Daughter of Darkness (1948) User Reviews

An unexpected treat

[lorenellroy · 7/10 · 16 October 2007]

This is a little known movie but one undeserving of the obscurity into which it has fallen ,throwing,as it does , a sharp light on the narrow mindedness and pettiness of small ,enclosed and isolated communities .The opening sequence is especially gripping and commands attention from the word go.It takes place in a church in a small ,backwater Irish community where the local women break off from their gossip to eye with undisguised loathing a younger woman ,Emily Beaudine (Siobahn Mckenna).She has the reputation of being a siren ,a temptress able to turn the heads of the men of the village .In a scene between herself and the local priest it is hinted strongly that he too feels an attraction towards Emily .To add to the miasma of gloom and oppression ,she is a talented organist but one with a fondness for the tonally darker and more plangent aspects of the instrument's tonal pallete . She is isolated within her community and young girl's warned not to associate with her .When a fair visits the village she receives the unwanted attention of Dan ,a boxer employed by the fir ,and she wounds him in self defence .She is sent away to england where she ingratiates herself with the Talent family ,until the return of Dan and the suspicion of the eldest Talent sister Beth precipitates the final tragedy

Lance Comfort directs with fine use of light and shade and good use of some neat monochrome photography .The script leaves open the issue of Emily's true nature giving a pleasing ambiguity to proceedings and the fine ,intense performance of Siobahn Mckenna makes her relatively sparse engagement with the movies a matter to be regretted

This is no masterpiece but it is a subtle ,ambiguous picture that should be better known

Fascinating If A Bit Flawed Film

[joe-pearce-1 · 8/10 · 2 June 2014]

I am dismayed by just about all the reviews which precede mine, mainly due to the fact that they seem seriously involved with the film only when trying to psychoanalyze the title character, which simply cannot be done because the screenplay never really gets very involved in doing so; this actually makes the nuanced performances of all concerned that much more admirable and certainly does so with the direction of the film by Lance Comfort.

This may not be LAWRENCE OF ARABIA, but I think the dismissal of it as a quota quickie or a British B film is a bit much. The carnival scenes alone seem to demonstrate that some expense was gone to in the film's making and, in pure size at least, compare well with those in Hitchcock's STRANGERS ON A TRAIN. And while Comfort may not be David Lean, it is obnoxious to call him, as one commentator did, the English Ed Wood, as this bespeaks a total lack of knowledge of either man's work. Comfort achieves a tremendously atmospheric production throughout, and is hampered in suspense only by the holes in the screenplay, which simply do not give any indication of what forces drive the title character. (He does similar and excellent work in BEDELIA.)

As for the acting, which is excellent on everybody's part, someone complains about the 'posh' accents used in the farming family for whom the Irish girl goes to work, but he should be advised that not every farming family in England is the British equivalent of the Joads, especially in the post WW2 era. Many of those families were quite wealthy and educated - this particular family seems to have at least 15 or 20 farmhands working for them and are leaders in the community. Also, with the exception of some undeservedly nasty remarks about Maxwell Reed (who could hardly be better at playing a lowlife than what we see here), and a couple of mentions of this being Honor Blackman's first movie (actually, it was her second), the important considerations about most of the cast go unmentioned. The first may be that we get a look at a very young Barry Morse (later, of THE FUGITIVE TV fame), more importantly at the very stylish Anne Crawford, who was a fairly major English star of the day and who tragically died of leukemia at 36, and most particularly, at Siobhan McKenna, who was quite arguably the greatest Irish actress of the entire twentieth century (and certainly of the second half of it) and regarded so by critics and audiences alike, but who, with the exception of not more than a half-dozen times (mostly early on), eschewed film appearances almost entirely in favor of stage work on both sides of the Atlantic and a very occasional TV appearance. Do most of the correspondents here even know that? It would seem not. That all of this about her (and to some extent the others) goes unmentioned, while commentators waste their time with gratuitous attacks on even the unnamed wife of one of this film's stars, does not say a great deal of good about much of what appears in these reviews.

This is a rock-solid film made less than it might have been by an unclear screenplay; it might have been something of a masterpiece if made by an Alfred Hitchcock, but to blame Lance Comfort for not being Alfred Hitchcock is like blaming Cary Grant for not being John Gielgud - in other words, just plain silly.

