Ida Lupino, who was a low-budget version of Bette Davis, starred as a young woman named Agnes Langley who hires on as a caretaker at the ominous and forbidding Gayle estate in the foothills of Santa Barbara, California and discovers that the previous caretaker named Jennifer Brown, a cousin of the wealthy Lorna Gayle (Mary Shipp), disappeared under mysterious circumstances. Jennifer may have embezzled serious amounts of money by blackmailing a prominent attorney, and she may have been murdered as a result. Agnes and local handyman Jim Hollis (Howard Duff) go on a dead body safari, and Agnes herself becomes obsessed with finding Jennifer. It turns out that she had been committed to a sanitarium. The murder story was spread by Norma Gayle to cover up evidence of insanity in the family. Very spooky, indeed. Ida Lupino and Howard Duff were married in real life; it was one of Hollywood's longest-lasting marriages until they divorced in 1984. This suspense thriller benefits from some serious cinematography by James Wong Howe; he made the estate itself the star of the movie. Not taking away from Ida Lupino, who was an excellent actress and director. Joel Newton, whose only film this was, might be a pseudonym of Bernard Girard, who directed a ton of television episodes during the 1950s and 1960s. Try to catch JENNIFER if you can.
Review of Jennifer
