Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

Admirable film.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

In 1945, Producer's Releasing Corporation took the rising film noir genre by surprise with low budget film noir classic "Detour". A nearly similar classic, "Decoy", followed the next year. Unfortunately, even with the casting of the legendary Erich von Stroheim here, "Dijon" barely makes the mustard, closer to French's than Grey Poupon. It's your standard "Svengali" like melodrama with hypnotist von Stroheim obsessed with assistant Jeanne Bates so much that through a trance like manipulation, he gets Bates to marry him. She's really in love with pianist William Wright, but von Stroheim is obsessed so much that he continues to stalk Bates even though it's a lost cause. A complete meglomaniac, von Stroheim harasses Bates to the point of murderous intent, leading to a scheme to where he hypnotizes Bates into killing her true love.This, for the most part, is pretty standard melodrama with only von Stroheim's commanding presence to keep it from sinking into poverty row muck. PRC does a great job with lavish sets and a few surprises, but nothing like that final which comes after a rather standard chase sequence and shoot out. Psychologically, this is fascinating as a study of the mental illness surrounding complete self absorbtion, and is another reminder of Shakespeare's immortal words that whom God intends to destroy, he drives mad first. I much prefer von Stroheim's similar tale of conceit, "The Monster and the Lady", made at Republic just two years before. But what fails in this film won't make you forget this film, leaving you with a dropped jaw followed by uncontrollable laughter and possibly even applause.

When horror fell out of favor at the big studios, it fell into Poverty Row, which was to 1940's pictures what Direct to DVD is today.The plot of this film is that a retired magician is nagged by his young wife and associates to get back on stage, but he wants to discover the secrets of hypnotism and mind control. When his wife's old boyfriend comes on the scene, he plots his revenge, discovering he has the ability to hypnotize people with his will.Edward Van Sloan of the Universal Horror movies has a bit part as the owner of a magic shop who designs a guillotine illusion that couldn't possibly actually work, but does set the stage for the movie's rather silly climax.Chunks of the plot make no sense at all.. Why not just GIVE her the right gun? Why go back to the magic shop when you know they are going to be looking for you?

The year 1946 was one of the best for great movies, giving us such winners as The Best Years of Our Lives, The Strange Loves of Martha Ivers, and Canyon Passage. Unfortunately The Mask of Diijon was not one of these.Bizarre actor-director Eric Von Stroheim had his triumphs in a long career, which dated back to the early silent era -- as a director, Foolish Wives (1922), The Merry Widow (1925) -- as an actor, The Grand Illusion (1937), Sunset Blvd. (1950). Unfortunately The Mask of Diijon was not one of these.Showing up in Hollywood just before World War I, Stroheim excelled playing cruel German officers with his trademarked shaved head and monocle. He passed himself off as an Austrian aristocrat and a military expert, claiming he had served as an officer in an elite cavalry regiment. In reality he was from a respectable Jewish lower middle class family, and the closest he got to the cavalry was a brief stint as a mounted mail carrier. Never mind, the self-made legend was born, and it stuck to him all his life. He was billed as "the Hun" and "the man you love to hate." His career as a director was over by the late twenties. After several expensive flops, studio bosses were tired of his extravagant ways and his egotistical, abrasive personality. He continued on as an actor though, on occasion rising out of mediocrity with such as The Grand Illusion (1937) and Five Graves to Cairo (1943), in the latter of which he played German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel!The Mask of Diijon is a long way down from those days, possibly Stroheim's darkest pit with the light of Sunset Blvd four years distant. This is a very cheap production. No-name actors, except for "the Hun", cheap sets, bad lighting, and awful script. The use of many dark scenes that some people may mistake for arty noir style is obviously just the result of not wanting to spend the dough for bright lights. Murky was the word all the way through. The acting was uninspired but not terrible, especially considering the cast got maybe 20 seconds per scene to rehearse in a budget-minded number like this. The story was the real killer though. Disturbed, paranoid magician uses hypnotism to get innocent victims to do his will, including suicide and murder. His hokey method of hypnotizing these clucks is simply reflecting off a shiny lighter into their eyes and mumbling something like, "You vill do vatefer I say!" And get this -- he learns this evil, occult skill simply by reading some books with self-help type titles something like How to Control People with Your Mind. Puleazee!!! If it were that easy to hypnotize people, I would have my grouchy old wife packed and down the road tonight, and by tomorrow night I would have a half-dozen young babes cavorting about my house! Come to think of it, I would have to hypnotize myself into being able to cavort. Never mind.There were a few good moments in The Mask of Diijon, but I found myself continually praying the 70 minutes would finally drag to an end (I'm one of those masochist types who can't just turn one off). This movie is a stinker -- only for Von Stroheim devotees or desperate insomniacs.

Disappointing. The screenplay always seems on the verge of presenting some interesting plot twists and spell-binding effects, but they never happen. The attractively noirish black-as-a-nightmare lighting photography also constantly signals that some intensely gripping story development is about to occur, but once again all we get are the usual predictable situations which lead to a dull if action-full climax.Steadfastly routine and even turgid direction from Lew Landers doesn't help matters. On occasion, Mr Landers can direct a movie with both punch and style; but in this instance, he exhibits neither quality. And as might be expected, aside from the charismatic von Stroheim, the players are not much to write home about either. Both hero and heroine wear out their welcome, and even von Stroheim's performance suffers from the film editor's tendency to hold shots far too long. Trimming the close-ups would have improved the movie a lot. As is, it's far too slow.Production values are also somewhat limited. True, the camera-work rates as a definite notch above the usual flat Producers Releasing level, and the sets are fulsomely dressed. But we tire of them. The one small set in front of Sheffield's shop is used over and over, and the fact that it becomes so familiar negates whatever small impact the brief spurt of climactic action might otherwise have enjoyed.