'Oh Danny boy....'

SPOILERS

I just got the DVD and enjoyed watching the film again, as well as the controversial commentary from Darryl Hickman. I think all the comments from people rooting for Danny's cruel demise in the lake scene are hilarious, but I wonder then why people find the scene chilling (or do they?). I myself do find it very chilling. The way he keeps stopping, then gets urged again to his death by the evil Gene, it's like a cat playing with a mouse. I don't really find Danny quite as irritating as everyone here, having watched enough forties films to know adolescents of the period are always played like this, as super-wholesome, ultra-enthusiastic, boy/girl next door types (at least it's not as bad as Tiny Tim, Danny's spiritual predecessor). Besides, kids that age often are goofy, even today. Maybe he should have been allowed one scene where he dialed down the gee whiz-ness, but his panicked cry for help was still chilling, I thought (literally so for the actor), especially as Gene sits there impassively, icily impervious in those glorious shades she's wearing. My biggest complaint is we never get a real breakdown scene from Cornel in response to Danny's death, but maybe that would have taxed Cornell's dramatic capacity too greatly.

All Gene's "crazy" scenes (the urn scene, the lake scene, the stairs scene, the lake scene) are dynamite, with Gene ravishingly wicked and that BOOM-BOOM-BOOM score. The weakest scene for me is the confrontation between Gene and Cornell, where she admits what she's done. What she's done to Danny and to his unborn son is really bad stuff, even by today's standards, but Gene's and Cornell's acting doesn't convey it. Cornell's flatness is no surprise, but I was surprised by Gene's, given her strength in the rest of the film. Maybe the director just didn't want to "go there" emotionally (I mean, if I had been Cornell I think I would have strangled Gene on the spot). but it's like they are discussing her having bought too many blouses or something (quite possible, come to think of it, given all Gene's costume changes).

By the way, it's weird, I just watched a VERY good season three "Alfred Hitchcock Presents," and guess who stars in it: Darryl Hickman! He's about 27 or 28 years old in this one but could pass for a high schooler. He's still got that fresh-faced, gee whiz quality--it seems to have come naturally to him (and to his brother from the Dobie Gillis Show--though it's fortunately toned down. It's characteristic of 50s films too. But it's put to good use in the Hitchcock episode. I think Hickman was actually a pretty good actor, it's too bad he apparently has nothing but bad meories of his most famous role.