Stolen Face (1952) Paul Henreid, Lizabeth Scott, André Morell

In Sunset Boulevard (1950), Norma Desmond contends that silent movie stars “didn’t need dialogue. We had faces.” Indeed, motion pictures have been obsessed with faces from the very beginning, particularly the faces of women who, like the celebrated Helen of Troy, have launched a thousand films with their alluring looks, from Lillian Gish and Gloria Swanson to Lauren Bacall and Marilyn Monroe. A London plastic surgeon called Dr. Philip Ritter (Paul Henreid) falls in love with American concert pianist Alice Brent (Lizabeth Scott) while on holiday in rural England. However, Alice is already engaged to be married to the well-to-do David (Andre Morell). Devastated, Ritter returns to London and is called upon to perform a charitable operation on a disfigured convict called Lily (Mary Mackenzie), whose face he recreates in Alice's image. Ritter then marries Lily thinking that her new face will cure her criminal tendencies, but this results in disastrous circumstances. Lizabeth Scott manages to create two very different characters and breathes life into each. Her Alice Brent, though far less interesting than her doppelganger Lily Conover, is a woman who has no clue what she wants out of life, never certain over the decisions she has to make. Shall she choose a life with a man whom she barely knew but fell head over heels for, or a man who has dutifully stood by and cared for her throughout her career? Should she continue a life as an esteemed concert pianist, or live a simple life with a man who she has been swept away by. Her lack of assertiveness makes her choice to stay with a man who has become psychotically obsessed with her at least somewhat plausible. As Lily Conover, on the other hand, she truly shows her growth as an actress. Lily Conover is incredibly complex, incredibly vulnerable and yet recklessly destructive to everyone around her. She’s a twisted version of Eliza Doolittle, who only causes more destruction when managing to become a ‘lady.’ She now can both charm her way to get what she wants in addition to her many criminal impulses. However Scott adds a childlike demeanor to this femme fatale, making her vulnerable and incapable of telling right from wrong. This plot development, in which a scientist creates in effect a dangerous new person through his surgical skills, certainly looks forward to Fisher’s Frankenstein films for the studio, but the movie also deserves some kudos for preempting many of the themes and motifs that Alfred Hitchcock would use several years later in his classic plunge into morbid romance, Vertigo (1958, Universal-International).

In scene after scene, moments that we remember from the classic Hitchcock film all get their first airing here – first there is the romantic obsession with a beautiful but unobtainable blonde who vanishes from a man’s life. He then makes another woman over in her image – dying her dark hair blonde, than buying her a new wardrobe, obsessing as he tries to recreate his lost love. We even get a scene centered on a broach that indicates the woman’s criminality, much as we would in the later film. Here though it indicates that Lily is in fact slipping back into her old habits – just having Alice Brent’s face and marrying her surgeon-cum-saviour seems not to have been enough to curb her darker impulses, the story switching course again into what would seem to be a crime plot crossed with a psychiatric case history about a woman suffering from kleptomania. The finale is a little bit too pat and, like Vertigo, doesn’t really solve things satisfactorily at a plot level, though one could argue that emotionally it is the only way the story could go in what is a variant on the story of beauty and the beast.It's not too often that you get the chance to play dual roles in a film, but that's exactly what happened to Lizabeth Scott in Hammer's Stolen Life (1954). In 1950, American producer Robert Lippert formed a business alliance with Hammer studios. Under the agreement, Lippert would provide American acting talent - frequently stars on their way up or on their way down who fancied a profitable trip out of the country - while Hammer would supply the rest of the cast and the production facilities. Together they would split the profits. Famous for his concern with the bottom line, Lippert produced over 140 films between 1946 and 1955, characteristically genre pieces such as I Shot Jesse James or Rocketship XM. For the British deal, most of the films were noir-ish thrillers which include this title.Stolen Face was directed by Terence Fisher and adapted to screenplay by Martin Berkeley and Richard H. Landau from a story by Alexander Paal and Steven Vas.

Good movie. My only issue is that he should've just divorced her! He had a valid case! Her infidelity was no secret to anyone! Lol oh well, i spoke my piece so I feel better now!! ️

OMG, yes!!! That is so true about Vertigo! Great observation!! And super interesting information all around, thank you for taking the time to share it!