An unusually subtle horror allegory

[melvelvit-1 · 8/10 · 20 October 2007]

Emmie, a chaste young serving girl, is driven out of her small Irish village by the womenfolk who hate and fear the effect she has on men. The parish priest, giving in to prejudice, finds her a position with a family in rural England but the same revulsion women feel in her presence, combined with mens' lust, lead the child-like girl to take revenge until (Divine?) intervention brings the sad, sinister story to a shocking conclusion.

This movie amounts to a very subtle horror film in that the viewer never sees Emmie kill. A number of men are found dead after going off with her and, no doubt, the girl is responsible -but is she a succubus? A serial killer? Emmie, as portrayed by Siobhan (pronounced "She-vahn") McKenna (resembling a sensual Agnes Moorehead), seems to be the embodiment of "Original Sin" with the supernatural sex powers of a Lilith and she is eventually "hounded" to death a la the Biblical Jezebel. Based on the play "They Walk Alone" by Max Catto, the storyline is similar to Val Lewton's superstitious CAT PEOPLE in that sex (and the fear of it) can wreak havoc. Here, lust -and the ability to arouse it- are evil and, like Eve in the Bible, temptation has to be driven out. The way the young girl is persecuted is not unlike what happened during the Salem witch trials and the poor thing evokes audience sympathy throughout the film. All women -the only sex to sense the presence of evil- refer to her as horrifying and revolting so the audience may come to believe there's something unearthly at work. That the girl has a devastating effect on the male of the species is never in question. Handsome Maxwell Reed plays a carnival boxer who's infatuation unwittingly releases the girl's inner demon and pays a terrible price as does the family who, once again, intends to drive Emmie from civilization. Honor Blackman, in her first role, plays one of only two young girls who can abide Emmie's presence and this implies that the real problem may lie in the fears and hatreds of adults. Emmie herself is afraid of what's inside her and only uses her strange sex-power to defend herself from the lustful intentions of the opposite sex and the constant persecution by her own sex who seemingly won't be happy until the girl is permanently removed from society. The story begins and ends in a church and gives this rather Gothic tale a strange allegorical feel. If one discards the nebulous supernatural interpretation, humanity is a bit barbaric here and the moral, if there is one, is right out of the Dark Ages. Society had made the girl a killer. The film's very theme is of a dual nature- man's inhumanity to man vs. confronting something that may be "not of this earth". The movie's title and the presence of the Church throughout slants the debate in favor of the latter interpretation -and the fact Emmie plays sombre, "unholy" music on that venerable institution's various organs implies a stranger in its midst. There are a number of masterful set-pieces (the carnival, the countryside, the church services) that are visually arresting and shows the care and effort taken with this film. Directed with style by Lance Comfort, the baroque play of light and shadow, sanctimonious good and ambiguous evil, and a possible force of Nature that can't be tamed give this psychological melodrama, with its references to Mary Shelley's FRANKENSTEIN, more than a semblance of "Brit Noir". The fact that McKenna has the same off-beat appeal (and thin upper lip) as that genre's masochistic temptress, Gloria Grahame, only adds to this impression. True horror fans may be disappointed -as will "noir" purists- but if one goes in with no expectations, they won't be disappointed and may even find themselves pondering some complex issues long after the movie's over.

Recommended, for sure.

A real lost treasure.

[alice liddell · 7/10 · 24 February 2000]

For a film of absolutely no reputation, with zero out of four in Halliwell's, directed by a man regarded with as much respect as Ed Wood, this Gothic psychodrama is really rather good. I'm not suggesting that it's in any way a classic - the acting , if I may say so under IMDb guidelines, is indifferent, the pacing in the second half is less than exciting - but as far as scope, subject matter and ambition are concerned, there are few low-budget British films to match it. Imagine a more modestly skilled admirer trying to make a B-movie Powell and Pressburger film replacing genius with added hysteria, then you've some idea of this amazing oddity.

The film opens at a febrile pitch, and barely relents. The opening credits, accompanied by a highly strung score, features Gothic tableaux that give a grotesque precis of the subsequent story - distorted, sharp-edged follies with witchlike fingers, ancient houses, Leroux-like organs, frenzied screams, rabid religious imagery.

