Tags:
Film: Mad Love
Year: 1935
Director: Karl Freund
Writers: P.J. Wolfson and John L. Balderston
Starring: Peter Lorre, Frances Drake and Colin Clive
Review:
This was a film that I learned about in an interesting way. I saw The Beast with Five Fingers, which is a variation on the source material. Last year I watched The Hands of Orlac which is closer to the book that was the inspiration. I believe that I learned about this film through special features on my disc as well. This is one that has been on my radar to see for a while and now finally getting to it as a Voyage through the FiVes. I’ve also watched this a second time with an audio commentary from screenwriter and historian Steve Haberman.
Synopsis: in Paris, a demented surgeon’s obsession with a British actress leads him to secretly replace her concert pianist husband’s mangled hands with those of a guillotined murder with a gift for knife-throwing.
Now we start this at a theater where they do horror plays. The star is Yvonne Orlac (Frances Drake). We see her backstage with her maid, Marie (Sara Haden). They’re listening to the radio where someone is playing the piano. This turns out to be Yvonne’s husband, Stephen (Colin Clive). He’s a famous pianist. To signal he loves his wife, he coughs twice between each set.
Yvonne has another admirer though in Dr. Gogol (Peter Lorre). He’s a famous doctor in the area and I get the idea that he no longer practices for money. He takes on difficult cases that challenge him. He comes to this theater for every performance, buying the same box. After the show, he goes backstage to see her. She is flattered but reveals that she’s married. This devastates the doctor. He does steal a kiss, celebrating her final show.
She is heading to meet Stephen and they’re going to London to start a new life. Tragedy strikes when his train crashes. His hands are maimed and the doctor’s initial diagnosis is that he’ll never play again. Yvonne goes to Dr. Gogol and begs him to help. An odd thing that happened ahead of this is that he bought a wax figure of her that was set to be destroyed. Dr. Gogol examines Stephen’s hands, coming to the same conclusion. He does have another idea though.
Dr. Gogol attended an execution of Rollo (Edward Brophy), a murderer. He reaches out to Prefect Rosset (Henry Kolker), wanting to know he can take the deceased body for experiments. He is given clearance. The doctor then takes the hands and places them on Stephen. This is successful but requires extensive therapy to get them working back to ‘normalcy’. Stephen notices that his hands don’t look the same, to which Dr. Gogol assures him it is due to how badly damaged they were. Stephen wonders though, especially with a new skill that he has at throwing knives or similar objects. He also descends into madness due to this as well as not being able to play like he used to, as the bills are stacking up.
That is where I’ll leave my recap and introduction to the characters. Where I want to start is that this is an interesting remake of The Hands of Orlac and re-imaging of the source material on film. This focuses more on the doctor who does the transplant, making him an obsessed villain toward Yvonne. It focuses less on Stephen’s descent into madness. I also think that it has an interesting approach to this character and the explanation they’re going for with everything.
Now that I’ve set that up, let me delve deeper. I want to start with our villain, Dr. Gogol. We’ve seen this story play out in the era. It is toxic masculinity with him being obsessed with Yvonne. Something of note that would be hard to comprehend in this world without the internet, he had no idea that she was married. It is wild to remember back at a time when you wouldn’t know or couldn’t find things about celebrities' personal lives. Dr. Gogol has spent all this money, seeing Yvonne perform and now he’s devastated to learn that it was all for nothing. That is how he sees it at least. Lorre does a great job here at being stoic, but you still feel his rage.
I want to shift slightly from this commentary and go over to his madness that stems from it. Before he is asked to help, he takes home a wax figure of Yvonne. He has his maid upkeep this statue. He is then asked to help. This is something that he does, hoping that it will result in her falling for him, especially since Stephen will more than likely never play the piano the same, even after the surgery. He takes this obsession farther, making for one of the great scenes from this film. It is misguided that he’s helping, but that feels real.
Something that I found interesting with this version of the story is the fact that we are following the psyche of Stephen as much. He doesn’t feel like his hands are his anymore. There’s a good reason there for what we know by the end of the first act. I have not read the book, so my understanding of the special features on The Hands of Orlac is that much of what he’s dealing with is doubt from the accident. This manifests in believing that his hands are doing things he’s not controlling. This version though is leaning into the supernatural, that because he has these killer hands, he’s able to throw knives like Rollo could. I found going on that route curious. I do appreciate doing a different take on it. It doesn’t make as much sense but will still credit even if I don’t like it as much.
Let’s then discuss the acting performances. I’ve already said how good Lorre’s performance was. His look also helps, having a completely bald head. Drake works as the object of his obsession. What I like here is that she is treading lightly. She doesn’t want to upset him and tries to let him down easily. Something intriguing here though is that Clive takes a backseat. Yvonne tries to help him and it causes his depression about their situation. Stephen is more of a catalyst. The rest of the cast do help to push these characters to where things end up. This would be like Haden, Brophey and Kolker. The acting is solid across the board in support.
All that is left then would be filmmaking. I’d say that this is made well enough. We are early into film so the cinematography and framing were solid. There are images that stood out to me whether it was focusing on Stephen’s new hands. Yvonne and Marie talking to the radio, or the great reveal of ‘Rollo’. Then to go along with that, the effects that we get here are limited. It also doesn’t necessarily need them as this is more about the psyche of Stephen and Dr. Gogol. Other than that, the sound design worked well in conjunction and the music fit without standing out.
Now I watched this a second time with an audio commentary done by Haberman on and just wanted to share things that I learned through that. He had such a wealth of knowledge. He gave such interesting insight to the lives and works of Lorre, Clive and Drake. There does sound like scenes that they wanted to include that would have ramped up the darkness of the movie. That is something that I wish we could see. My guess is that footage was destroyed. That commentary made me appreciate the film even more.
In conclusion, this is an interesting take on the source material. Now my limited knowledge there is seeing adaptations and watching special features. What works best here is the acting. Lorre is great with Drake and the rest of the cast pushing the characters to where they end up. This is made well enough. They are limited by the technology available, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t capture some great shots. Credit cinematography and framing there with the sound design and effects adding to it. I rather enjoyed this one. I am excited to revisit the audio commentary.
My Rating: 7.5 out of 10