The Devil Commands (1941)

A misleading title, 8 July 2006

In The Devil Commands, Boris Karloff is Dr. Julian Blair, a scientist working on experiments with brain waves. When his wife suddenly dies, he is so distraught that he turns his attention to using his brain wave machine to contact his wife. He meets a medium named Mrs. Walters (Anne Revere) who may hold the key to his success. But Mrs. Walters has another idea for Dr. Blair's experiments. She sees the opportunity to make a fortune with Dr. Blair's machine if he's successful. And she will stop at nothing to see that the experiments succeed.

To begin with, I have no idea what the title, The Devil Commands, has to do with anything in the movie. It's Mrs. Walters who is directing the events in the movie, not the devil. But I suppose a title like Mrs. Walters Commands wouldn't have been nearly as intriguing or saleable.

Although Karloff is the star of this movie, he has surprisingly little to do. He plays a one note character with an overwhelming desire to contact his dead wife. Karloff gives a decent performance, but he's just not very interesting. It's Anne Revere that makes The Devil Commands worth watching. She gives an understated, but delightfully evil performance and dominates everything on screen. The rest of the cast is okay, but no one stands out.

The highlight of the movie has to be the final scenes in Dr. Blair's laboratory. The sight of several dead bodies sitting around a table connected to the brain wave machine is morbidly fascinating. Unfortunately, too much of the movie is only average and no where near as fun as the final moments.

6/10