Anyone who remembers Maurice Evans' kindly turn as Mia Farrow's friend in "Rosemary's Baby" may be shocked to find him so convincingly evil in this gripping melodrama. Ethel Barrymore plays a sharp, sensible woman who gets taken in by a con-man; he moves into her house and she quickly becomes his prisoner. The plot is infuriating (we in the audience feel like prisoners, too) and the inevitable turning-the-tables ploy seems to take forever to arrive. Still, Barrymore's plight is played to the urgent hilt, and Evans (along with his brutish cohorts, Keenan Wynn and Angela Lansbury) is downright despicable. The handling of this story, previously filmed in 1936 with Aline MacMahon, twists all the right screws with grueling accuracy, but calculated pictures like this may turn off many viewers before the final act. Ultimately, too many plot entanglements are left ignored and some crucial moments take place off-screen. Strictly as a masochistic thriller, however, the film is queasy and indeed suspenseful. **1/2 from ****
Review of Kind Lady
