Stolen Face (1952)

Calificación de los usuarios:

5.7/10   

Director:

Terence Fisher

Escritores:

Martin Berkeley (writer)
Richard H. Landau (writer)

Fecha de Lanzamiento:

16 junio 1952 (USA)

Género:

Drama

Plot:

A plastic surgeon has a brief fling with a concert pianist, then she leaves him to go back to her previous boyfriend...

Plot Keywords:

Plastic Surgery

Comentarios de los usuarios:

Far-fetched but entertaining

Reparto

Paul Henreid	...	Dr. Philip Ritter
Lizabeth Scott	...	Alice Brent / Lily Conover, after surgery
André Morell	...	David
Mary Mackenzie	...	Lily Conover, before surgery
John Wood	...	Dr. John 'Jack' Wilson
Arnold Ridley	...	Dr. Russell
Susan Stephen	...	Betty
Diana Beaumont	...	May
Terence O'Regan	...	Pete Snipe, Lily's friend

Duración:

72 min

País:

UK

Idioma:

Inglés

Color:

Negro y Blanco

Relación de Aspecto:

1.37 : 1

Sonido:

Mono

Locaciones de Filmación:

Riverside Studios, Hammersmith, London, England, UK

Compañía:

Hammer Film Productions

Trivialidades:

The first film of John Wood.

Far-fetched but entertaining

Lizabeth Scott has "A Stolen Face" and also has the face that was stolen in this 1952 film also starring Paul Henreid and directed by Terence Fisher. Scott plays a beautiful concert pianist, Alice Brent, who meets Dr. Philip Ritter (Henreid), a plastic surgeon, while he's on vacation. They fall in love, but she leaves suddenly. She's involved with her manager and rather than confront the situation, she just takes off.

Devastated, Ritter returns to his practice, part of which is done at a prison where he reconstructs patients' injured or deformed faces to help them rehabilitate and live better, crime-free lives. One such patient is Lily Conover (Mary Mackenzie), a thief whose face is disfigured on one side. Ritter makes her over to look like Alice Brent and marries her. Lily, however, can't quite rehabilitate. She feels stifled by the doctor's lifestyle and starts stealing and hanging with her old crowd. Then Alice Brent decides she can't marry her manager and pays Philip a visit.

This film could be considered a camp classic - the story is, but the performances are quite good. Until he returns from vacation, Dr. Ritter is a fine doctor, totally professional and generous. A bad love affair makes him into an obsessed whacko who makes over a thief into the woman he loves and marries her. Go figure. And I agree with one of the comments here - why Alice Brent didn't cut and run when she realized what he did defies imagination.

Scott is older here than in her big noir days but is radiant and beautiful in both roles. She's more animated than in other films and pulls off the Cockney nicely. The only strange thing there was that when the makeover was complete, Lily suddenly had Alice's very distinctive husky voice.

Henried gives a good performance in an impossible role. How do you play a warm, normal, hardworking man who does a complete turnaround with no indication in the script as to where it came from, no tendencies beforehand, no grasping obsession during the affair - and suddenly a patient goes under the knife and emerges Lizabeth Scott. Only in Hollywood. I wouldn't have it any other way.