The film was created by Lewton based only on a title given to him by RKO. It was directed by Mark Robson (his first film as director) and stars Tom Conway (playing the same guy he played, and got killed as, in The Cat People!); Jean Brooks (The Leopard Man); Isabel Jewel (The Leopard Man); Kim Hunter (her first film role) and Hugh Beaumont (Railroaded!). Cinematography by Nicholas Musuraca (Blood on the Moon, Cat People) and music by Roy Webb (Out of the Past, and many other films noir).As you can see the film boasts a very good cast and film makers who worked on many classic period films noir. So why isn’t this film “noir”? Who knows? People just didn’t go out and make noir back in the 1940s, they just came out that way. I would be interested in seeing what others think about this film.
I watched the film a few times on DVD this week and couldn’t get it out of my head. I’ve never seen it before or read much about it. Apparently, when Val Lewton was asked what the film was about he said, “Death is good.” The film is filled with a bunch of sad lonely people. Even the bit-part secretaries in the film have drunken fathers or great regrets in their lives. This is not a happy movie but one that makes you think. And one that makes you think “How the hell did this film get made?” In my opinion, it’s brilliant. I enjoy Cat People a little more because the story for The Seventh Victim doesn’t hold up when you ask key questions about the plot. I wrote a long (probably too long) synopsis for the film below, but my recommendation to you if you haven’t seen it is to watch it first. There are a few scenes in the film, not to mention the ending, which knocked my socks off.
A few things to think about when you’re watching: Notice how Mary and Gregory fall in love and seem to give up looking for Jacqueline half-way through. Only the poet Jason seems to care what happened to her.
The film appears to be a B-movie with more literary and satanic references than you could imagine.
Jason, the poet sitting under “Dante’s” feet.
The doomed Mimi (a reference to the prostitute in the opera La bohème?)
The number 7 room with a noose.
The film tells the story of a young woman, Mary, away at school who finds out about her sister’s disappearance. Jacqueline Gibson, who has always talked about suicide, is Mary’s only relative. Mary finds out later that Jacqueline "Had a feeling about life. That it wasn’t worth living unless you could end it."
Mary returns to New York City and attempts to find her. She finds an apartment above a restaurant (Dante’s Restaurant) that her sister rented and talks the old couple that owns it into opening the door. Before she enters, she spies Mimi, a sick coughing woman who lives down the hall. The only thing in the empty room is a chair and a hanging noose hung ready above it. Later, she meets a private detective at the police station who, after being threatened not to by another agency looking for her, decides to help her. Meanwhile, Mary visits the morgue where she receives a tip that someone else was there looking for her. She visits lawyer Gregory Ward who she eventually finds out is Jacqueline’s secret husband. They agree to team up and find her sister but first they have dinner and it seems like they are falling in love.
The diminutive private detective that initially shunned Mary digs into the case and finds some information. He finds out that Jacqueline has given her beauty company “as an out-right gift” to the manager of the place, a woman, Mrs. Redi, who told her earlier that she was sold the company. They decide to search the premises, particularly a back room that the detective could not enter when snooping around the place. Mary and the man break into the place at night and Mary bullies the small man, who is scared, into entering the room at the end of a long dark hallway. The man picks the lock and enters. He exits quickly, in a zombie-like state then drops dead apparently with a stab wound to his stomach. Mary runs from the place and takes the subway home. While on the subway, she’s deep in thought and rides the A train all the way through a few times. Back on 14th street, a pair of men drag a third on the train. It first appears that the middle man is drunk. Then his head flops back to reveal that it’s the dead private dick. She changes train cars and gets the ticket-taker to come back to the compartment and help capture the men. Of course, when she returns, the men and the body are gone. Did she dream it?
Mary and Jacqueline search the papers but find no stories on the dead man in the paper. Ward gets Mary a job as a kindergarten teacher. Later in the day, Ward meets with creepy psychiatrist Dr. Judd who admits that she’s keeping Jacqueline for the last few days to keep her out of danger and that he needs money to take care of her. The husband, who doesn’t seem very shocked or outraged that his wife is being kept by the doctor (maybe because Mary and him are loosing interest in the case). He refuses to give him money, but eventually gives him about 45 bucks from his wallet. Dr. Judd, who now possibly realizing that he won’t get more money for her, visits Mary and offers to return Jacqueline to her. They go to the Doctor’s house. Jacqueline isn’t there which prompts the doctor to rush out looking for her. The second he leaves there’s a knock on the door and it’s Jacqueline! Jacqueline looks around and puts her finger to her lips to shush her and shuts the door. Mary opens it and she’s gone. Apparently she spotted the detectives hiding in the doctor’s quarters.
Later at the restaurant, Mary and Gregory have lunch where they’re introduced to a failed poet. The old woman running the place decides that the man may help in cheering up young Mary. She brings him to the table just as Gregory admits that he wants to find his wife to settle things. What things? We don’t find out because that’s when the poet decides to sit with them. Gregory looks at Jason like a jealous woman. The poet, Jason, knows of Jacqueline and decides to help them find her.
