mark.waltz With only a subtle bit of horror, this romantic melodrama focuses on the companion (Margaret Lockwood) hired by Barbara Mullen to work for her in the new home purchased by her husband (James Mason). The aging couple know there is a bit of a mystery surrounding the house, but when Lockwood begins to act rather oddly, it is obvious that something or someone is taking over her personality! Wearing old age make-up, Mullen and Mason give very credible performances as the retired couple who have moved to the country, and Lockwood, having been sinister in several pictures such as "The Man in Grey" and "The Wicked Lady", gets to combine gentility with the subtle display of sinister intentions when she is taken over by the fragile home bound ghost who while alive committed suicide after being jilted. Mason begins to investigate the history of their house in order to help Lockwood who has become like the daughter he and Mullen never had. It's ironic that the unseen phantom does not take over until Lockwood has fallen in love with Mason's house guest (Dennis Price) who becomes concerned over the obvious changes he sees in her personality.With this film and "Dead of Night", British cinema proved that it could do seriously themed horror movies that were both chilling and excellent examples of how film could become a work of art. The entire cast is superb, and Mason is barely recognizable in his gray hair and aged make-up. Of the supporting cast, Dulcie Gray is excellent as Mason and Mullen's maid. The bird-like Edie Martin is hysterically funny as the prim and proper (and gossipy) cook, with "Bride of Frankenstein's" Ernest Thesiger also very good in a small role as a doctor of the occult who has many of the answers Mason has questions for. This shows how you can grab the audience and keep their attention strictly through subtleties and not going overboard on special effects, of which this has little to none of. I was surprised to read that this was considered a box office disappointment, but perhaps that is a tribute to its artistic qualities which might have gone over the head of most film goers looking for escapism and a bit more horrific environment considering the goings on with World War II.

writers_reign Not that it matters now or, for that matter, that anyone involved is still around to furnish an answer of sorts, but, having seen this recently on the fairly good Talking Pictures channel I wondered why anyone, in the last year of the war, would elect to make a ghost story- lite and/or would prevail upon James Mason to play a man twice his age or indeed why he would consent to do so - other, of course, than to show he could - and just what audience it was targeting. Gainsborough is a well remembered production company to those of a certain age and most of the credits here, both behind and in front of camera are up to snuff but still the question persists: Why?

James Tardy This film has it all, billowing night gowns, Victorian pomp, and a mysterious old house. There is a genuine spooky ghostly tension to this film. The camera work is interesting with a lot of establishing tracking shots that are ahead of their time. However the dialogue is written more with stage in mind. The cast do well, although Lockwood's acting could have been better.Set in the 1900s, a Scottish couple purchase a large mansion, the husband a wealthy industrialist congratulates himself on getting a good price from the estate agent. To wife employs a lovely young girl as a companion to keep her company. The girl falls in love with a handsome young doctor who works in the district and the couple intent do marry. After one of the servants finds an old gold locket in the garden, the young girl falls ill with a mysterious nervous illness which cannot be explained by medicine. Gradually it becomes apparent that she is being possessed by the spirit of the previous lady of the house. This film has a great story and wonderful atmosphere, it has real potential to be remade for a modern audience.

Robert J. Maxwell Other comments have mentioned that this story of ghosts, possession and romance is slow. And it does have its longueurs. I don't know how much time is spent on establishing the fact that Lockwood, who is like a daughter to the elderly couple, Mason and Mullen, is possessed by the spirit of an invalid who died in the house forty years ago. It's wasted time. The film seems slow not because it's intrinsically dull but because it's too long. It might have made a perfect episode of "The Alfred Hitchcock Hour." James Mason is at his best being suave or moody. Here, he's crippled by an abundance of old-age make up and an attempt at some kind of exotic English dialect. He's a well-off, no-nonsense retired businessman who unwittingly buys a haunted house, and he harumphs around denying that anything strange is going on, even when something strange is going on. His more sensitive wife realizes something is up, but not until the end does Mason come around, and even then he opts for straightforward first-order change.As the possessed chief factotum, Margaret Lockwood is okay but looks a bit older and, more important, stronger than she did in "The Lady Vanishes." She's supposed to be wasting away, calling out for "Doctor Marsham", the doc who could have saved the life of the now-departed invalid. The problem is that Marsham moved away years ago and no one has any idea where he is, or if he's still alive. Her fiancé, the young and handsome doctor, Dennis Price, doesn't believe in ghosts and can do nothing to help her.At the end, the spectral Dr. Marsham shows up and gets the job done, but he's always in shadow and photographed from behind, so it's difficult to tell that he's the celebrated character actor, Ernest Thesinger, the mad scientist who had a penchant for shrinking kings and queens in "The Bride of Frankenstein." The tale takes place around the turn of the century, during the Boer War, and it's interesting to observe the details of a proper middle-class English country life -- the exchange of visiting cards, the lawn parties at which everyone is dressed up as if it were Easter Sunday. The cups of tea. The little glass of port after dinner.On the whole, if you liked, say, "The Uninvited" or the sentimental but amusing "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir," you'll probably enjoy this.