Dorian's pretty shallow and he's easily swayed by Wotton. Dorian is generally a pretty piss poor example of a human being.
Dorian is having his portrait painted by artist Basil Hallward, he's played by Lowell Gilmore. That's him in the middle between Peter Lawford and Donna Reed. Donna is Gladys Gilmore, Basil's daughter and Peter is David Stone, a man in love with Donna. Their lives become a mess from being involved with Dorian. Gladys is a child when the painting is finished, about 18 years pass and she grows into a lovely young woman. Dorian looks the same but his painting is growing more and more grotesque from his naughty life style. Dorian asks her to marry him and she excepts. What's wrong with these people?
Angela Lansbury is Sibyl Vane, a singer in a small tavern in a rough part of London. Shortly after the portrait is finished Dorian sees her sing and returns over and over to the tavern. He proposes to her but Lord Wotton's influence causes Dorian to offer her a choice, sleep with him before marriage or get out. She walks but returns. The next day Dorian sends her a letter telling of his disappointment in her giving into him, he ends the relationship and includes a pile of cash. She commits suicide.
Time passes and Dorian becomes known as a bounder and his portrait has become as grotesque as he is inside. Gladys brother vows revenge but fails. Dorian becomes more and more evil. In the end he destroys himself.
It's a pretty darn good looking film, plenty of great sets, really good cast, everything about it is top notch. Might be the best film I've seen this year. Well worth a look.
Molly And The Ghost 1990 No writer is credited on the film or the IMDb. Don Jones is the director. I can see why the writer might have taken his name off the film, there's nothing much good about it. A horrible 16 year old runs away to LA and moves in with her older sister. She steals money and jewelry from her sister and tries to seduce her husband. Thrown out she hires a hit man but she's so stupid she mails him a picture of herself. He kills her and she become's a vengeful ghost. It's a pretty piss poor film and should be punched in the face. I started fast forwarding after a while.
The Mind Benders 1963 James Kennaway wrote the original screenplay and adapted that into his novel of the same name, Basil Dearden directed.
Professor Sharpey jumps from a moving train and a huge pile of money is found in his briefcase. He's suspected of selling secrets to foreign interests. Major Hall comes to investigate Sharpey and he finds he'd been involved with a project studying the effects of cold and isolation on men. That project has morphed into a study on sensory deprivation, Professor Sharpey had worked on the project with Dr Longman and Dr Tate, scientists at the University. Major Hall is played by John Clements, he's on the right, the guy on the left is Michael Bryant who played Dr Tate. Dirk Bogarde plays Dr Longman.
The Major finds that the process of cutting off the body from all sensation leaves the mind messed up and the person susceptible to easy manipulation. If this is the case it might be that Professor Sharpey could have been an easy mark for spies after being in the tank.
Longman had been in the tank for four hours and taken a leave. He's at home with his wife Oonagh and their four children when the Major comes to call. Longman believes that Sharpey could have been easily swayed by some spies. The Major talks a reluctant Longman into going back into the tank. They leave him in for 8 hours and he's pretty much a broken man.
As part of the experiment they tell Dirk his wife is a pain and he doesn't really love her. Dirk seems to recover but the seeds have been planted and his marriage breaks apart. That's Dirk with Mary Ure, who plays his wife Oonagh. Now the Major has to try to rectify is awful blunder.
That's Wendy Craig, it was one of her early film roles, she'd been in a few TV programs and would go onto star in the beloved series Butterflies. There's a few people in the cast that I knew, Terence Alexander, Roger Delgado, Edward Fox, Geoffrey Keene and Norman Bird. The good script gives them good material to work with. It's well filmed and directed. Everything about it is way above average. It's also a good reminder that human's are fragile. Well worth seeing. It's another film that turned out to be one of the best films I've seen this year. I have the Kino Lorber DVD and it looks nice. There's a commentary that I listened to part of, might get around to it again someday.
Comments