Anyone here a fan of...

[therealfuster]

 

Margaret Lockwood?

 

With the release of "The Lady Vanishes" on DVD, I can only hope there are more Margaret Lockwood films set to be made available in that form.

 

Last night I was lucky enough to watch a videotape I just purchased of the Lockwood film that I've only seen in bad prints on tv, "Cast a Dark Shadow" which stars Dirk Bogarde as Edward "Teddy" Bare, Margaret Lockwood as his second wife, Freda Jeffries, Kay Walsh as Charlotte Young, Kathleen Harrison as maid Emmie, Robert Flemyng as attorney Phillip Mortimer, Mona Washbourne as Monica Bare and Lita Roza as the Nightclub Singer. Though this is not major Film Noir, but it is listed in some Noir encyclopedias [but with a different release date of 1955 while the IMDB has it as 1957] I found this film notable for a bravura performance as usual by the urbane Bogarde, and yet here portraying a bit more of a charming low life schemer. Other highlights for me included the inclusion in the cast of Robert Flemyng, who I find intensely provocative in his outlandishly perverse performance in "The Horrible Dr. Hichcock", the undeniably adorable Kathleen Harrison, who was so memorable as housekeeper Mrs. Dilber, in the David Lean version of "A Christmas Carol" with Alastair Sim, and the unique Mona Washbourne [who can forget her totally nude and rather matronly walk in "If..." the Lindsay Anderson tribute to Jean Vigo's "Zero de Conduite"]. Admittedly their appearances in this film are not enough to recommend it, but as I have only seen them in these above isolated performances, as the majority of their films are not higly screened in the US, it was pleasureable for me and my guests.

 

Directed by Lewis Gilbert and written by Janet Green, [spoilers ahead] the film opens with a ride through a fun house with Monica in a state of euphoria, but with the glinting and glistening eyes of Teddy brandished on her face, with the stamp of death incarnate. What appears at first glance to be a mother/son relationship soon becomes indubitably one of an older woman and doting younger man duo. On their arrival home from this seaside adventure, Monnie [as Teddy Bear affectionately has nicknamed her] entreats her attorney Mortimer, to make up a new will leaving Teddy the bulk of her estate, instead of just her house and a nearby cottage. When questioned by Mortimer as to the feasibility of this move, as Teddy is not family and the largesse is due to the family enterprise...Mortimer is told defiantly by Monnie that Teddy is her only family!

 

Teddy, unaware of the new will in preparation, plies Monnie with liquor that night, with the intent of doing her in, assuming that he is heir to her whole estate. Monnie sadly buys the farm that night, in a death ruled accidental after the testimony of maid Emmie. To Teddy's dismay, he is informed by suspicious Mortimer that no accidental death inquest is ever closed, if new evidence arrives. Also the state of his inheritance, or lack thereof, is news to avaricious Teddy and he soon sadly realizes he jumped the gun, so to speak. Upon borrowing some funds from his uncle, Teddy takes off for a vacationing sojourn with one intent only...to pick up and marry another wealthy woman, who can keep him in the style to which he is accustomed. Teddy meets his match in tough talking and street smart Freda [very nice performance by Margaret Lockwood, as a rather blowsy quasi-harridan] who he weds in haste, but then lives to regret hitching his wagon to...in leisure.

 

As always...complications ensue when Wifey Number Two doesn't fall for the same bait as Wifey Number One was so partial to, and with which she was so enamored daily.

 

It was fun also to see Lockwood in a role totally different from the one in Hitch's "The Lady Vanishes" and to view a very young, yet still supremely self confident Bogarde, who excels in his many small gestures and nuances of character...whether charming, threatening or sociopathic.

 

I hope someday, TCM might have a Lockwood, or more reasonably a Bogarde festival, and show this gem. Anyone else here seen it, or "The Mind Benders" with Bogarde, which I also bought, which is reminiscent of William Hurt in the film, "Altered States".