Well Deserved Praise

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

Nowadays it is extremely fashionable for critics to praise Mamoulian's version at the expense of Fleming's. After all, Mamoulian has a much higher status as an auteur than Fleming. Why? Fleming died in 1947 whereas Mamoulian was attending retrospectives and giving interviews well into the 1970s. Furthermore, his comparatively small body of work — 16 films over a 28-year period — makes the job of researching so much easier, leading to a proliferation of articles, theses and career studies. In addition, the 1931 version has attained a cult status due its purchase and subsequent suppression by MGM. (And no wonder they hid it away. Although Mahin receives sole screen credit, not only the adaptation — with its introduction of the Ivy character who is not present in Stevenson's line-up — but many of the scenes themselves are a direct steal.Despite the similarities, Mamoulian's is really a somewhat different film, looking at Hyde from a less moralistic angle. His direction is much more showy than Fleming's with its imaginative first-person camera and ingenious slow wipes. Both films have the benefit of no- expense-spared period sets and marvelously atmospheric photography.March's Hyde with its grotesque make-up and spell-binding special effects is one of the highlights of 30s cinema. The actor won an Academy Award for his performance, but deserved it more for his projection of the incarnately evil Hyde than his portrayal of the somewhat simpering Jekyll. Tracy's Hyde has an equally fascinating malevolence, but his Jekyll is much more forthright and believable. And despite the technical brilliance of March's transformation (compared to the obvious if increasingly skilled use of superimposition for Tracy's), the climactic scenes in the Fleming film are more effectively handled and set. (The climax starts about three-quarters of the way through when the transformation unexpectedly takes place of its own accord. Hyde suddenly becomes the dominant personality, taking refuge in Jekyll primarily to escape detection. The Mamoulian climax starts with Jekyll sitting on a park bench, listening to a nightingale and quoting Keats while a black cat stealthily advances on her prey — an effective metaphor, but Fleming's is even more vivid: Tracy goes whistling off in the fog to his engagement party. He disappears into the mist. The whistling continues jauntily, hesitates and stops. Cut to a close-up of Tracy, slightly bewildered. He starts off again, once more sauntering gaily into the fog, but this time he is whistling not the Lana Turner theme but "See Me Dance the Polka".) Not only is Tracy more than a fair match for March, but producer Fleming has surrounded him with an absolutely first-rate support cast. Ingrid Bergman's remarkably luminous yet sexually provocative performance (this was her 4th American film, following Intermezzo, Adam Had Four Sons and Rage In Heaven. Her next film was Casablanca) far outshines Miriam Hopkins'. Of course, we expect a skilfully charming performance from Ingrid. What is even more of a surprise is the appealing conviction Lana Turner brings to the heroine. (Oddly enough the roles were originally reversed, but Bergman persuaded Fleming to let her try her hand at a "bad girl".)Ian Hunter is perfectly cast as the stolid Lanyon (yet so much more personable than Holmes Herbert in the Mamoulian version), while Peter Godfrey brings a lively yet sensitive spirit to Poole. Donald Crisp purrs his usual warm authority into Sir Charles and there are some delightfully animated character cameos from both upper (Lawrence Grant's indignant Dr Courtland, Aubrey Smith's smooth- tongued bishop) and lower (Billy Bevan's talkative park attendant, Alec Craig's inflexible waiter, Forrester Harvey's mendacious manager) classes. While not as showy as Mamoulian's, Victor Fleming's direction is equally as sophisticated, using a great variety of effective camera angles and dramatic compositions, allied with a superb sense of atmosphere and a masterful knowledge of pace and movement. Right from its opening credits to its fade-out 127 minutes later, the narrative grips like the proverbial vice, no matter how familiar you are with the story or how many times you've seen the film before. The credit for this mounting excitement and suspense must be shared with the players, the writers, and the other technicians. Tracy never gave a more electrifying performance. His Hyde is achieved with comparatively little make-up (compared to March's), the menace conveyed primarily through a change in voice and demeanor. Mahin has supplied him with some fascinatingly malicious dialogue. Even when stealing scenes direct from Heath and Hoffenstein, he usually improves them. For example, Tracy's famous line, "Even as Hyde I warned you", is missing from Mamoulian, leaving March's motive in warning Lanyon completely unexplained.(As noted above, both scripts have been considerably fleshed out from Stevenson's original novel, while retaining much of its flavor and many of its ideas — principally that Jekyll's vice is from the very first a deliberate assent — rare themes indeed for Hollywood, especially i

This film is far superior to the 1941 version with Spencer Tracy, Ingrid Bergman and Lana Turner. Fredric March's portrayal was more subtle than Tracy's. March's Mr. Hyde is terrifying, especially in his scenes with Miriam Hopkins, but at the same time, he was able to imbue his "bad side" personality with sympathy, especially toward the end when he realizes the monster that he's become because he messed with his natural impulses through the use of chemical augmentation. The scene where Jekyll is watching his fiancée cry and he desperately tries to control his impulses and keep himself from transforming was well-acted by March and was very sad to watch. I thought March did an excellent job and he earned his Oscar.Spencer Tracy's rendition of Mr. Hyde was way too hammy and the makeup was ridiculous. He seemed forced and over the top, whereas March's portrayal of the two sides of his personality was more complex. Both Jekyll and Hyde had their bad parts. Hyde, even though he did some awful things, may have had some good qualities despite his selfish and unconscionable behavior. Based on March's portrayal, it seems that the best of human nature lies somewhere in the middle of Jekyll and Hyde.Miriam Hopkins is very good here as the professional trollop who gets more than she bargained for in Hyde. I thought her cockney accent was a little uneven, but it didn't detract from her performance. Miriam's bad girl liked to take chances, and thus she gets herself into questionable situations, but she didn't deserve the fate of being stuck with the abusive Mr. Hyde.I really liked her opening scene with Dr. Jekyll where she flaunts her legs and ends up nude in the bed with a strategically placed sheet, that was pretty risqué, even for a pre-code. Unfortunately, her whispered "come back" was a temptation for Dr. Jekyll, but it was an invitation for Hyde. The scene where Mr. Hyde attacks her was very frightening and I thought that Hopkins and March acted it well.I think that director Mamoulian managed to keep the secret of Hyde's transformation until his death or pretty close to it. That is an accomplishment in and of itself - keeping a secret that long. At any rate, highly recommended.

