Whirlpool (1950)

Sorry, this movie sucks

I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Oh sure, Ann Sutton could pay for that pin - or for many other things - but there's something, probably, about the thrill of taking something, very non-chalant out of a store, especially as an unsuspecting adult white woman in the late 40's, and not getting caught. Is it Kleptomania? Perhaps. But the point is, at the start of Whirlpool, Ann gets caught at a department store stealing a pin, and she's in luck that David Korvo is there to help excuse her away - these are false charges after all, she has the money to buy a dozen of these pins, right - but there's a catch to her being let go: not so much for money, at least it seems at first. She tries to pay him, but for five thousand, p-shaw. No, he wants to get at her mind, to find what it is that made her do this thing... but it will lead to murder.Gene Tierney and Jose Ferrer play Ann and Korvo, and they're both excellent here. Even a one and a half note character (not quite one, maybe, almost two dimensional, if it tried) like Ann's husband Bill gets a solid performance out of Richard Conte, to the point where we really feel for their marriage, and see the conflict very plain as soon as Ann 'turns' on to her 'nothing's the matter' tone of voice to her husband after she comes home and tells the maid that there's something very wrong and she must speak to her husband soon as he gets home. Is she crazy? Has she been driven mad? She's no femme fatale really - she is in what seems to be a fairly happy marriage (though at one critical point she'll say otherwise in a very tense confessional). But she is flawed and interesting, and that helps.It's especially good that this character is so strong, as well as Korvo being an equally strong, conniving villain, and we know he's a villain from basically minute one but the fun is seeing how he does things like slip a glass with the lady's fingerprints into his jacket while she's away for a minute from the lunch table. But there's a couple of plot holes here that are jarring - one is more character-based and comes in the third act, it felt like a scene was missing that involved convincing a particular character to give Ann one more chance, and there was a connective tissue from the convincing to her not in prison - and I have to wonder how much they cut out of the book. It seems like a lot. Not to mention the notion of how completely tight the hypnosis can be, just how air-tight a plot can be (that we don't really see be suggested by the way) for Ann to go out in her car and get those records and then for that other thing to happen.Whirlpool isn't weak tea by any means, but I have to think Preminger, despite some clever camera angles and the usual flair for hardcore film noir as a director (the tension in that final scene is really terrific, especially how a character hides just until a certain moment) would have had some trouble without this cast. Thankfully, Tierney gives this character credibility and she makes her fragile, torn and frayed, and when she's in her hypnotic trances it's like she's walking on air. I even liked the one/two scene turn by Barbara O'Neil (Constance Collier also has some good lines). Not something to rush to see, but it's a fair follow-up for the director and star from Laura - more of a B-side if one were to screen them back to back

Otto Preminger hit something of a speed bump in his career when he did Whirlpool. A nice cast and the makings of what could have been a good story is undone by a really incredible and unbelievable premise.Gene Tierney is the wife of psychiatrist Richard Conte who has her own issues, to wit she's a kleptomaniac. Jose Ferrer who plays a quack hypnotherapist spots her and was probably stalking her waiting for a moment to catch her stealing from a department store. He's got a fine line in blackmailing and another of his victims is Barbara O'Neil.With a little hypnosis Ferrer gets Tierney to go to O'Neil's home where she's been strangled and have the police discover her. Here's where the rub is, Jose has an iron clad alibi. I won't go any further, but ain't no way he could have done the deed given his situation. How he did it is just too much for the viewer to swallow.I will say that Ferrer does steal the film with a portrait of pure evil. Still it was a performance wasted in a mediocre movie.

Film Noir to me is dark, with evil deeds and especially unhappy endings. This was before I began thinking about it and determined that noir is more a type of film making rather than film content. A film like "Double Indemnity is noir even tho we do have some happy in the ending (the daughter and boyfriend reconcile). Sunset Boulevard has Norma so bonkers she thinks things are happy and so they are. So, this noir is a happy noir. Gene Tierny is hypnotized by Jose Ferrer and he makes her do things to help him murder a former sucker who turned on him. Jose is so good at hypnosis he even google-eyes himself after gall bladder surgery so he can get about knocking off people and listening to records. Gene's husband is a shrink himself, but legitimate and somehow he connives that Jose is not on the level. He believes her, then he doesn't, she's nuts, she's not, oh dear, what to do, what to do. Cut to murder scene and Jose hiding in the wings with a guy he finally Jose tries to get Gene to cover for him while hubby and a cop are searching a closet. Failure and good wills out, happiness and joy, cut. This movie is so contrived, I wanted to hypnotize myself in to shutting it off but stayed to course to see how lousy a top notch cast/production could screw up. Pretty bad.

Ann Sutton (Gene Tierney), wife of a respected L.A. psychoanalyst, steals an expensive ornamental dress pin. She gets caught. Instead of taking her psychological problem to her competent husband (played by Richard Conte), she confides in a hypnotist named David Korvo (Jose Ferrer), who just happens to be present when Ann is caught by store security. This chance encounter propels the plot, which is heavy on hypnosis, and which later involves murder.The problem here is the idea that people can do seemingly impossible tasks while under hypnosis. Maybe it was a plausible premise in 1949. Certainly, the story shows how enthralled people were in those days with the potential of hypnosis. Today though, the story's premise is not remotely credible.The plot is slow. The script is talky. Dialogue contains lots of exposition. B&W cinematography is fine. This is not a film noir, but the lighting is noirish. Soundtrack consists mostly of dreamy, nondescript elevator music, consistent with the sleepy, hypnotic tone of the story.Richard Conte seems stiff and uncomfortable in his role. Gene Tierney is quite beautiful. Yet at times her self-conscious glamour seems to substitute for acting. Tierney's character steals a pin, but Jose Ferrer steals the show, with his resonant voice and expressive face. Constance Collier puts in a delightful cameo appearance as the hostess of an elegant party.That hypnosis can motivate characters is hokey and not believable. And on this pseudo premise the entire story hinges. Too bad. Still, the film provides some dark glamour, and offers some interesting characters. And the film will appeal, of course, to viewers enraptured by Gene Tierney, as "Whirlpool" is largely a cinematic vehicle for her acting.