The main reason to watch this film is Anne Crawford : she gives a really disturbing performance,sadly unsupported by a mess of a screenplay .
We know nothing,or almost nothing of her past : she's been an outcast for all of her life , period;she first appears as an underdog , rejected by the holier-than-thou spinsters who warn the priest against her ; when she first meets the boxer ,one thinks he will defend him , he will rescue the damsel in distress (the scene at the fair recalls Borzage's "moonrise " ,released the same year,where Dane Clark -the hanged man's son- looked like a male "daughter of darkness")
But the comparison ends here ; All along the movie , the heroine is longing for love , she seems to need understanding,compassion and affection, her face is sometimes deeply moving ; however ,this character is downright ambiguous:she knows she has a strong power on men, but she uses it to detroy them ;thus it does not make much sense ;besides, why such an awkward "serial killer" is not discovered sooner by the police remains a mystery .
But the comparison ends here ; All along the movie , the heroine is longing for love , she seems to need understanding,compassion and affection, her face is sometimes deeply moving ; however ,this character is downright ambiguous:she knows she has a strong power on men, but she uses it to detroy them ;thus it does not make much sense ;besides, why such an awkward "serial killer" is not discovered sooner by the police remains a mystery .