- Directed by Georges Franju and based on a novel by Jean Redon, Eyes Without a Face is a welcome reminder that black-and-white horror films can be just as effective as their color counterparts. In the film, a young woman named Christiane (Édith Scob) wears a pale, expressionless mask to hide her horrible disfigurement. Color would have made her mask look unnatural and her scars either too gruesome or comical to accept, but in monochrome it all works. When Christiane's father, Dr. Génessier (Pierre Brasseur), makes his first incision on a patient named Edna (Juliette Mayniel), the dark black rivulets of blood dripping from her neck are much more believable than they would have been in color, I think.
- But I'm getting ahead of myself, no pun intended. As you may have deduced, the film is arranged around Génessier's efforts to procure a new face for his daughter. He and his unfailingly loyal assistant Louise (Alida Valli) spend the film working through a string of involuntary donors, but the skin grafts keep rotting away before Christiane can fully heal. The police (Alexandre Rignault, Claude Brasseur) and Dr. Génessier's fellow physician (François Guérin) begin to wonder if the doctor has a connection with the missing girls, but his subterranean surgery lab and adjacent guard dog kennel make him difficult to ambush. Maybe dangling an attractive young woman (Béatrice Altariba) as bait will help them to uncover Génessier's bizarre operation.
- While the drama in Eyes Without a Face is somewhat predictable (I knew those mistreated dogs were going to be a problem!), its haunting imagery and eerie characters also make it quite memorable. Even in a film that features quite a bit of blood and surgical equipment, the most disturbing imagery is provided by Christiane's uncanny mask, which makes her resemble some strange injured bird rather than a normal human being. The most interesting character, however, is surely Louise, who (after a few minutes of initial reticence) proves an absolute expert at luring young women to their appalling deaths. Eugen Schüfftan's skilled cinematography ensures that every drop of black blood on a white neck stands out.
- I feel contractually obligated to mention that Alida Valli's full name is Baroness Alida Maria Laura Altenburger von Marckenstein-Frauenberg.
