The Dark Mirror

11/2/2013

Lemon Drops and Dopplegangers. The Dark Mirror is directed by Robert Siodmak and adapted to screenplay by Nunnally Johnson from a story by Vladimir Pozner. It stars Olivia de Havilland, Lew Ayres, Thomas Mitchell, Richard Long and Charles Evans. Music is by Dimitri Tiomkin and cinematography by Milton Krasner. A man appears to have been murdered by one of the identical twin Collins sisters, but both of whom have an alibi. The police and the psychiatrist have their work cut out... Straight out of the corner of postwar Hollywood that began to take fascination with mental illness, The Dark Mirror triumphs more as a technical exercise than as anything resembling thought provoking analysis. The simplistic Freudian elements aside, film is impressively mounted and performed by Siodmak

7/7/2022

This is one of those films that you really have to pay close attention to - otherwise you can miss the nuances and menace created by the super performance from Olivia de Havilland - who plays two twins - in this whodunit with lots of twists. When "Dr. Petralta" is found stabbed through his heart - witnesses swear to policeman Thomas Mitchell ("Lt. Stevenson") that they saw "Ruth" leave his apartment moments after the grizzly deed was supposed to have been committed. Upon further investigation, however, he discovers that "Ruth" has a cast iron alibi! She also has a twin sister "Terry", and so proving who did what to whom - they both, naturally, deny any involvement - is nigh on impossible. That is, until scientist "Dr. Elliott" (Lew Ayes) who specialises in the behaviour of twins starts to