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      The Dark Past

      Released Dec 22, 1948 1h 15m Crime Drama List
      50% 8 Reviews Tomatometer 45% 100+ Ratings Audience Score Taken hostage along with his family and friends, psychologist Andrew Collins (Lee J. Cobb) is held by the murderous fugitive Al Walker (William Holden) and his gang. While Walker's crew, which includes his lover, Betty (Nina Foch), tends to the other hostages, the desperate mastermind talks to Collins about his troubled past. As the night progresses, Collins gets Walker to focus on a disturbing dream, resulting in a psychological breakthrough that may help avoid a violent conflict. Read More Read Less

      Critics Reviews

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      Nick Schager Lessons of Darkness Another of the era's barely tolerable advertisements for Freudian psychoanalysis. Rated: C May 16, 2006 Full Review Yasser Medina Cinefilia "The Dark Past" is minor film noir from Maté that frames light psychoanalytic notes, but it seems to me that its intrigue is absent like a prisoner on the run. [Full review in Spanish] Rated: 6/10 Jul 1, 2021 Full Review Nathanael Hood Unseen Films Rudolph Maté's The Dark Past is a superb noir remake of Charles Vidor's subpar proto-noir Blind Alley (1939). Rated: 8/10 Apr 16, 2020 Full Review Sean Axmaker Turner Classic Movies Online ... a minor noir notable largely for Holden's uncharacteristically feral performance... Oct 13, 2007 Full Review Emanuel Levy EmanuelLevy.Com Rated: 3/5 Jul 1, 2005 Full Review Andy Klein Los Angeles CityBeat Rated: 3/5 Sep 2, 2004 Full Review Read all reviews

      Audience Reviews

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      william k Superior psychological thriller is original, tense and graced with with some excellent performances; the psychoanalysis presented to resolve the killer's insanity shouldn't be taken too seriously, though. Rated 3 out of 5 stars 03/31/23 Full Review martin a William Holden is fantastic in this as a damaged escaped criminal who ends up holding out in the house of a criminal psychologist. Hour by hour the psychologist begins to unravel the criminal's past and tries to reveal his reoccurring nightmare! The film is tense, well-acted, and just wonderful Rated 4 out of 5 stars 03/31/23 Full Review deke p Did not age well. 1948. Cobb as constantly pipe-smoking psychologist cures his captor William Holden. Everyone wore suits and ties. Nonsense psychological miracle, pretentious and melodramatic. Never heard of until saw on broadcast tv The Movie Channel 13.3, on 2.6.20 Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars 03/30/23 Full Review Audience Member Introductory Psychology Gussied Up as a Crime Film--The Fifty-Minute Cure!! Rated 3 out of 5 stars 02/22/23 Full Review Audience Member Holden did well, but I thought his character was not written as well as it could have been. Cobb's character had much more depth, but the extra story about the boy he may be able to save in the future was fairly unnecessary, most of his character building came in the holdup story anyway. It's fairly short, so if you have a little over an hour to kill, it'd be worth a look. Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 01/22/23 Full Review Audience Member Perhaps a little excessively/obviously freudian. But definitely worth watching for the interplay between Cobb and Holden. Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 01/16/23 Full Review Read all reviews Post a rating

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      Movie Info

      Synopsis Taken hostage along with his family and friends, psychologist Andrew Collins (Lee J. Cobb) is held by the murderous fugitive Al Walker (William Holden) and his gang. While Walker's crew, which includes his lover, Betty (Nina Foch), tends to the other hostages, the desperate mastermind talks to Collins about his troubled past. As the night progresses, Collins gets Walker to focus on a disturbing dream, resulting in a psychological breakthrough that may help avoid a violent conflict.
      Director
      Rudolph Maté
      Screenwriter
      Michael Blankfort, Albert Duffy, Philip MacDonald, Oscar Saul, Malvin Wald, James Warwick
      Distributor
      Columbia Pictures
      Production Co
      Columbia Pictures Corporation
      Genre
      Crime, Drama
      Original Language
      English
      Release Date (Theaters)
      Dec 22, 1948, Original
      Runtime
      1h 15m
      Sound Mix
      Mono