The action proper begins in a church, the departing congregation unaccountably demanding the removal from the village of a young woman, Emmie, who remains behind praying. The irrational hatred in their demands is shocking - all we can glean is the supposed effect on men. Two spinster matrons demand her exile from a priest who seems neurotically ragged, probably because of his lust for the girl, who is meanwhile playing a dismally murmuring lament on the organ, having some sort of psychosomatic fit. This is a sequence of remarkable Franju-like beauty, Siobhan MacKenna's fragile, quivering mask evoking great sorrow and distress.

The picture of gentle innocence, it's difficult to see what danger anyone sees in Emmie, but so loaded have been both the accusations and the relentless style, that we shudder when she bends down to talk with a little, shaking girl, who has been warned off by her mother. When Emmie offers her flowers, there is an ominous FRANKENSTEINish (James Whale) frisson, but her mother, terrified, reefs her away, and brings her into a shop. A circus has set up tent nearby, and one of its members, a boxer Dan, has watched this scene, kicks the shop's door down, and asks Emmie to watch him fight tonight. She coyly agrees.

Besotted with lust, Dan turns what is supposed to be a fixed match into a farrago to impress Emmie. They later enjoy themselves throughout the fair, and we see Emmie happy for the first time. The pair venture to a quiet space just outside the fairground. Dan's intentions are clear, but when Emmie professes innocence, he turns nasty. In the next shot we see a petrified Emmie running through the fair, followed by Dan, whose eye has received a violent wound.

The priest succumbs to the public pressure, and sends Emmie to stay in England with a wealthy landowner, Mr. Tallent. She fits in well enough, but one daughter, Bess, views Emmie with an hostility even she can't explain, although intensified by the effect a much more brazen Emmie seems to have on the men folk. One day, Dan's circus comes into town, and Dan reimposes himself on Emmie. We see his injury, a loathsome scratch gashing his eye. He determines to avenge himself on Emmie, and chases her to an isolated barn. Later Emmie is found by her employer running home dazed. The next morning Dan is found dead. (The film isn't even halfway there by this stage!)

DARKNESS is considered notable as the first in-depth treatment of a female serial-killer, but it is much more than that. On an abstract level, Emmie is an embodiment of the Id, the unconscious desires that, if acted on, could result in the destruction of civilised society. This nearly happens as the women intuit, and Emmie is a remarkably subversive presence, linked to the carnivalesque, fairground atmosphere, all the more powerful in that she doesn't seem to understand her own power.

In the conservative societies she disturbs, sex is linked to fertility, reproduction, continuity and the land - Emmie offers a destructive opposite, all-consuming, disruptive and fatal. This allegory is heightened by conscience, the only bind on the Unconscious, here an almost supernatural Alsation that preys on Emmie (a pun on prey and pray pervades the film).

The resolution of this problem might seem reactionary, if it wasn't for the fact that Emmie is so sympathetically portrayed, and her malady is never explained away, its inexplicability making it all the more disturbing; while her enemies are repulsive, intolerant, in both societies becoming a lynch mob.

The film's abstract elements are matched by very real traumas - that of a parentless (she is a daughter of darkness; she calls the very disturbed priest Father, he calls her child) young girl, hounded and lonely in strange lands; class issues (the demonisation of a working class girl by her aristocratic employers), as well as being a returning of the Irish repressed on a complacent, historically amnesiac England (and a new Ireland that is beginning to repeat its repressions).

The portrayal of Emmie's disturbed mind is given a Romantic/Gothic framework (her only peace is facing the ocean on a lonely crag) that is very reminiscent of the Archers. Lance Comfort may not be a 'good' director in the conventional sense, but his seeming fausses pas contribute to the film's disorientating effect. He even pulls off the old heroine trapped by shadow of barred staircase shot with a vivid tangibility not even the great noir directors could quite manage. He follows this with that noir scene's seeming antithesis, a sun-dappled, pastoral idyll, site perhapse of Emmie's rebirth, except for one, very natural shadow, of a gate, with bars. Comfort's use of Gothic and animal imagery as well as some chilling ghost-story effects (see Emmie run away from Dan to the barn, or the whole organ playing sequence), are brilliantly successful.

