Leave Her to Heaven

7.6

3,421

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Original title: Leave Her to Heaven
Year: 1945
Running time: 110 min.
Country: United States
Director: John M. Stahl
Screenwriter: Jo Swerling. Novel: Ben Ames Williams
Music: Alfred Newman
Cinematography: Leon Shamroy
Cast: Gene Tierney, Cornel Wilde, Jeanne Crain, Vincent Price, Mary Philips, Ray Collins, Gene Lockhart, Reed Hadley, Darryl Hickman, Chill Wills
Producer: 20th Century Fox
Genre: Drama. Mystery. Film noir | Melodrama. Jealousy
Movie Groups: Ben Ames Williams' Adaptations
Synopsis: Ellen Berent (Gene Tierney) meets and falls desperately in love with Richard Harland (Cornell Wilde), an author who resembles her late father. Ellen is pathologically possessive of Richard, jealous of anyone who he pays the slightest attention to. In order to be completely alone with him, she convinces him to live in a isolated, but beautiful lakeside home in a spot called "Back of the Moon. " She dismisses the local handyman and then drowns his crippled half-brother Danny (Darryl Hickman). To Richard's delight, Ellen becomes pregnant. Ellen, resentful of the restriction caused by the pregnancy and afraid that she will lose some of Richard's love and attention, causes a miscarriage by throwing herself down the stairs. Ellen also becomes insanely jealous of her foster sister Ruth (Jeanne Crain), who is open and uncomplicated and soon becomes Richard's friend... Filmed in an incredibly rich Technicolor.

Rankings Position

#51 Best Film Noir Movies
#82 Best Mystery Films

Awards: 1945: Oscar: Best Cinematography - color. 4 Nominations

Critics' reviews

"Tierney's Ellen Berent [is] one of cinema's most chilling psychopaths"

Melissa Anderson: Village Voice
"A piece of cheap fiction done up in Technicolor and expensive sets."

Bosley Crowther: The New York Times
"Has emotional power in the jealousy theme but it hasn't been as forcefully interpreted by the leads as it could have been in more histrionically capable hands."

William Brogdon: Variety
"A fevered yet clinical study of jealousy, Leave Her to Heaven is probably John M. Stahl's best-known film."

Dan Callahan: Slant
"Stahl's use of space and the performances in Leave Her to Heaven...suggest he was at least the equal of the much-exalted Sirk as an artist of melodrama."

Lou Lumenick: New York Post
"Gothic psychologizing melodrama, so preposterously full-blown and straight-faced that it's a juicy entertainment."

Pauline Kael: The New Yorker

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