Hangover Square (1945)

Don't listen to the negative reviews

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

Laird Cregar (George) suffers blackouts whenever he hears discordant sounds. His brain is taken over by impulses that lead to actions for which he has no recollection. And they're not good actions! Basically, don't annoy him as he seems to dish out revenge in these moments. Outside of these episodes, he's a composer who has a champion in noted conductor Alan Napier (Sir Henry) and pupil Faye Marlowe (Barbara). But, enter floozy Linda Darnell (Netta) and her ruthless streak for fame and fortune and Cregar is in trouble. She lures him into her trap with false promises of love in return for his services in composing songs for her to perform and promote her own career. She can then drop him once she hits the big time. Wow, did she ever pick the wrong guy to wind up! Musicians are sometimes a funny breed – wrapped up in a self-obsessed world of creativity. It's an admirable path. Sometimes the music doesn't work – as with Elton John, and sometimes it does as with Cregar in this film. The music is so powerful that it deserves a credit as one of the major cast. Other cast members are all excellent with special mention to Darnell as a total bitch. She will have you rooting for Cregar to have an episode with her and the film doesn't disappoint. However, it is Cregar who drives the film and does an excellent job eluding sympathy despite the horrors that lurk within him.Two scenes that stand out are the Guy Fawkes bonfire sequence where Cregar places his dummy at the top of the bonfire and the end sequence as he is driven to perform his concerto to the end. Literally. We have the added curiosity of the terrible fate that fell upon all 3 of the leads in this film. Sanders committed suicide, and while many people give the nod to Cregar in his last performance before his death, surely the most eerie aspect of the film is what happens to Darnell.

In this variation on the Jekyll and Hyde story, a composer has sporadic episodes where his subconscious takes over and he has no recollections of his actions during these lapses when he comes to. This film reunites Cregar and Sanders with director Brahm from "The Lodger" the previous year, and, like the earlier film, it is visually opulent but the story is less than compelling. Cregar gives perhaps his best performance in this, his final film before his untimely death at age 31 just as he was coming into his own. Darnell, who would also die young, is a sensuous presence as the object of his obsession. Herrmann provides an impressive score, including a piano concerto used in the finale.

This is the story of George Harvey Bone who resided at number 12, Hangover Square. London S.W. in the early part of the Twentieth Century. The British Catalogue Of Music lists him as a Distinguished Gentleman...1944 saw producer Robert Bassler, writer Barré Lyndon, director John Brahm and leading actors George Sanders and Laird Cregar, make the terrific and atmospheric The Lodger. Here just one year later all parties are back for this loose adaptation of Patrick Hamilton's novel of the same name. Hamilton was the guy who gave the world Angel Street {Gaslight} and Rope's End {in film form it became Hitchcock's experimental Rope}. Much like The Lodger, Hangover Square is a thriller set in a foggy dimly lit London. With Cregar {Bone} again playing a shady and tormented character befuddled by his own mental state.This was to be Cregar's last film before he died as a result of a heart attack, believed to have been brought about by his crash dieting and stomach reducing surgery. Cregar would not live to see Hangover Square released, and most upsetting is that he would not see the critical acclaim that his chilling and touching performance garnered. Watching both The Lodger and Hangover Square in sequence, one can see the vast difference in stature of the actor. With both films showcasing what a talent Cregar was, with that, both films are equally a fitting tribute and also a sad eulogy.In the mix on photography duties comes Joseph LaShelle {Laura}, who may not be in the class of The Lodger's Lucien Ballard {who also helped out on Laura apparently}, but LaShelle's London is equally atmospheric and integral to the skin itching story. With the film based around a tortured composer it was a masterstroke getting Bernard Herrmann to score the picture. Creating the "Hangover Square Concerto" in just six weeks, Herrmann's music is suitably dark and makes for an impacting alliance with LaShelle's edgy London backdrop. John Brahm's direction is smooth and contains camera work of the highest order, especially as he and LaShelle had their work cut out with an excellent climatic indoor fire sequence {the biggest ever filmed at the time}. Linda Darnell {what a pair of legs}, George Sanders, Glenn Langan and Faye Marlowe all contribute to what is a top notch production.Hangover Square, a captivating tale about passion, obsession, insanity and murder. 8/10

This is basically a remake of 1944 Lodger, starring Laird Cregar as another serial killer terrorizing Victorian London of 1940's Hollywood, shot again as black and white, written again by Barre Lyndon, directed again by John Brahm and and featuring Linda Darnell (replacing Merle Oberon) as another glamorous vaudeville performer courted by the killer. And yes, George Sanders gives support again, this time as a psychiatrist. However, Linda's unscrupulous Netta, so beautiful in lovely rose-decorated dress, is a villainess instead of heroine in peril, and Cregar's insane killer is not sex-hating mutilator of female bodies. Actually, this intriguing, if fictitious psychosis of doomed and sympathetic protagonist gives literally sanitized version of serial killing, which in real life is usually motivated by truly filthy perversions and not mental illness and never falls into the innocent-by-the-reason-of-insanity-category like in Hangover Square. All this lack of realism definitely helps the movie - made with all the class and taste of Golden Age Hollywood, where the dialogue and imagery are clean, the acting is melodramatic and women glamorous, Hangover Square provides fascinating story and milieu, and some fantastic shots like Netta's murder (!) which is reflected in the mirror lit by opulent gas-lamp, .