This take on the classic Robert Louis Stevenson story is classic in its own right, and works on many levels. There's the obvious psychological component to the story, with Jekyll representing the ego/superego, and Hyde the id. We also have the theme of the scientist tampering with nature with an altruistic goal, in this case to rid the psyche of the bad side, become 'super-good', and achieve more, but with a disastrous result that quickly gets out of his hands. But perhaps most importantly, we have the sheer horror of a man unchecked by morality, who is 'free' from constraint, and who promptly rapes, brutalizes, and murders before running off into the foggy London night. He's not an unthinking animal, however – he has all of his cognitive abilities, speaks, and uses logic to elude capture – and this, combined with film sequences that are shot from Jekyll/Hyde's perspective, amplify the fact that this villain is within us all, which is the greatest horror of all.As an aside: isn't it interesting that while Dr. Jekyll clearly contains the two sides of man, the good and the evil, the female characters in the film seem to be neatly one-dimensional: Muriel (his fiancée, 'good'), and Ivy (the dancehall girl, 'bad'). And that after he's taken the potion, he gets darker in addition to becoming uglier and needing some serious orthodontia? But I digress. Frederic March is fantastic as Jekyll and Hyde, and won an Oscar for his performance. He plays the lecher without mercy, and leaps around during some exciting chase sequences. The scene where he shows up in Ivy's mirror after she's been assured by Dr. Jekyll that he's gone for good is frightening. Dr. Jekyll thought he could make that promise before he realized that not taking the potion was no longer sufficient to stop the transformation to Mr. Hyde, and that mere impure thought could now bring it about. It's hard to put the lid back on once Pandora's Box has been opened.Miriam Hopkins shows nice range as Ivy, first absolutely sizzling in a scene where she tries to seduce Dr. Jekyll, a scene ending with her swinging her bare leg from a bed, giving him a serious ravage-me look, responding to his saying he can't return playfully with "oh yes you can", and imploring him to "Come back soon, won't you?....Soon...Come back." Yowza. Later, she's suitably horrified by Mr. Hyde, who does have his way with her, and abuses her without mercy. (she only shows the whip marks to Jekyll, we neither see this happening or the marks themselves … but it's enough to make us shiver) That dangling leg is left superimposed on the screen for some time while Dr. Jekyll walks off with a colleague, exclaiming ""Can a man dying of thirst forget water? Do you know what would happen to that thirst if it were denied water?" His marriage to Muriel has been delayed at her father's request; the suggestion is he's sexually frustrated, and after taking the potion, he makes a beeline back to see Ivy.Aside from special effects that are outstanding for the time period, and which hold up well today (particularly the first transformation), the film adds some other nice touches. Dr. Jekyll's organ playing is brief but adds a manic and morbid tone, as the film cuts to a candelabra, a statue, a bust, and a tight shot of his servant's face in succession. At one point, Dr. Jekyll is in the park, hears birdsong, and quotes Keats' 'Ode to a Nightingale' ("thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird! No hungry generations tread thee down…") … before seeing a cat advancing along the branch to silence that song. Later, as Hyde strangles Ivy, they slump behind a bed, revealing in the background a replica of Canova's 'Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss' which director Rouben Mamoulian leaves us with until Hyde gets back up.The movie has some pretty dark content, but it's asking questions about man's nature, and this version is balanced and moves along well. Definitely a classic.

Of all the different versions of the Jekyll and Hyde story that I've seen, this is hands down the best. One of three influential horror classics to come out in 1931 and the only one not released by Universal. The other two being Dracula and Frankenstein, of course. Fredric March deservedly won the Academy Award for his performance. That's a rarity for a horror film, then and now. Miriam Hopkins is dynamite as Ivy, a prostitute rescued by Jekyll and later forced to become Hyde's plaything. Ivy's first meeting with Jekyll is one of Pre-Code Hollywood's raciest scenes. Good support from venerable character actors Holmes Herbert and Halliwell Hobbes.It's a visually amazing movie for 1931, with great sets and impressive camera-work. Director Rouben Mamoulian creatively uses virtually every trick in the book to great effect. As much as I love Dracula and Frankenstein, from a technical standpoint this film runs circles around them. The transformation scenes are decades ahead of their time. The makeup for Hyde gives him an apelike appearance that's frighteningly gruesome. Those teeth! Yikes! The script dives headlong into the psychological elements of the Stevenson story that have made it so timeless. The monster in Jekyll is the monster in all of us. Also represented by Mamoulian's use of first-person point-of-view in many scenes, essentially placing the viewer in Dr. Jekyll's shoes. The theme of sexual repression runs throughout the film. The driving force behind Jekyll's taking the formula that transforms him into Hyde is his lust for Ivy and frustration over having to wait ten months to be with his fiancée Muriel.It's a classic, plain and simple. I can only imagine how powerful it must have been to see it in a darkened theater in 1931. It blew me away seeing it for the first time over 60 years later. It grips you from the opening moments and doesn't let up the whole way through. Exciting, atmospheric, and intelligent. A definite must-see.