Rent My Name Is Julia Ross (1945)
3.6 of 5 from 64 ratings
1h 5min
- General info
- Available formats
- Synopsis:
- The morning after Julia Ross (Nina Foch) takes a job in London as secretary to wealthy widow Mrs. Williamson Hughes (Dame May Whitty), she wakes up in a windswept Cornish mansion, having been drugged. Mrs. Hughes and her volatile son, Ralph (George Macready), attempt to gaslight Julia into believing she is Ralph's wife, Marion. Her belongings have been destroyed, the windows barred and the locals believe that she is mad. Will Julia be able to escape before she falls prey to the Hughes sinister charade? And what happened to the real Marion Hughes?
- Actors:
- Nina Foch, May Whitty, George Macready, Roland Varno, Anita Sharp-Bolster, Doris Lloyd, Joy Harington, Leyland Hodgson, Olaf Hytten, Marilyn Johnson, Queenie Leonard, Charles McNaughton, Harry Hays Morgan, Leonard Mudie, Ottola Nesmith, Milton Owen, Reginald Sheffield, Evan Thomas
- Directors:
- Joseph H. Lewis
- Producers:
- Wallace MacDonald
- Writers:
- Muriel Roy Bolton, Anthony Gilbert
- Aka:
- The Woman in Red
- Genres:
- Classics, Drama, Thrillers
- BBFC:
- Release Date:
- 18/02/2019
- Run Time:
- 65 minutes
- Languages:
- English LPCM Mono
- Subtitles:
- English Hard of Hearing
- Formats:
- Pal
- Aspect Ratio:
- Full Screen 1.37:1
- Colour:
- B & W
- BLU-RAY Regions:
- B
- Bonus:
- Commentary by noir expert Alan K. Rode
- Identity Crisis: Joseph H. Lewis at Columbia - The Nitrate Diva (Nora Fiore) provides the background and an analysis of the film
- Theatrical Trailer
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Reviews (1) of My Name Is Julia Ross
Budget Noir (spoiler). - My Name Is Julia Ross review by Steve
This was a minor studio production but has become a B film legend. Julia (Nina Foch) takes a job as a secretary to a family of nutcases who kidnap her and lock her up on a remote estate in Cornwall (shot in California). They need a body to stand in for the woman who was murdered by her psychopathic husband, which will be made to look like a suicide.
They parade Julia as the wife for the benefit of local witnesses, claiming her protests are part of her psychosis. OK, it's a screwball story, though no more than many other golden age mysteries. It succeeds because Joseph H. Lewis stages it so well. No screen time is wasted, and there's one of the most brilliant noir house-of-shadows.
Nina Foch is believable in the difficult title role, but it is the crazy abductors who make a bigger impression. May Whitty is the eccentric but ruthlessly pragmatic mother of the simple-minded George Macready. He is splendidly menacing as the killer who relishes their plans for Julia, while also enjoying having her as his wife, for a while.
It is set in England, where in the world of Hollywood these things happen. Like Gaslight. Film fans like to flag up the doomed males of film noir, exploited by a predatory female, as a key postwar theme. But there were many women like Julia; lonely, vulnerable and manipulated, particularly by family. My Name is Julia Ross is among the most typical and successful of these.
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