Experiment Perilous is a 1944 melodrama

Melodrama

The term melodrama refers to a dramatic work that exaggerates plot and characters in order to appeal to the emotions. It may also refer to the genre which includes such works, or to language, behavior, or events which resemble them...

 set at the turn of the 20th century. The film is based on a novel by Margaret Carpenter and directed by Jacques Tourneur

Jacques Tourneur

Jacques Tourneur was a French-American film director.-Life:Born in Paris, France, he was the son of film director Maurice Tourneur. At age 10, Jacques moved to the United States with his father. He started a career in cinema while still attending high school as an extra and later as a script clerk...

. Albert S. D'Agostino

Albert S. D'Agostino

Albert S. D'Agostino was an American art director. He was nominated for five Academy Awards in the category Best Art Direction...

, Jack Okey, Darrell Silvera

Darrell Silvera

Darrell Silvera was an American set decorator. He was nominated for seven Academy Awards in the category Best Art Direction...

, and Claude E. Carpenter

Claude E. Carpenter

Claude E. Carpenter was an American set decorator. He was nominated for three Academy Awards in the category Best Art Direction.-Selected filmography:...

 were nominated for an Academy Award for Best Art Direction

Academy Award for Best Art Direction

The Academy Awards are the oldest awards ceremony for achievements in motion pictures. The Academy Award for Best Art Direction recognizes achievement in art direction on a film. The films below are listed with their production year, so the Oscar 2000 for best art direction went to a film from 1999...

-Interior Decoration, Black-and-White. Hedy Lamarr

Hedy Lamarr

Hedy Lamarr was an Austrian-American actress celebrated for her great beauty who was a major contract star of MGM's "Golden Age".Lamarr also co-invented – with composer George Antheil – an early technique for spread spectrum communications and frequency hopping, necessary to wireless...

's singing voice was dubbed by Paula Raymond

Paula Raymond

Paula Raymond was an American model and actress.In 1950, she was put under contract by MGM, where she played opposite such leading men as Cary Grant and Dick Powell...

.

Plot

In 1903, Doctor Huntington Bailey (Brent) meets a friendly older lady during a train trip. She tells him that she is going to visit her brother Nick and his lovely young wife Allida. Once in New York, Bailey hears that his train companion suddenly died. Shortly afterward, he meets the strange couple and gets suspicious of Nick's treatment of his wife. Nick keeps Allida, who he is trying to pass off as crazy, a virtual prisoner in their London town house, cutting off all contact with the outside world. The kindly psychiatrist Bailey takes it upon himself to attempt to free his new love Allida from the control of the insanely jealous Nick.

A frenzied gun battle in an aquarium, replete with shattered glass, gushing water and floundering fish may be the most memorable (and most often imitated) scene in the film.

Cast

• Hedy Lamarr
  Hedy Lamarr
  Hedy Lamarr was an Austrian-American actress celebrated for her great beauty who was a major contract star of MGM's "Golden Age".Lamarr also co-invented – with composer George Antheil – an early technique for spread spectrum communications and frequency hopping, necessary to wireless...
  
   as Alida Bederaux
• George Brent
  George Brent
  George Brent was an Irish film and television actor in American cinema.-Early life:He was born George Brendan Nolan in Raharabeg, County Roscommon on the opposite bank of the River Shannon from the town of Shannonbridge, County Offaly, Ireland, the son of a British Army officer.During the Irish...
  
   as Dr. Huntington Bailey
• Paul Lukas
  Paul Lukas
  Paul Lukas was an Austrian-Hungarian-born actor.-Biography:Born Pál Lukács in Budapest, he arrived in Hollywood in 1927 after a successful stage and film career in Hungary, Germany and Austria where he worked with Max Reinhardt. He made his stage debut in Budapest in 1916 and his film debut in 1917...
  
  as Nick Bederaux

• In the movie version this is actually a New York brownstone.

External links

.

• Experiment Perilous at Senses of Cinema.