A decent little film

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 8 November 2013]

"Daughter of Darkness" begins with some very cool opening credits. The font and backgrounds are quite striking and work well with the rest of the film. As for the rest of the movie, it's an odd little story about a strange woman who rubs other women the wrong way. While I thought this aspect of the story was overdone, the overall film is worth your time.

The story begins with a bunch of sexless old biddies approaching the local priest. They think that his housekeeper, Emily, is evil. Why exactly they think that is a bit vague--but apparently they hate her because men are inexplicably attracted to her (she's not THAT pretty by the way). Regardless, the priest is a wimpy guy who just wants things to be quiet, so he sends her to work for some far off folks. However, once in the new locale, once again the local women inexplicably grow to hate her. The problem is, you learn later that they have darned good reason--though they have no idea how bad she really is!

This is a good film but I think some of it was overdone. The way women almost automatically hate Emily seems ridiculous and making all this more subtle would have worked much better. Still, it is an enjoyable little film and worth seeing despite a few limitations.

Is human darkness a catchy disease?

[mark.waltz · 7/10 · 5 November 2020]

It's very easy to dismiss the group of Irish women in the opening scene bashing a young girl praying in the side as a bunch of hateful hags. No reason is given other than the fact that the men of the Town find her alluring. When they go to the priest to have the girl, Siobhan MacKenna, removed as a cleaning woman in the church, you don't really get to see their reaction, but their problem now gone becomes a problem for the women of a family where she is sent to in an English countryside. MacKenna is certainly a mystery. when first seeing, she is in deep prayer, but the women of that Irish town and the English town she moves to buy no choice of her own find her without knowing why to be evil and a bad influence on their men.

Employed by the family of Anne Crawford, MacKenna stirs up the feelings of one of the younger male members of the family which leads to an ugly scene between her, Crawford and other women in the family. MacKenna has a past relationship with a traveling carnival worker, and when she runs into him in the English countryside, it is not long before violence occurs, and the man is found dead. A deep distrust erupts with her female employers, especially with the suspicious Crawford who slowly becomes more deranged as she deals with this young, if not conventionally attractive, minx.

This is a dark, fascinating melodrama with MacKenna providing a lot of mystery that makes you wonder if she is engaged as horrible as all the women think, and if she is indeed capable of murder. Terrific photography, editing and a wonderful musical score help makes this one of the best sleeper thrillers of the 1940's, perfect in practically every detail even if certain elements of the story create questions that go unanswered. In a sense, MacKenna's character is a female version of Heathcliff from "Wuthering Heights" in that her actions are innate and unpreventable. But the fact that the men are so easily manipulated by sex and that the women can't help but gossip and hate other women gives this a darkness and one sided view of the individual sexes. In spite of its flaws, this film is irresistible from start to finish, and to watch it unfold really as pulling yourself deep into a brilliant novel.

Dirge.

[ulicknormanowen · 6/10 · 4 October 2020]

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 .

The Lilith Chapter.

[hitchcockthelegend · 9/10 · 28 March 2014]

Daughter of Darkness is directed by Lance Comfort and adapted to screenplay by Max Catto from his own play titled They Walk Alone. It stars Anne Crawford, Maxwell Reed, Siobhan McKenna, George Thorpe, Barry Morse, Liam Redmond, Cyril Smith and Honor Blackman. Music is by Clifton Parker and cinematography by Stanley Pavey.

Emmie Beaudine (McKenna) isn't liked by the women folk of the Irish village community where she lives. There's something about her that riles them, frightens them even. So when the women of the village round up on her keeper, the priest, she is sent off to live on a farm in a North Yorkshire county of England. Which is timely as she has had an altercation with one of the men from a travelling fair. Once at the "Tallent" family farm, Emmie settles in well and seems genuinely happy, but still some of the women folk in the vicinity view her with suspicion, and when a face from Emmie's past shows up, it's the catalyst for doom and desperation.

It's an odd chiller of a movie, something of an acquired taste, it's hard to pigeonhole. Never overtly horror, noir or otherwise, it's not hard to see why some specialist genre fans have found it a disappointment. Yet if you can buy into Comfort and Catto's ethereal world there's a picture of great rewards here, a complex character study mingling with asides on sexual empowerment, even a story with supernatural leanings, the edges of which are deliberately shaded in grey. And of course there's the crime factor bulging at the seams, Emmie Beaudine a cold murderess, her rhyme and reason for being so repulsed by male sexual contact is again deliberately left floating in an emotionally distorted purgatory.

