Crimes at the Dark House (1940)

I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

One of those movie experiences that is so good it makes you realize you've been grading everything else on a curve.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

This is scarier then A Nightmare on elm street. Crimes at the dark house will make you go AHHHHHHHH! This is one of the scariest movies you will ever. see. It has great acting it also has a great story line. It you like horror stories you should see this movies.

Callous thief and murderer kills the real Sir Percival Glyde whose gone bush down under for more than a decade, then returns to England impersonating his victim to inherit the vast estate. With a litany of perjury to maintain, things soon begin to unravel for the "false" Sir Percival, as his lechery and lies quickly catch-up leading to ever more desperate and depraved crimes.Tod Slaughter is suitably nasty as the greedy deviant whose unsophisticated ruse barely adheres through a mutually beneficial alliance with crooked Doctor (Petrie) who catches on to the deceit early in the piece, then becomes complicit through escalating blackmail. The sheer abhorrence of the imposter's crimes is breathtaking for a film made in 1940, and he surely ranks as one of the most unconscionable villains of that decade (his dismissive immorality is right up there with Richard Widmark's giggling killer from "Kiss of Death"). His vulgar disposal of one of the victims in particular really is quite shocking when you consider the motive.Memorable dialogue ("double cross me and I'll feed your entrails to the pigs") and plot twists (the apparently illegitimate daughter who's a basket case, and just so happens to be a dobbleganger for Sir Percival's reluctant wife), keep the momentum constant, and combined with Slaughter's wicked characterisation, it's worth hanging in just to anticipate his comeuppance.

"A deranged man murders another man in order to assume his identity and take over a recently inherited estate. Soon after arriving at the estate, the psychotic man finds he must continue his murderous tendencies in order to keep his charade from being exposed. As the number of victims increase, along with his deepening madness, it becomes a matter of time before all is revealed and the man's true identity is exposed," according to the DVD sleeve's synopsis.Thespian Tod Slaughter (posing as Percival Glyde) receives a rude awakening when he discovers the man whose head he hammered to death, "Sir Percival", was penniless. In order to keep the man's estate, he goes ahead with an arranged wedding to pretty Garbo-light Sylvia Marriott (as Laurie Fairlie). After a tearful wedding night, Ms. Marriott tries to distance herself from the repulsive Mr. Slaughter, who is trying to get her to sign over her fortune.When Marriott won't cooperate, Slaughter has her locked in a cell as "The Woman in White", a ghostly apparition seen around the family mansion. Slaughter must also contend with cast members he hasn't been able to murder, like wormy Hay Petrie (as Isidor Fosco). "Crimes in the Dark House" isn't very successful at adapting the Wilkie Collins novel, but it makes a great vehicle for Tod Slaughter - a thoroughly delightful actor in peak performance mode.******* Crimes at the Dark House (1940) George King ~ Tod Slaughter, Sylvia Marriott, Hay Petrie

Crimes at the Dark House (1940) was adapted from the famous Wilkie Collins novel, The Woman in White. Warner Bros made an outstanding (and far more faithful) version, directed by Peter Godfrey in 1948, with Alexis Smith, Eleanor Parker and Sydney Greenstreet (which is not at present available on commercial DVD). This one was obviously filmed on the cheap. Nonetheless, despite Slaughter's fulsome melodramatics, it has its suspenseful and even horrific moments, plus a delightful interpretation (the extreme opposite of Greenstreet's) of Fosco by diminutive Hay Petrie. Geoffrey Wardwell (in his last of six movies) is a dead loss as the hero, but Sylvia Marriott manages her dual role quite ably. Stage actress Hilary Eaves also makes a considerable impression in one of her rare movies (she made only three), while Rita Grant is an absolute stand-out as the maid of no account.