We returned to the Insane Asylum this evening - no, not in real life but in "Shock"(1946), starring Vincent Price as an unctuous shrink who murders his wife, then goes to great lengths to prevent the only witness from talking. As the movie opens (which I've thought would make a great title for a book of movie reviews - "As The Movie Opens" by Yours Truly), but yeah - as it opens, "Janet Stewart" (Anabel Shaw) is checking into a hotel in San Francisco. She's there to meet her husband, "Lieutenant Paul Stewart" (Frank Latimore), who's just been released after two years as a prisoner of war in Japan. During a fitful sleep, she's awakened in the wee hours by a loud argument. A man is yelling at his wife in a nearby room. She accuses him of adultery. He picks up a heavy object and strikes her. She falls dead. Janet sees all of this from her balcony.
In the morning, Janet's husband finally arrives, to find her in a state of shock. He calls the manager to ask what has happened, and the manager, not knowing, suggests calling the House Doctor, a man named "Dr. Richard Cross" (Vincent Price). Holy smokes! He's the guy who's just murdered his wife! Good Lordy Moses do we ever have a setup.
At first, the doctor's secret is safe. Janet is catatonic. Price has no idea she saw what he did. But then, as he finishes his exam, she wakes up. Thrashing about in her bed, she describes the horror in half-finished sentences : "He......killed her........picked up a candlestick and........hit her and......she fell and.......he killed her"! Janet never looks at Price as she's saying these things. But she's frightened and obviously remembering something.
Maybe it's only a dream? After all, she's just come out of a stupor. Price, now realising she's talking about him, decides to run with it. He maintains his composure, telling the Lieutenant that Janet is having an hallucination. "It's common with victims of shock. But I'll need more time to determine the actual cause. If you don't mind, I'd like to bring her to my clinic for a more thorough exam. You can meet us there if you like". The Lieutenant agrees, figuring Price is the expert. Price has a jump on him and gets to the clinic first. There he meets with a nurse, Elaine Jordan (Lynn Bari). OMG! She's the woman he's been cheating with! "Quickly", he says, motioning to the semi-conscious Janet. "Get her into a room and give her a shot of scopolamine".
I've gotta cut in to say I recognised that word right away, as it was the drug used extensively by the Supremely Evil Dr. Ewen Cameron in his MK Ultra Mind Control experiments. One of the things scopolamine does is to erase memory.
Hmmmm. No comment. (actually a ton of comment but not now).
Price wants the scopolamine given to Janet for obvious reasons. Nurse Elaine doesn't question his order, even though it involves a Schedule II drug. To her, Janet is just an anonymous patient. But she's involved with Price and can see he's a nervous wreck.
"What happened? Did you tell her about us"?, she asks, referring to Price's wife.
"I did worse than that; I killed her"!
"My God, why"?
"It was an accident. I lost my temper".
Elaine thinks for a moment, then reveals the depth of her callousness.
"Actually, Richard.....this is perfect. Now we don't have to worry if she'll divorce you. We're free"!
Price gives her the bad news.
"No we aren't. That woman, the one you just gave the injection? She saw me"!
This conundrum leads to ever escalating tension, as Price continues to "treat" Janet. The Lieutenant sees she isn't getting better - she's actually worsening - and he begins to question Price's expertise. "I'd like to get a second opinion", he tells Price, who cooly responds that it's fine with him. But the doctor called in is a friend of Price and defers to his initial diagnosis. "Yes, I'm afraid Dr. Cross is correct", he tells the Lieutenant. "There's no telling what caused your wife's mental state. Her hallucinations could come from anything, including her imagination. Only time will tell if she returns to normal".
Smug now that the "second opinion" is dispensed with, Price lords it over the Lieutenant, using his "expertise" as a blunt instrument. "You see, it's as I told you. I've had years of study to go by and have treated a hundred such patients". He then adds a small dose of self-deprecation to soften the blow : "But even we in the medical profession will never know the full workings of the mind".
Price continues to gaslight both the Lieutenant and now Janet, who despite being drugged is beginning to regain her memory. When he has Janet alone, he tries hypnotizing her : "You did not see anyone being killed; it came from a dream". But when she awakens, Janet still insists she saw the real thing.
The case takes a turn when Price is visited by a detective. "Dr. Cross, I have some unsettling news. We think your wife may have been murdered". (In the interim, Price has taken her body and dumped it off a cliff, making her death look like an accident). The detective explains that there's been another murder in the same vicinity, committed by a transient. "There's a chance he killed your wife, too, and then threw her off the cliff. We'd like permission to exhume her body to check for similar head injuries".
Price remains unruffled. "Oh, detective.........that's horrifying. But don't you think it's ghastly to exhume her body after what she's already suffered"? Unfortunately for Price, his silky persuasiveness doesn't work on the no-nonsense cop. "I know it's appalling, Doctor, but we've got to strengthen our case against this man. If we can prove a similar m.o. in both murders, we'll convict him. You'd want that, wouldn't you? To see your wife's murderer convicted"?
"Oh.......of course, detective.......of course. I guess you'd better go ahead with the exhumation then".
All the air seems to go out of Price at this point. When the detective leaves, he comes unglued. "Why oh why didn't I just tell them the truth to start with? I killed her by accident, in a fit of anger. Now, by lying, I'll face the electric chair"!
But Nurse Elaine won't let him give up.
"Richard! Get ahold of yourself! Don't worry about the police, they've got nothing. They can't prove anything by examining your wife, especially after such a fall. We could say her injuries resulted from hitting the rocks. They've got nothing"!
"Yes, but what about the young woman"? He means Janet, who continues to stick to her story.
Nurse Elaine is sadistic. "We can get rid of her, too, using insulin therapy. Once she's out of the way, we're home free".
Insulin "shock" therapy was another specialty of mental health practitioners in the old days. In fact, it was another big favorite of the Dreaded Ewen Cameron.
Price is coming apart now. He doesn't want to be part of cold-blooded murder and retreats to 20/20 hindsight. "I should've told the truth to begin with! Maybe I could still go to the police".
But Nurse Elaine won't let him. Her ambition and sexuality are out of control; they're what have been driving the entire situation. "No! You won't go to the police! We'll start the insulin shock immediately"!
This will lead to a three-way collision of forces, making for a powerful ending, as the cops exhume the body of Mrs. Cross, as Price and Nurse Elaine begin insulin therapy on Janet, and as the Lieutenant arrives at the clinic just in the nick of time to see what's being done to his wife.
"Shock" is a superior thriller with a multi-layered script, one of those - as we saw in many Film Noirs - that packs a ton of story into a brief timeframe (70 minutes). Vincent Price is wonderful as the clammy Dr. Cross and Lynn Bari smolders as his opposite number, an overheated temptress whose risk-taking can only bring Price down in the end. I give the movie Two Big Thumbs Up. It's a minor classic of the nuthouse genre, highly recommended! ///////
That's all I've got at the moment. Hope your Summer is going well, despite the craziness of the year. I'm listening to Buddy Holly, Bobby Fuller and Gentle Giant. What a combo, eh? Have a great day and stay safe, stay strong. See you tonight at the Usual Time!
Tons and tons of love! xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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