Obsession, Edward Dmytryk, 1949

Dmytryk directing actors in Obsession.

I sat through a movie, a "Brit Noir" called Obsession, directed by Edward Dmytryk, 1949. Dmytryk was a Canadian of Ukrainian descent. He was one of the Hollywood Ten and fled to England, came back, went to prison then got out and testified before the HUAC and said the Communists tricked him!

Obsession was about an English doctor who chains his wife's American boyfriend in an underground lair.

I realized I had seen this thing on a Roku channel for public domain movies, most of them terrible B movies. I didn't notice it was directed by Dmytryk and I thought it was terrible. Just dreary. English guy carrying on civilized conversations with his victim. It made me wonder why I watched these old movies.

I just watched it again as part of the Criterion Collection on Flimstruck. The beginning was a little interesting, the middle was terribly dull and the end picked up slightly when a Scotland Yard detective starts giving the doctor the Columbo treatment. Even then, I wish they had just thrown him to the floor and handcuffed him as they arrested him instead of chatting and having a drink.

Do the Londoners really refer to calling the cops as 'calling Scotland Yard'? Do cops really introduce themselves as being from Scotland Yard? If not they really should. The characters in this refer to two weeks as a "fortnight" as in, "Not to worry! My husband shan't be home for a fortnight!"

Kind of interesting that the guy fooling around with the other guy's wife was the sympathetic one.