Gaslight
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Movie Reviews of Gaslight
Movie Review: Love the movie!
Summary: 5 Stars
I have been looking for this movie for years! This has the older version and the best version with Paula!!!Movie Review: Gaslight
Summary: 5 Stars
My students loved this classic suspense tale and used the information to write their own screenplays!Movie Review: Perfect!
Summary: 5 Stars
The DVD arrived promptly and in perfect condition. We are very happpy with the service!Movie Review: STUNNING NEW TRANSFER OF A THRILLING MASTERPIECE!
Summary: 4 Stars
I am going to make you believe that you are mad and then push you over the edge of sanity. With those intensions, Gregory Anton (Charles Boyer) sets out to destroy his wife, Paula's (Ingrid Bergman) mental stability in "Gaslight"(1944). Greg's reasoning? ? Paula?s dead aunt, his former lover, has hidden a fortune in jewels somewhere in the house which Paula now owns. I suppose Greg could have just sent Paula to the music hall to get her out of the way, but then the prospects for high melodrama and intense suspense wouldn?t have been nearly as diabolical or as fun. The film opens on one of MGM?s spooky and unsettling soundstages, gussied up to look like a typical English square. From one of the brownstones a distraught Paula is taken away, having just discovered her aunt?s horribly mangled body inside. In a state of shock, Paula is sent to Florence where she falls in love with a piano player, Gregory Anton. The two married. Returning to London, Paula and Gregory set up housekeeping in her aunt?s old house. However, not long afterward Paula begins to become increasingly absentminded ? or does she. Priceless antiques are moved, paintings are switched on the walls and a broach belonging to Gregory?s mother vanishes without a trace. Gregory, growing increasingly impatient with Paula?s emerging psychosis (actually he?s upset how long its taking to drive her crazy), leaves her alone each night, presumably to go off and paint portraits (his profession). Actually, he sneaks around the back of their house, reentering from an adjacent attic into theirs to search for the aunt?s missing jewels. The tap, tap, tapping on Paula?s bedroom ceiling and the sudden lowering of gaslights are attributed to figments of Paula?s growing mental instability. To create further doubt, paranoia and suspicion, Gregory hires an upstairs maid, the saucy Nancy (Angela Lansbury in an Oscar nominated role) who delights at taunting Paula with coy flirtations toward Gregory. Deception never looked so good. The melodrama is first rate and the performances will have you applauding in your seat. Joseph Cotten costars as the police investigator who does not believe that all of the mysteries inside Gregory?s home can be attributed to Paula?s failing mental health.
The transfer is rather disappointing. Though the gray scale is very nicely balanced with black levels that are solid and contrast levels that are fully realized, nothing can eclipse the distracting shimmering effects and edge enhancement that plague many of the scenes throughout this film. Fine details uncontrollably shimmer and thoroughly distract in spots. The audio is sharp and well balanced.
As part of the extras we are given the original 1940 British version of "Gaslight" that, I must tell you, is just as compelling as MGM's remake. In comparing the two versions, MGM?s obvious attention to ultra high gloss glamour becomes instantly obvious. So does the fact that director, George Cukor managed to create an overwhelming sense of claustrophobia in the remake that works well with the subject matter but is wholly lacking in the original. The transfer elements for the British version are much poorer than one might expect but they are by no means awful - leaving you with twice as much sinister fun on this double feature. Contrast and shadows on the British original are poorly balanced but there appears to be no aliasing, shimmering or edge enhancement employed for a far more smooth presentation. There's also a new retro-documentary on both versions that is generally compelling if all too short.
Movie Review: Mind Games
Summary: 4 Stars
I don't often watch the oldies, but a while ago, I was intrigued with a term a group of women friends used - "gaslighting" - in reference to men who play mind games with women to cover their womanizing and their lies. When I asked for an explanation, I was directed to watch this movie for the origins of the term.
In this 1944 version of a British melodrama originating in 1939, directed by George Cukor, Ingrid Bergman stars as a young woman being slowly driven to madness by the mind games played upon her by her deceiving husband, played by Charles Boyer. The man she loves is not who he appears to be. To cover his deceptions, he slowly drives Bergman into psychological torment by first drawing her closer to him with loving behavior, then, just as she begins to feel some degree of happiness, suddenly and inexplicably pushing her away again, accusing her of lies or unsound judgment to cover his own dark nature. She loves him, and desperately tries to be ever more loving to him, but no matter how she tries to appease his moods, is never able to satisfy him. A once sane and strong person has gradually been reduced to an anxiety-ridden, trembling woman who no longer knows up from down. When he blatantly flirts with the housemaid (a shallow and silly female only too eager to see the better woman so humiliated but quickly falling under his mind control, too) in front of her, Bergman tearfully asks why he must so humiliate her, and he angrily accuses her of being too sensitive, of imagining things, even while demeaning her to his woman friends behind her back, strengthening the illusion that she is a lunatic whose judgment cannot be trusted. He is, in fact, married to another and having an affair with the housemaid, but Bergman cannot see his lies for the torment of her own confused mind. She begins to question her own judgment, her own senses, what should be obvious to her or anyone, but what he has convinced her is the deterioration of her sanity. She has already had one nervous breakdown and is fast heading for another. Even as she tries to please her husband, he spirals into anger should she ever question his behavior, throwing the blame back on her, stonewalling her as she begs for his "forgiveness" for questioning him.
One almost starts to feel a little nuts just watching this process. The suspense builds as at last an outsider to this psychological torment, a Scotland Yard detective played by Joseph Cotten, comes to Bergman's aid, finally convincing her that she's not mad, that the man she loves is not only a liar and a womanizer, but also a murderer and thief. She nearly succumbs to her husband's mind games yet again, fearing his anger, but a climactic scene brings sweet satisfaction along with psychological freedom at long last.
I may just change my mind about watching the occasional oldie but goodie. For all the melodrama and stiffness of acting in old movies, the stories of human nature can be just as real and relevant today. And it is always fascinating to trace back the route of a phrase still used today to describe questionable behavior in contemporary relationships.