Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941): A Review

DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE (1941)

Ten years after Fredric March won Best Actor for playing dual roles, two-time Oscar winner Spencer Tracy tried his hand at matching March's performance. The 1941 Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde remake suffers from an unintended sense of comedy. The film was miscast three times over, but each actor did their best. 

Dr. Harry Jekyll (Tracy) is a good man. He believes that the base aspects of a person's character can be removed through science. Jekyll is engaged to British belle Beatrix Emery (Lana Turner), the daughter of respected Sir Charles (Donald Crisp). Sir Charles is dubious of Jekyll's medical theories. He is also displeased by how loose Beatrix comes across. By the standards of the time, Beatrix would be a Victorian tramp. She lets him kiss her in public.  

A real Victorian tramp is lusty Cockney barmaid Ivy Peterson (Ingrid Bergman). Jekyll and his friend and colleague, Dr. John Layton (Ian Hunter), rescue Ivy from a rough man. She wastes no time attempting to seduce Jekyll. While she does not get her way, Jekyll seems open to the suggestion. He still is devoted more to his experiments than to Beatrix. One fateful night, he takes his concoction. From that emerges his dark side, which takes the form of "Mr. Hyde".

Mr. Hyde wastes no time either. He quickly forces Ivy to be his mistress. Beatrix and Sir Charles have left for the Continent, so Jekyll will be fine to play with his basic instincts. Good news comes to Jekyll when he learns that the Emerys have returned. Even better news is that Sir Charles has finally agreed to let them marry sooner than originally planned. Jekyll swears off Hyde. That in turn will please Ivy, who turns to Jekyll for help. Things, however, do not go as planned.

Jekyll can no longer control his split nature. Which of his two sides will win out? Will both Ivy and Beatrix survive the ravishes of Mr. Hyde? Will Dr. Jekyll similarly be able to survive Mr. Hyde as well? 

I think that our three leads did as well as they could with the roles they played. However, all three of them look rather silly attempting to be the characters. Spencer Tracy was best when playing the everyman. He excelled at being a good man, the best friend, the sidekick. Here, I think he gave it as good a go as his skills permitted. However, I found a lot of his performance elicited more chuckles than suspense.

I think it is because of a variety of factors. There was director Victor Fleming's decision to have Spencer Tracy speak in a whisper when playing Hyde. One does not need to make the villain cartoonish or silly. However, whenever Tracy is Hyde, his whispers come across as one of two things. Either he is trying to make Hyde more menacing by whispering or trying to suppress giggles himself that one could see him as threatening. Either way, the end results are more humorous than horrifying.

Spencer Tracy was also not known for using makeup. He had surprisingly little makeup as Hyde. He mostly attempted to show off the dark side by widening his eyes. That, added to his persistent whisper, only made Mr. Hyde a figure of fun than of danger. 

A second factor was the decision, presumably by Fleming, to not have Tracy even try for a British accent. That leads to a bizarre situation of having this very American man in London high society. Presumable, Dr. Jekyll is British. If he is supposed to be British, Tracy's very American tones make no sense. If he is supposed to be American, there is never an explanation as to why this Yank is in London high society.

Spencer Tracy's performance here is a rare miss. He comes across as exaggerated to downright silly. He apparently thought that widening his eyes showed menace and murder. Instead, it looked like someone trying to elicit chuckles at spookiness. Bless him, for he is trying, so there is that. It is that in his trying, Tracy just looks comical.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is equally perplexing when it comes to the two female leads. If I understand things, Ingrid Bergman and Lana Turner were meant to play each other's roles. I get that both wanted to play against type. Bergman wanted to play someone sleazier and Turner the sophisticated lady. That being said, neither looked logical. 

Ingrid Bergman is a Cockney by way of Sweden. One was unaware that the East End of London extended all the way to Stockholm. Like Tracy, Bergman tried to make this tart believable. In her defense, she did act the part of the tragic Ivy well. However, like Tracy she ended up looking foolish. The issue is her Swedish accent. Ingrid Bergman almost always sounded Continental. In Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, that European tone is so at odds with this working-class barmaid. In terms of performance, Ingrid Bergman does quite well. In terms of sound, it comes across as laughable.

Lana Turner, curiously enough, is the best of the three. One could see Turner trying to be this innocent, posh British lady. Oddly, to her credit Turner did not try for an accent either. I think that would have made her look absurd. Throughout the film, you could see Lana Turner working to play this role. It might not have been convincing but one gives mad props to her for making the effort.

One element that does look creepy is in how obvious the age differences were. Spencer Tracy was 41 when he made Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Lana Turner was twenty-one years younger. In their scenes together, Turner looks old enough to be Tracy's daughter. That is because she was old enough to be his daughter. It looks almost obscene to have someone that much younger play Tracy's love interest. Ingrid Bergman was twenty-six. Although their fifteen-year age gap wasn't as horrible as that of Tracy and Turner, it still looked a bit peculiar. 

In his smaller role, Donald Crisp does well as Sir Charles Emery. He is respectful without being haughty, supportive without being a simp. Crisp does not have much to do in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. He does make his presence known as the man who tries to understand Jekyll.

John Lee Mahin, Percy Heath and Daniel Hoffenstein's adaptation of the Robert Louis Stevenson novel sometimes takes surreal and downright perverted turns. In one dream or fantasy sequence, Tracy's Hyde imagines his dueling broads as horses. He whips them repeatedly, turning this into some whacked-out S&M scene that is quite daring now, let alone in 1941. The sadomasochism in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is barely concealed. Ivy, for example, is clearly being whipped for Hyde's erotic satisfaction. He also repeatedly assaults her, though the screen goes black every time that he does. 

There are good elements in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Franz Waxman's score and Harold Kress' editing create that moody, gothic atmosphere. They, along with Joseph Ruttenberg's cinematography, all received Academy Award nominations. Each elevate the film and makes for interesting viewing. However, the three performances are why this version of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde ultimately fails. Spencer Tracy, Ingrid Bergman and Lana Turner all tried. They are not bad performances. They just are not particularly good ones either.       

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde fails to match the original. I understand that efforts were made to hide the Fredric March version so that the public would not compare it to this remake. Fortunately, the original survived and will stand the test of time better than this remake. 

To be fair to this remake though, the original never featured women being whipped like horses.

DECISION: C-