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IMDB message board about DME's score to Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde
| Adolph Zukor presents JOHN BARRYMORE in "Dr. Jekyll
and Mr. Hyde" By Robert Louis Stevenson. Scenario by Clara S. Beranger.
Directed by John S. Robertson. Photographed by Roy Overbaugh. Art Directors: Robert M. Haas, Architecture; Charles Seessel, Decorations. Cast: John Barrymore, Brandon Hurst, Martha Mansfield, Charles Lane, Cecil Clovelly, Nita Naldi, J. Malcolm Dunn, George Stevens, Louis Wolheim, & Alma Aiken. "Dr. Jekyll (John Barrymore) is a London doctor, progressive in his medical research, conservative and repressed in his personal life. A friend encourages him to explore the underside of life with a visit to a London music hall. Dancer Nita Naldi arouses Jekyll's repressed sensibilities, and when she embraces him, the doctor runs off. Later, Jekyll speculates on the advantage of separating the two natures of man in different bodies- one could "yield to every evil impulse, yet leave the soul untouched." Jekyll's scientific passion leads him to a formula that brings out his other side, Mr. Hyde, a man without a conscience. The initial transformation scene is deservedly famous, achieving its power solely with Barrymore's expressive features. Visually, Barrymore's Hyde is not a monster, but the physical result of the effect of a dissolute life. Hyde becomes more decrepit as the film progresses, while Jekyll's goodness falters. Hyde pursues women, stealing their honor, while his alter ego Jekyll is uncomfortable even with his fiancee. This distinct duality is further developed when Hyde's depravities get worse and worse, and the two sensibilities begin to become less distinct. The scenario goes to the essence of the story: the thin line between good and evil in the same person, and the inevitable conflict between the two. On an unconscious level, the film is also about different classes in the same city. The behavior of the working class Hyde is considered strange, but acceptable, until he attacks someone from the upper class (the father of Jekyll's fiancee). Just as Hyde allowed Jekyll to indulge in forbidden pastimes, the movies allowed Barrymore to indulge his upscale and downscale sensibilities. As a measure of the star's versatility, while this film was in production during the day at Paramount's New York studio, John Barrymore was starring as Richard III on Broadway each evening." 1997 David Pierce |