Description: A fake aunt and uncle attempt to drive a nervous young heiress to suicide in order to collect her estate. Aided by the bayou, the would-be killers implement a series of terrifying ploys to suffocate the young girl in her own madness. Andre de Toth (House of Wax) directs Merle Oberon and Elisha Cook Jr. in this excellent melodrama set in the dank, forbidding Louisiana bayous, the perfect aid to the mystery and violence of the story.
Amazon.com: Love film noir? Here's an exotic variant--call it 'bayou noir.' Leslie Calvin (Merle Oberon), an oil heiress, is in shock several times over, having been run out of her East Indies home by Japanese troops and then losing her parents during a disaster at sea. Seeking safe haven, she looks up her only known relatives--whom she's never seen--an aunt (Fay Bainter) and uncle (John Qualen) who have just taken up residence at Rossignol, an unused sugar plantation in a remote Louisiana bayou. They seem harmless enough, albeit aggressively eccentric. But what to make of the eternally smiling, white-suited houseguest, Mr. Sydney (Thomas Mitchell), or the creepy Cleeve (Elisha Cook Jr.), a caretaker with nothing to take care of? Soon Leslie is hearing voices in the night, plus sinister stories from a former servant (Rex Ingram) who keeps popping out of the underbrush. Far from recuperating in peace, she fears she's sinking into madness, from which not even the kindly young local doctor (Franchot Tone) can rescue her....
Sounds like a backwater Gaslight, or a swampland Manderley without a Rebecca (and as a matter of fact, Rebecca veteran Joan Harrison worked on the script). Director André De Toth pumps up the atmosphere despite limited independent production resources, and he creates an unsettling mise en scène in which the heroine is either effaced by off-kilter camera angles or utterly isolated in vulnerable closeup. Unfortunately, Merle Oberon, notwithstanding her heartstopping Eurasian beauty, is about as expressive as a marble paperweight, and the screenplay doesn't so much advance as sink into the neighboring quicksand. Still, De Toth's inventiveness, Miklós Rósza's score, and some filigreed lighting by Bride of Frankenstein's John Mescall keep you watching. --Richard T. Jameson
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Rating: - Security
Why do they put a 'security seal' along the top of the case which tears the front off the box when you try to remove it? I need a new box now
The film was very good... but of course that was made when they could still make things that worked
Rating: - Interesting story, excellent cast, fabulous score but desperately in need of restoration work.
"Dark Waters" is a 1944 film that begins with a story of survival after a horrific torpedo attack on a civilian freighter. It soon turns into a Southern Gothic tale with steamy swamps, Spanish moss, Hollywood quick sand with the consistency of oatmeal, and creepy men in tropical white suits.
To escape the war, Leslie Calvin (Merle Oberon) flees Batavia with her parents on an old merchant freighter. Soon into the voyage, the ship is sunk by enemy torpedoes. The few survivors are dying off as they spend several horrific days drifting under the relentless sun with a very small ration of drinking water. Eventually three survivors are found, rescued and taken to a New York hospital for treatment. Leslie can be treated for the physical effects of starvation and exposure, but the psychological trauma is much more difficult to get over.
After she regains consciousness, Leslie receives a ... Read More
Rating: - Merle Oberon shines in gothic Southern thriller
DARK WATERS (directed in 1944 by Andre de Toth) stars Merle Oberon and Franchot Tone in a well-plotted psychological thriller about a young woman driven to madness by murder-minded fortune hunters.
Rich heiress Leslie Calvin (Merle Oberon) survived the German bombing of a cargo ship which claimed the lives of her parents; and after a long stay in hospital, goes to live with her aunt and uncle at their Louisiana plantation. In the steamy bayous she hears dismembered voices calling her name, and other ominous things which cause her to believe she's slowly going mad. Only the reasonings of Dr. Grover (Franchot Tone) help Leslie in living at the gloomy plantation, where her aunt and uncle (Fay Bainter and John Qualen) act in strange ways which lead Leslie to believe that they are imposters.
The moonlight and magnolias of the South are replaced by quicksand and searchlights in DARK WATERS, ... Read More
Rating: - A Fine Swamp Noir, With A Gloomy Mansion, Quicksand, Dark Intentions And, Perhaps, Madness
To grab your attention, there's nothing quite like a screaming face with bulging eyes slowly sinking under quicksand. Few actors could bulge and scream as well as Elisha Cook Jr, and in Dark Waters he's given every opportunity to deserve his fate. Please note that while elements of the plot are discussed, we know the whodunit within the first 15 minutes of the movie. It's the whydunit combined with swamp atmosphere and movie-making craftsmanship that make the movie as good as it is.
Leslie Calvin (Merle Oberon) was one of four survivors of a sub attack during World War II. She and her parents were returning to America from Batavia. She wakes up in a Louisiana hospital, distraught, anxious, knowing no one and afraid she's losing her mind. She remembers a sister of her mother, and her doctor encourages her to write. She eventually receives a letter inviting her to stay with her Aunt Emily and Uncle Norbert ... Read More
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- Interesting story, excellent cast, fabulous score but desperately in need of restoration work. 
