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Strange Illusion | 
 enlarge | Director: Edgar G. Ulmer
Actors: Jimmy Lydon, Warren William, Sally Eilers, Regis Toomey, Charles Arnt
Studio: ROAN
Category: DVD
List Price: $9.95
Buy New: $7.99
You Save: $1.96 (20%)
New (3) Used (4) from $5.39
Rating:  9 reviews
Sales Rank: 140045
Format: Black & White, Color, Dvd-video, Ntsc
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Region: 1
Number Of Discs: 1
Running Time: 80 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.9
Dimensions (in): 7.3 x 5.3 x 0.6
UPC: 785604205920
EAN: 0785604205920
ASIN: B00004YS6P
Theatrical Release Date: March 31, 1945
Release Date: January 30, 2001
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Amazon.com
Clean-cut American teen Jimmy Lydon is tormented by nightmares in which his deceased father warns him about Mom's new boyfriend, and he feigns madness to infiltrate a mental hospital where he suspects the answers lie. Yes, it's Hamlet refigured as a suburban film noir thriller with a psychiatric twist. Former Hollywood leading man Warren William is thoroughly wolfish as a silver-haired lothario whose slick charm and classy manners hide a disturbing taste for teenage girls, and Sally Eilers plays his mark, the young widow with two teenage kids and a sizable life insurance payoff. B-movie legend Edgar G. Ulmer (Detour) overcomes a starvation budget to create a modest little thriller with understated mood, simple but eerie dream sequences, and a creepy undercurrent of corruption and sexual deviance. --Sean Axmaker
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| Customer Reviews: Read 4 more reviews...
It's an ULMER! Not REALLY noir, but an adequate cheap imitation... March 7, 2008
Marilyn Jones (Mason, Texas)
I watched this because it was supposedly a noir, and Edgar Ulmer certainly is a noir director, but this one fell short in a lot of areas. The first hint that this movie's budget was bare-bones was in the scene where Jim Bob or whatever the kid's name is goes fishing with the doc and you can hear oars banging around in the boat and all kinds of stuff...I actually found myself laughing. Also, you don't see people fishing in noirs unless they are doing it in the rain and/or they are going to find a body.
SPOILER: Along with the little shortcuts like the noisy boat scene, there is a serious plot problem with the whole movie revolving around a dream that Jim Bob has at the very beginning--it's a premonition dream and it all comes true with no explanation. Willing suspension of disbelief comes hard in this one.
Now that I think about it, there are more plot problems, too. For instance, the story unfolds like a story told by someone who just can't tell a story--it goes along and then it's like that bad storyteller ("OH WAIT! I forgot to mention that Jim Bob thinks his father was murdered!" "OH WAIT! I forgot to mention that Jim Bob's father was involved in Curtis's being exposed!").
But all in all, it was a fairly entertaining movie. The acting was pretty good, considering, and it had some exciting moments.
From the era before the psychiatric takeover of Hollywood. October 24, 2007
Dr. Serizawa (Utah USA)
To me it is very interesting to watch a movie from the era before Hollywood was infiltrated by the psychiatrists. In this movie the shrink is a villain who uses his power for evil ends. Sadly this is the true character of psychiatry and many movies from before the 1950s still recognized psychiatry as the fraud it is. If shrinks weren't depicted as evil they were depicted as incompetents, idiots and buffoons... also true depictions.
I suppose that's one reason I like the pre-1950 movies best. Few of the movie producers and directors had been duped by this destructive and evil profession. Today we get a constant stream of pro-psychiatric claptrap from Hollywood, Law and Order being one of the worst offenders. Sad. One only needs to see what happens to stars like Owen Wilson... who attempted suicide AFTER being placed on antidepressant medications by a filthy shrink.
 Give me a Break! July 16, 2007
Margaret Colby-bittner (southern CA USA)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
My Illusion is shattered. After scores of orders from Amazon, I got a real dud. Looks like this is VCRd from televison (maybe even French television). This is such a poor recording that it is not really viewable. If I could give it less than 1 star it would get it. And yes, it was returned. That was the only good thing about this transaction.
 A Poverty Row psychological thriller, with Warren William making a sleazy, creepy villain September 25, 2006
C. O. DeRiemer (San Antonio, Texas, USA)
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
Hamlet, Freud and Edgar Ulmer may seem like an unnatural group of pals, but among them they have come up with a tidy little psychological thriller. In fact, with a bigger budget and stronger actors, Ulmer might have had a classic on his hands. As it is, Strange Illusion can't escape its Poverty Row heritage. Even so, it's a well-paced movie that keeps a person's interest. Even if the best-acted roles are the bad guys, that's not necessarily a drawback in a B movie.
Paul Cartwright's father, an older man and a respected judge, died two year ago in a train accident...at least it appeared to be an accident. Paul's not so sure. Paul (James Lydon) is a young man from a good family. He has a younger sister and an attractive mother, Virginia Cartwright (Sally Eilers). The family is well off. Paul lately has been having dreams, disturbing dreams, of his father telling him to take care of his mother, to be wary of a shadowy someone who is coming into her life. Paul confides in an old friend of the family, Dr. Martin Vincent (Regis Toomey), who tries to calm Paul but who also respects Paul's intelligence. Paul is, in fact, smart and resourceful. Then one day Paul's mother introduces him to Brett Curtis (Warren William), a smooth, gracious man Paul feels he's met before. Curtis and his mother announce that they plan to wed.
