Man in the Attic (1953)
Overview
London, 1888: on the night of the third Jack the Ripper killing, soft-spoken Mr. Slade, a research pathologist, takes lodgings with the Harleys, including a gloomy attic room for "experiments." Mrs. Harley finds Slade odd and increasingly suspects the worst; her niece Lily (star of a decidedly Parisian stage revue) finds him interesting and increasingly attractive. Is Lily in danger, or are her mother's suspicions merely a red herring?
Cast
Jack Palance
Slade
Constance Smith
Lily Bonner
Byron Palmer
Insp. Paul Warwick
Frances Bavier
Helen Harley
Rhys Williams
William Harley
Sean McClory
Constable #1
Leslie Bradley
Constable #2
Lester Matthews
Chief Insp. Melville
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CinemaSerf
Jack Palance is "Slade", a curiously enigmatic stranger who takes rooms in the home of the "Harley" family. It's at the height of the paranoia in Victorian London surrounding the "Jack the Ripper" killings and as our story develops, both "Mrs. Harley" (Frances Bavier) and the audience begin to suspect that our reclusive visitor may well have a secret to keep. Those suspicions only intensify when he takes a shine to her actress niece "Lily" (Constance Smith) and we really do wonder if she is soon to be toast, too! Hugo Fregonese does manage to build a little menace into this: the dark eerie settings, the foggy London scenes all add a richness to the drama. Palance, however, is as wooden as a picket fence; he brings very little to his part. Indeed, aside from an amiable few scenes from Rhys Williams as "Harley", the acting is all a bit dry and stagey and that drags the whole thing down rather. It is still quite watchable, though, but with a better actor in the lead it could have been much more intriguing and I think I preferred "The Lodger" (1944).
