The Devil Commands (1941), aka The Devil Said No, aka When the Devil Commands, stars Boris Karloff and was directed by Edward Dmytryk, who later directed The Caine Mutiny (1954).
Karloff plays Dr. Julian Blair, a scientist who has been experimenting with machinery designed to record brainwaves of individuals. It seems people's brainwaves are as distinct as fingerprints, and Dr. Blair believes he is on the path to unlocking the secrets of the human brain.
After the untimely death of his wife, the grief stricken Dr. Blair stumbles across the possibility of using his machinery to talk to his dearly departed, but finds himself at odds with his colleagues and family. While visiting a woman purporting to be a spirit medium, he exposes her as a fraud, but discovers she does seem to have enhanced perceptical (I know this isn't a word as I just made it up. I contact the good people at Websters and have them include it in their next edition) abilities, and enlists her aid in helping him. Being an unsavory individual, the woman agrees to help as she thinks if the good doctor can pull off speaking with the dead, he will gain power and riches beyond belief. Dr. Julian, quitting his job at the university and selling his home, leaves with Mrs. Walters, the psychic medium, and Karl, a mute, brutish man who was injured in one of Dr. Julian's experiments, and they relocate to an isolated manor in a small town, far away from prying eyes and inquisitive minds.
Soon the villagers start to talk and get suspicious of the secretive work going on at the manor. Rumors begin to fly, and speculation runs rampant, certainly assisted with the disappearance of a few recently buried corpses. What was their purpose in Dr. Blair's experiments? You'll have to watch the movie. As the townspeople become more and more uneasy, I half expected a mob brandishing fiery torches to descend on the isolated manor. (Actually, they do, near the end.) The ending was wonderfully unsettling, and left viewers with questions never to be answered. After watching the film, I pondered the fate of Karloffï¿s character, and the more I thought about, the more chills these thoughts gave me.
Karloff is great, as always, as the mad scientist (for lack of a better term) consumed with his quest, but he also provides us with a rich, deep characterization in that Julian feels very remorseful when his experimentation leads to the injury (Karl, who Dr. Julian now provides and cares for) or death. I thought that aspect rare in movies like this. His only intention, his desire, is to speak to his dead wife. Anne Revere is wonderful as Mrs. Walters, and her character makes no bones about what she is in it for, money...she insinuates herself into Julian's life to the point where she actually becomes a surrogate wife, taking care of all matters, allowing Julian to work unfettered, unencumbered with mundane responsibilities. She was very attractive, but in a cruel sense, as she had a gaze that could chill your blood.
One of the many things I enjoyed about this feature was attention to detail. The machinery Karloff uses, especially near the end of the movie, was exquisite and intricate. It reminded me of the machinery from Frankenstein (1931) with dials, electrodes, arcing electricity, indicators, huge, switches for the throwing...it really aiding in providing atmosphere and a real sense of creepiness. Check out the metal, iron maiden-like mask used during the experimentation. Would you let someone fix that on your noggin? I surely wouldn't. Also, the film was intelligent, and provided an atmosphere of belief. There were some very minor plot variances, but those faded quickly as I became engrossed in the Karloffï¿s character knocking on the door of the great unknown.
The movie does get talky at times, but the pace is brisk with a 65 minute running time. The quality of the print used on this DVD is very good, but some minor blemishing is apparent, more so at the beginning. There is little in the way of special features, which is comprised of three movie trailers for current Culumbia/Tristar horror films.
What I really found odd was the title and the tagline for the movie, ï¿This mad wizard kills at will in Satan's service!ï¿ While there were some occult elements, there certainly wasnï¿t any Satanism involved. Maybe some studio lunkhead thought the movie needed some ï¿zingï¿ to draw audiences in, but I think just having Karloff would have been good enough.
Cookieman108