Nicely photographed in black and white, the visual atmosphere is very tight to the murky themes swirling around the plot. There's also a number of memorable scenes, the hurly burly of the carnival sequences, the hauntingly troubling playing of an organ, and some super scenes featuring Thorn the Alsatian dog, a real life war hero (look him up, amazing animal) who is also very much a key character here. Strong acting performances around McKenna are a bonus (including the beautiful Blackman in her first credited role), but it is the Northern Irish actress who spellbindingly holds court, with much of her visual acting stunning in its execution.

Love it or hate it, you wont be able to ignore it. 9/10

One Star For Comfort

[writers_reign · 6/10 · 9 April 2010]

If you know the name Lance Comfort today you're either 80 plus with a total recall of British 'B' pictures you saw more than half a century ago or else a film student specializing in British 'programmers' from the 40s and early 50s. Daughter Of Darkness dates from 1948 and introduced Siobhan McKenna to British film-goers, not that anyone seemed to care. In one sense acting joke Maxwell Reed enjoyed a higher profile but then he did marry Joan Collins before she decided that one non-actor was enough in any family and gave him the old heave-ho. What we have here is the old con trick; we're shown McKenna as a seemingly innocent, naive colleen in Ould Oirland, who wouldn't say boo to an erect phallus and gradually come to realize that she is a prototype serial killer before the term existed. Liam Redmond, Ann Crawford and Honor Blackman are along for the ride and those with a keen eye will note an uncanny resemblance between Maxwell Reed and another Max, Wall. Worth watching if it surfaces on the Late, Late Show but don't go out of your way.

I Don't Get It...

[scottdou · 5/10 · 25 March 2019]

The servant girl most of the women hate but all the men cannot resist is neither especially pretty or flirtatious...she does not even wear provocative clothes and the film never really explains why she is supposedly so evil. Based on her interactions with men in the movie, it seems like each man tried to rape her and thus they got what they deserved. I was expecting she was a vampire/Dracula's daughter but no such thing. I felt sorry for her. Having said that, the movie was quite suspenseful and well photographed...it just made little sense without any explanation of her "evil" and why men were drawn to her.

To quote Tom Jones - "Daughter Of darkness, stay out of my life!"

[AAdaSC · 8/10 · 7 July 2009]

The story sees an Irish girl Emmie (Siobhan McKenna) driven from her community and relocated with a farm family in England. Other women can sense evil around her yet she seems innocent to the viewer. However, by the end of the film, it's pretty clear that Emmie is bad news as the body count increases! Throughout the film, Bess (Anne Crawford) senses that there is something wrong about the girl. She finally fires her to which the response is "You'll be sorry". You just know that there is going to be a repercussion .... and there is.....

Siobhan McKenna is creepy in the lead role - she looks weird. The English family that she stays with is pretty ghastly with their extremely posh accents and enthusiasm for everything (among the guilty for inappropriate posh dialect is Honor Blackman) yet this doesn't distract from the story. It's a good film with some genuinely creepy scenes.

Daughter of Darkness

[CinemaSerf · 7/10 · 5 January 2023]

This is quite an effectively creepy crime drama - all centring around "Emmie" (Siobhan McKenna). She arrives from Ireland at the farm owned by the "Tallent" family where she soon gains a reputation as a bit of a flirt, an instant success with the local men but less so with the ladies - especially the suspicious "Bess" (Anne Crawford). It's a this point that the roguish boxer "Dan" (Maxwell Reed) appears on the scene. Now he knows a thing or two about "Emmie" and so when he is found face down in a ditch, the fingers of suspicion all point at their newcomer. Did she do it, though? What is her mysterious secret? The story is tensely directed by Lance Comfort with two strong performances from McKenna and Crawford that go some way to demonstrating the position of women in society at the time, and of the attitudes of their menfolk. The cinematography makes good use of light and shade techniques to enhance the sense of menace that does, gradually, accrue as the story heads towards it's quite exciting denouement, too. Unlike many films of this genre, it thrives as much on what we don't know as what we do; there are gaps - like a jigsaw with missing pieces, and that adds nicely to this short but sweet intrigue. Maxwell Reed adds little, but Liam Redmond and Barry Morse prop up well from a familiar-looking supporting cast and present us with a surprisingly good watch.