Paul becomes suspicious of Curtis and Curtis' association with Professor Muhlbach (Charles Arnt), a psychologist who runs an exclusive and very private sanitarium. Before long, Paul becomes a "guest" in the place so that he can investigate Muhlbach and Curtis. But things begin to go wrong. It becomes a race to see if Paul can break away, if Dr. Vincent can convince the police that there may be a link between the death of Paul's father and the team of Curtis and Muhlbach, and if Paul and some of his friends can get to the lake cottage where Curtis has gone with Paul's sister.
James Lydon had a great success as a child actor, especially playing in the Henry Aldrich films. He was typecast as a gawky, friendly, well-intentioned kid. Strange Illusion was an attempt by him to break out of those roles as he grew older. He's not a gifted enough actor to carry the weight of the movie, but he certainly gives the role all he's got. He's no embarrassment. The acting interest, however, comes from Charles Arnt and, especially, Warren William. Arnt gives the professor a great gloss of smiling insincerity. He's unethical down to his polished fingernails.
Warren William really shines. William was a tall, broad-shoulder man with a profile that out-Barrymored Barrymore's. He had a creamy baritone voice and a smooth manner. Although he was in private life a shy man long-married to one woman, in movies he became typed as a charming rotter. He was big stuff in the early Thirties, but by the late Thirties had slowly moved down to B movies. In Strange Illusion, at 51, his profile was still as sharp as a crease, but his face was beginning to look its age. His eyes were a little puffy and pouched, the jaw line not quite so firm. With the Curtis character, William's face looks like dissipation. As soon as we see Brett Curtis walk into Virginia Cartwright's parlor to be introduced to Paul, we know this man is as insincere as a head waiter. Later, while we watch him try to sweet-talk Virginia into to an early marriage, all the while subtly looking over the daughter, we know the ghost in Paul's dream was right on. William does a fine job showing us a creepy, dangerous charmer.
Ulmer starts the movie with the dream sequence. It's B movie special effects but it serves the purpose of getting us into Paul's mind and preparing us to believe in Paul. Be forewarned. There's a brief dream sequence at the end which verges on the icky. I've seen this movie on DVD and on VHS tape. The transfers are watchable but nothing special for either one. Both bear all the poor quality hallmarks of a public domain movie: Soft images, specks, too contrasty in places and impenetrable night scenes.
Solid B-Movie Thriller from a Master of Shoestring Budgets. May 29, 2005
mirasreviews (McLean, VA USA)
2 out of 4 found this review helpful
"Strange Illusion" was directed by the great B-movie director Edgar G. Ulmer, sometimes called "The Poet of Poverty Row" -meaning independent film and small studios, who is perhaps best known for making the famous and famously low-budget film noir "Detour" in 1946. "Strange Illusion" is more a conventional thriller than film noir, as it lacks film noir's introversion, alienation, and cynicism. It's a creepy but optimistic crime film that's well-conceived despite its shoestring budget and overstated acting. Ulmer's background in production design is evident in the thoughtful set design.
Paul Cartwright (James Lyndon) is a college student haunted by a dream in which an impostor, posing as Paul's deceased father, fools his mother and sister into accepting him into the family. Paul's father, an eminent criminologist, was killed in an unexplained car accident 2 years before, and left letters with his estate to be sent to Paul every few months. When Paul receives a letter from his father asking that he guard his mother and sister against unscrupulous associates, shortly after his troubling dream, Paul heads for home anxious as to what he might find. Paul's mother (Sally Eilers) is being romanced by a slick middle-aged bachelor named Brett Curtis (Warren William). When Curtis' words and actions recall his dream, and Curtis resembles a notorious criminal in his father's files, Paul becomes intent on finding out more about his mother's suitor.
"Strange Illusion" isn't subtle or multi-layered. It pretty much hits you over the head with these characters and their story. But this is a B-picture, probably part of a double bill, and it works as enjoyable, creepy, occasionally licentious entertainment. The film's flaw, looking at it from 60 years hence, is the character of Paul. He's an 18-20 year old man who has the speech and manners of a 12-year-old. In other words, he's annoying. Audiences at the time may have liked his boyish...um...charm. And he does contrast sharply with Curtis. As for me, I got used to Paul's demeanor and enjoyed the film in spite of it.
The DVD (This refers to the 2001 Roan Group DVD only.): During the opening titles, the picture quivers, and the sound quality is poor. Once the film starts, the picture is steady and sound is ok. About an hour into the film, the volume drops off, though, and I had to turn it up. The picture is watchable but has some white specks and scratches. Bonus features are a "film background" essay about director Edgar Ulmer and a list of credits for the DVD. No subtitles on the Roan Group DVD.
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