The Accused (1948)
Grade: 61
"The Accused" is a crime drama and character study. The film has a good script and a competent cast. There is a reasonable amount of suspense, although one can easily guess where the plot is headed next.
"The Accused" is Loretta Young, playing a college Psychology professor. One of her students is brash playboy Douglas Dick, who is determined to score with her prim but attractive teacher. Young stupidly goes on a date with Dick, and ends up killing him in self-defense. She then tries to make it look like a suicide.
Soon, police inspector Wendell Corey (whom you may remember in a similar role in "Rear Window") is on the job. Dick's lawyer, Robert Cummings, becomes romantically involved with Young. Student Suzanne Dalbert (who has a terrible foreign accent) is the prime suspect, but eventually the focus is turned on Young.
The career of Loretta Young was at its peak in 1948. She had just won the Best Actress Oscar for "The Farmer's Daughter" and would be nominated next year for "Come to the Stable". Her character in "The Accused" is tense and sexually repressed, and the glamorous, graceful Young is a bit miscast. When Young changes her clothes and hairstyle as part of the cover-up of her crime, the difference is not strong enough, perhaps because the studio felt it would hurt her image if she were less attractive in the first half of the film.
The best role, although a small one, is given to Sam Jaffe, who plays a colorful forensics examiner.
The script is intelligent, perhaps too much so, throwing in psychology jargon. The script controls the direction, which rushes the story along. The pace does maintain dramatic tension, but perhaps the impact of key scenes would be greater if cinematography was used more often to tell the story.
kollers@mpsi.net http://members.tripod.com/~Brian_Koller/movies.html
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