The Strange Woman ***½ (1946, Hedy Lamarr, George Sanders, Louis Hayward, Gene Lockhart, Hillary Brooke) – Classic Movie Review 4377

Hedy Lamarr caught flu three days after filming started on her own production of The Strange Woman (1946) and the production had to be shut down for three weeks.

Director Edgar G Ulmer’s 1946 American melodrama film The Strange Woman stars Hedy Lamarr, George Sanders and Louis Hayward. Hedy Lamarr (executive producer) and Jack Chertok (producer) formed a partnership to produce the film, which was made by Hunt Stromberg Productions and Mars Film Corporation, and was released by United Artists, but it is now in the public domain.

Hedy Lamarr grabs by the lapels her opportunity to shine as beautiful, poor wicked woman Jenny Hager, who marries rich old man Isaiah Poster (Gene Lockhart). But of course her heart doesn’t belong to daddy. She makes a love slave of his son Ephraim Poster (Louis Hayward) and also ensnares his company foreman John Evered (George Sanders), who is engaged to her best pal Meg Saladine (Hillary Brooke).

[Spoiler alert] Then she prompts Ephraim to kill his old man Isaiah. Yes, she has an eye to the Maine chance in 1820s New England timberland!

This swirling colourful, lip-smacking historical melodrama is Hedy stuff, indeed. It may be kitsch and preposterous but it is richly enjoyable thanks to the campy yarn, the surprisingly good production (with fine noir-style black and white cinematography by Lucien N Andriot) and the relishably unrestrained performances, which are especially well aimed in the circumstances.

The acting is handled with much verve by Lamarr, in a masterly portrait of manipulative, and a strong ensemble of mostly British actors. The underestimated Lamarr delivers quite a tour-de-force and Sanders is in his element and highly entertaining.

Edgar G Ulmer directs with flair and energy, and executive producers Hedy Lamarr and Hunt Stromberg contribute a plush production.

Herb Meadow (screenplay), Ulmer (uncredited) and Stromberg (uncredited) pen the screenplay, based on Ben Ames Williams’s 1941 novel.

Also in the cast are June Storrey, Rhys Williams, Moroni Olsen, Olive Blakeney, Kathleen Lockhart, Alan Napier, Dennis Hooey, Jessie Arnold, Edward Biby, Ian Keith, Ray Teal, Katherine Yorke, Christopher Severn and Jo Ann Marlowe.

The sets are designed by Nicolai Remisoff.

It was shot from 10 December 1945 to mid-March 1946 at the Samuel Goldwyn Studios. But Lamarr caught flu and production was shut down between 13 December 1945 and 3 January 1946.

The film went over budget by $1 million but was a moderate success, taking $2.8 million in US rentals.

It was released on 25 October 1946 in the US.

It runs 100 minutes.

Hunt Stromberg disliked the opening sequence with Ulmer’s daughter Arianné as the young Jenny – apparently not nasty enough. So he and fellow executive producer Lamarr got Douglas Sirk to reshoot the scenes using Jo Ann Marlowe who was in Sirk’s A Scandal in Paris and had played Joan Crawford’s daughter Kay in Mildred Pierce.

The cast are Hedy Lamarr as Jenny Hager, George Sanders as John Evered, Louis Hayward as Ephraim Poster, Gene Lockhart as Isaiah Poster, Hillary Brooke as Meg Saladine, Rhys Williams as Deacon Adams, June Storey as Lena Tempest, Moroni Olsen as the Rev Thatcher, Olive Blakeney as Mrs. Hollis, Kathleen Lockhart as Mrs. Partridge, Alan Napier as Judge Henry Saladine, Dennis Hoey as Tim Hager, Jessie Arnold, Edward Biby, Ian Keith, Ray Teal, Katherine Yorke, Christopher Severn and Jo Ann Marlowe as the young Jenny.

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