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Bookmark this pageThe Seventh Victim (1943)
Director: Mark Robson
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
What other movie opens with Satanism in Greenwich Village, twists into urban paranoia, and climaxes with a suicide? Val Lewton, Russian emigré workaholic, fantasist, was one of the mavericks of Forties' Hollywood, a man who produced (never directed) a group of intelligent and offbeat chillers for next-to-nothing at RKO. All bear his personal stamp: dime-store cinema transformed by 'literary' scripts, ingenious design, shadowy visuals, brooding melancholy, and a tight rein over the direction. The Seventh Victim is his masterpiece, a brooding melodrama built around a group of Satanists. The bizarre plot involves an orphan (Hunter) searching for her death-crazy sister (Brooks), but also carries a strong lesbian theme, and survives some uneven cameos; the whole thing is held together by a remarkably effective mix of menace and metaphysics - half noir, half Gothic.Author: CA
User reviews of this film
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- uncle don said...
- Posted on Jun 01 2008 21:05 Great example of film noir of that period. Use of black/white/greys and shadows make for heavy use of one's imiganation.
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Cast & crew
Director: Mark Robson
Producer: Val Lewton
Cast: Tom Conway, Jean Brooks, Isabel Jewell, Kim Hunter, Evelyn Brent, Elizabeth Russell, Erford Gage, Ben Bard, Hugh Beaumont full cast
Duration: 71 mins
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