Hypnosis in Film Noir

[Andrew666]

Having recently watched Wood Allen's The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001) which I thought was fun and thoroughly enjoyed, I began to think about some other noir movies in which hypnosis plays a big part.


Curse of the Jade Scorpion

Otto Preminger's brilliant Whirlpool (1949) immediately springs to mind of course - with Gene Tierney as a kleptomaniac hypnotised to cure her problem, who then finds herself waking up at the scene of a murder with no idea how she got there.


Gene Tierney

Then there was Sleep My Love (1948) in which Claudette Colbert is manipulated by Don Ameche.

In Calling Dr Death (1943), Lon Chaney Jnr tortures himself with the thought that he may have killed his wife during a mental blackout. He gets nurse Patricia Morrison to hypnotise him to get to the root of the problem. This one is surprisingly good.



In Lew Landers The Mask of Dijon (1946), stage hypnotist Erich Von Stroheim is humiliated when his comeback fails so he hypnotises others to commit murder for him to get his revenge.

The Sherlock Holmes movie The Woman in Green has Holmes fighting against hypnotist Hillary Brook who hypnotises rich businessmen into thinking they have committed murders so they can be blackmailed. Watch the full movie here:



Those of the ones that immediately spring to mind - can anyone suggest any others?

[Steve-O]

Yes... Fear in the Night and the remake, Nightmare are both very good.

[Adam Lounsbery]

Somewhere in the Night and Shock, both from 1946, contain elements of hypnosis.

And, of course, there's the granddaddy of all "hypnosis noirs," Spellbound (1945).