Perhaps not quite as atmospheric as some of the Lewton pictures, this one nevertheless has an air quite of its own, as young Kim Hunter goes looking for her sister amongst satanists in Greenwich Village (I mean, that summary is surely enough for anyone to want to see it). Certainly has several highly memorable moments - seeing the dead investigator on the subway being one of them, and a creepy moment in a shower - and the ending really is remarkable. (That setup, the ill woman who lives near the sister's room, and the way she says she's finally going to go out and enjoy herself - there's something really weird and memorable about those scenes - DeWitt Bodeen and Charles O'Neal wrote it.)
Nick Musuraca's imagery looks wonderful in Criterion's newly restored release. Art direction by Albert S D'Agostino and Walter E Keller. That staircase at the girls's school appears in The Magnificent Ambersons.
Michael Powell's book describes how in 1945 Hitchcock introduced him to Kim Hunter, who was running lines for an Ingrid Bergman screen test. This seems somewhat unlikely somehow, as she had already appeared in this and Tender Comrade, and was in the US version of A Canterbury Tale (OK that may have been released after AMOLAD).
With Tom Conway, Jean Brooks (who I must say is a bit of a disappointment after all the build up), Lou Lubin, Isabell Jewell, Mary Newton, Evelyn Brent, Erford Gage (poet), Hugh Beaumont, Chef Milani and Marguerita Sylva.
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