Whirlpool (1949)

Whirlpool is an American thriller film first released in 1949, directed by Otto Preminger.  The film stars Gene Tierney, Richard Conte, José Ferrer, Charles Bickford and Barbara O’Neil.  Our overall rating for this film is: good.


Ann Sutton is the wife of a renowned psychoanalyst, who is somehow oblivious to her incipient mental derangement.  Leaving a department store one day, she is about to be detained for shoplifting when a smooth-talking stranger, Dr Korvo, intervenes.  A hypnotherapist, Korvo offers to help Ann to overcome her kleptomaniac impulses, but another woman Theresa Randolph, warns her that he is a dangerous man.  A short while later, Theresa is dead, apparently murdered by Ann.  The man who had most to gain from the killing was Korvo, but at the time of the murder he was in hospital, and so he couldn’t possibly be the murderer – or could he...?

Whirlpool would be a very respectable film noir were it not for the brazen absurdity of its storyline (which stretches credibility so far beyond breaking point that you would be well advised to wear a safety helmet) and some equally implausible characterisation.  Fortunately, there are some saving graces – the appropriate noir cinematography lends the film a mood of tangled intrigue and dark menace which helps to distract the viewer from the hideous plot contrivances, and Gene Tierney – her second collaboration with director Otto Preminger, after the superb Laura (1944) – brings a touch of class which adds greatly to the film’s enjoyment value.   The best performance comes from José Ferrer, who, as the sinister Dr Korvo, exudes an aura of villainous charm which is both irresistibly seductive and deeply disturbing, not unlike a cross between Noel Coward and Peter Lorre.  Not a great film, but certainly one that scores highly in the entertainment stakes.

© James Travers 2008

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