Spooky organ music played at night in church and an implacable howling dog in a young girl's tragedy

[clanciai · 9/10 · 21 October 2018]

This is a very remarkable film on a very remarkable story. There is probably some true background of its origin, because it is too realistic, both psychologically and in its characterizations not to have been founded on some truth. There is nothing wrong with Amy, and still everyone turns against her, only because she makes people feel uncomfortable, and able-bodied men are attracted to her with such a force that they cannot control it. Where does it all go wrong? It all goes wrong from the beginning, when the priest listens to the gossip of old spinsters and submits to their fanatical demand to have her thrown out of the community. He gets her a position on a farm in England by the coast for a compensation, but as the young men there are attracted to her, the women turn against her also there. A gipsy of a fair that saved her from some trouble in Ireland and then could not leave her in peace, turns up again at her farm in England, repeats his mistake and gets what he asked for, although he was well warned once. And thus the vicious circle begins. Siobhan McKenna makes an unforgettable characterization of a one-sidedly lovable sweet girl who unwillingly becomes the cause of harm done on an accelerating scale, and although the terror increases you must sympathize with her and defend her against all the world. It's they who go out of control, while she only plays the organ and desperately seeks to judst be left alone in peace, which no one will leave her. It's perhaps the anatomy of a witch, a destiny which is rather forced upon her than that she chooses it herself. The story is very dramatic, the plot thickening all the time, and the cinematography is on a virtuoso level, like the direction. Lance Comfort made quite a few films like this, and they are all remarkable and memorable. To all this comes William Alwyn's alwaysperfectly fitting, impressing and suggestive music. I felt tempted to almost give it a full 10 points.

Extraordinary and terrifying film

[jromanbaker · 9/10 · 22 December 2020]

Siobhan McKenna is the lead in this extraordinary film and yet the IMDB does not give her top billing. I wonder if they could rectify this. The last film I saw was directed by Lance Comfort and I was able to see another of his films. It is truly terrifying because it shows how not so long ago, and even now, how men want to possess a woman's body simply for sexual gratification and are allowed to do so. Ireland and the UK are presented as having a lynch mob mentality towards any woman who has a naturally strong sexuality to be hunted down for it, and left literally to be mauled by a dog. The girl Emmie played beautifully by the fine actress Siobhan McKenna is the young woman and because she is considered sexually dangerous ( mainly by conformist and possibly sexually repressed women ) she is driven out of Ireland to England. Here the pattern begins again, and her own internalised fear that she is ' evil ' causes her to repulse and kill the seducer who has followed her and even the men she either likes or desires. Again the women in this scenario sense her ' wickedness ' and one of them takes a final and horrifying revenge from a church which Lance Comfort maybe hinting is a place worthy of causing sexual repression and non-conformity. My one criticism is that possibly because of the censors the supposed evil is given too strong a Gothic feel and as much as I like the genre it seems at the same time to be undermining the premise that all this does not come from the young woman, but the societies in which she has been thrown into by life itself. The acting is good and as in a previous review of a Lance Comfort film accentuate how excellent he could be. An uncomfortable film for some, but it is unique in portraying ( for 1948 ) how destructive men's desires can be when unleased from their choirboy clothes. Literally so in this forgotten and fine film.

english Val Lewton gem

[happytrigger-64-390517 · 8/10 · 16 March 2019]

It was my day for serial killer woman movie, after just having seen "a Candle for the Devil" directed by Eugenio Martin.

"Daughter of Darkness" is a swell B movie about a young serial killer woman in english countryside. Lot of creativity : night expressionnist photography, virtuoso travellings, the killer girl playing organ, creepy shots of dog, ... so many details are seldom seen in usual murder movies in the 40-50's. It can easily be compared to "Cat People". Siobhan McKenna, who plays the devil girl, isn't as pretty as Simone Simon, but she's still really creepy. And for these reasons and many more, Lance Comfort is much better than Ed Wood, for sure.