Small House of Everything

Small House of Everything

Tuesday, July 18, 2017

OVERLOOKED MOVIE: THE SCAR (1948)

Paul Henreid plays John Muller, a medical school dropout who has recently been released from prison for practicing medicine without a license.  Bored with the job given him by the parole board, Muller gathers a gang of crooks to rob a local casino.  Things go awry and some of Muller's gang are killed.  Muller himself goes into hiding from a vengeful casino owner.  then Muller is mistaken for psychiatrist Dr. Bartok, who looks exactly like Muller except that Bartok has a large scar on one side of his face.  Muller sees Bartok's secretary (and lover) Evelyn Nash (Joan Bennett) and falls in love with her.  Deciding to impersonate Bartok, Muller scars his own face but, only after killing Bartok, realizes he scarred the wrong side of his face.  Things start to downhill from there until a number insignificant details brings us to a startling conclusion.

Henreid produced this film himself because he wanted (finally) to play a bad guy.  Directed by Steve Sekely, a Hungarian-born director of B-movies best known for THE DAY OF THE TRIFFIDS, The Scar was scripted by Daniel Fuchs from a novel by radio actor Murray Forbes.

The Scar is also known as Hollow Triumph and The Man Who Murdered Himself.

A pretty good Forties noir flick.  Look closely for Jack Webb in the uncredited role of Bullseye.


https://archive.org/details/TheScar

1 comment: