Overrated and overhyped

Horrible, fascist and poorly acted

Great visuals, story delivers no surprises

I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

Spinster scientist Ann Hamilton (Katharine Hepburn) is taken with famed chemical tycoon Alan Garroway (Robert Taylor). Her father sells him the rights to a chemical compound. Ann marries Alan but is concerned about fitting into his world of wealth and power. Alan tells her about his no-good hated brother Michael (Robert Mitchum) but there is more to the story.Hepburn sells the heck out of the role. She's enchanting. There is nobody like her. Veteran actor Robert Taylor is nowhere near her iconic level. He's fine but I can't help but wish for Robert Mitchum in the role. It's early in his career but he's already a sought after rising star. Mike should be a more meek character who could be pushed over by his more dominating brother Alan. Mitchum is not really that meek. It's understandable to have the bigger role given to the more experienced actor. What it could have been is epic. What it turns out is a solid noir from Vincente Minnelli who would gain more fame from musicals later on.

This unusual old film has a great cast and an aura of mystery that is sustained almost to the end.This is a trip into "Rebecca" territory. Ann Hamilton (Katherine Hepburn) recently married to the seemingly perfect Alan Garroway (Robert Taylor) begins to feel uneasy about her husband's near obsessive hatred for his brother, Michael, who has disappeared some time before, but whose memory hangs over them until dark secrets are revealed.For a woman who most people described as the most confident and assured person they had ever met, Katherine Hepburn plays Ann as a sensitive and rather socially awkward woman. All the mannerisms and patterns of speech that made her so distinctive are on show here, but her character is disarmingly vulnerable.In Charles Tranberg's well researched, but casually edited, "Robert Taylor: A Biography", the author reveals the tensions on the set between the strong-willed actress and the two male leads, Robert Taylor and Robert Mitchum, as well as with Vincent Minnelli, the director.Hepburn thought Robert Taylor a lightweight, but later reversed her opinion calling him an underrated actor. As they only made this one movie together, she must have drawn on memories of "Undercurrent" to make such a comment. However she had no time for Robert Mitchum whom she bawled out after overhearing him imitate her accent.The film has a rich look even though nearly everything, including the exteriors, was shot on the sound stage.Herbert Stothart's score incorporates a great deal of Brahms Symphony No. 3, which plays a part in the story. Stothart's scores, unlike the original scores by contemporaries such as Korngold, Steiner and Herrmann, were often pastiches with many borrowings from the classical repertoire, but he created the lush MGM sound as much as anyone did. Although it adds to the sumptuous feel of this B/W film, if anyone's music conformed to the notion that movie music stole from the classics it was his."Undercurrent" was successful at the time, but I only caught up with it recently when Bill Collins presented it on Fox Classics, 70 years after it was made. It was a pleasant surprise. It was one I had missed during the period when hundreds of the movies from the Golden and Silver age of Hollywood were shown on Australian television.Fortunately, Turner Classics and Fox Classics have saved movies like this from disappearing from the small screen altogether.

This is a dreadful movie with a terrific cast. The studios probably thought they could not miss with Hepburn, Taylor, Mitchum, and, I know, let's use Minnelli to direct. Can't miss!Whatever your thoughts of Katherine Hepburn, she is wildly miscast as the simpering, cringing wife. And Mitchum? Where the heck was he for 9/10 of the movie? It's Taylor's first picture after the war. He is probably sorry the Germans surrendered so soon.This one is only interesting for the historical footnotes and the absolutely, completely awful script. No one and nothing could have saved this dog. No one.

Why does this film have a 6.3? Even the most cruel critic would give it a higher grade. There are many reasons why it should have, at least, a 7.To start with, the performances are incredible. There are some people here who criticize K. Hepburn's performance, when it is very good, very funny at the start and increasingly good as the film develops. Robert Taylor is absolutely excellent. Robert Mitchum doesn't appear in much of the film, but he acts his part perfectly.This film is directed by a great director, Vincente Minelli, who never disappoints and gives the film a quick, captivating pace. This film has a lot in common with "Rebecca", which is only a little better. All in all, a film well worth watching.