"The Lodger" is not a history lesson and is based very, very loosely on Jack the Ripper. I say this because as a retired history teacher, I've noticed that a lot of folks think many film characters are real...and Mr. Slade and his odd proclivities are based on some real events as well as a lot of fiction.When the film begins, London is all in a panic due to the murders by Jack the Ripper. During all this hubbub, the ever-odd Mr. Slade (Laird Cregar) arrives at the home of two folks (Sara Allgood and Cederic Hardwicke). He wants to rent a room and seems like a pretty normal guy...initially. However, through the course of the film, you see more and more of the weird and peculiar aspects of Slade and folks start to add up all the weird details and think he might just be that serial killer.This film works pretty well because it sets an excellent creepy mood and Laird Cregar really was terrific as the creepy lodger. Too bad he died so young, as he sure had a great screen presence! Worth seeing.

"The Lodger" is considered by many to be the best of the several attempts to film the Jack the Ripper legacy. Much of the credit for this has to be attributed to the bravura performance by Laird Cregar in the lead role.Directed by John Brahm and photographed by Lucien Ballard we get a superior Gothic horror film complete with dimly lit foggy London streets with elements of "The Picture of Dorion Gray", Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" and "The Phantom of the Opera" thrown in. To appease the censors, the murder victims were changed from prostitutes to dance hall girls and all of the murders take place off screen.A mysterious man who calls himself "Slade" (Cregar), rents rooms from a down on their luck couple the Warwicks (Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Sara Allgood) at the time of the Jack the Ripper killings. The couple have a young niece Kitty Langley (Merle Oberon) who performs in music halls.Slade leaves little doubt as to who he really is and Cregar plays him as a soft spoken man with sinister overtones. Brahm has him photographed from low angles (a la Sidney Greenstreet) to emphasize his threatening size and piercing eyes. (Cregar was a big man standing over six feet and weighing 300 lbs).When the latest murder turns out to be a woman who had just met Kitty, Scotland Yard is called in with Inspector John Warwick (George Sanders) in charge. Naturally he is attracted to the lovely Kitty as is, we are soon to learn, Slade.The climax, which takes place following Kitty's performance, is the highlight of the film. Cregar's transformation into the mad murderer is positively frightening. This picture made a star out of the talented Cregar who went on to film a sequel of sorts the following year in "Hangover Square".If you pay attention closely, you will discover (due to last minute editing and voice over) that one lady is actually murdered twice.

Circumstances have forced the Bunting family to take in The Lodger at the same time in 1888 that the notorious Jack The Ripper was terrorizing all of London, particularly in the Whitechapel District where the Buntings reside. It should have made them think twice about taking in a boarder who is a complete stranger.Speculation about the Ripper murders has had professional and amateur criminologists going for years. There is no definitive work on Jack The Ripper because his identity is officially unknown. The Lodger is a work of novelist Maria Belloc Lowndes and her speculation is as good as anyone's including mine.What she did do and what 20th Century Fox did as well is give a great role to Laird Cregar, sad to say his next to last. Cregar is a mysterious medical student whose nocturnal wanderings have everyone wondering. Who's wondering most of all is Scotland Yard Inspector George Sanders.The Buntings, Cedric Hardwicke and Sara Allgood, think nothing of him at first, but his attentions to their actress daughter Merle Oberon are creeping them out. Not to mention the unease that she is slowly feeling around Cregar.Director John Brahm got some great performances out of his cast and really caught the mood of Victorian London. But Cregar will arouse all kinds of conflicting emotions in you. You will hate, loath, and pity him all at once, not an easy thing for an actor to maintain, but Cregar pulls it off. The Lodger is a remake of a film young Alfred Hitchcock did as a silent. They're both good, but I give the edge to this one.

Merle Oberon, George Sanders, Sara Allgood, Sir Cedric Hardwicke, and Laird Cregar (as the title role) star in what must be the definitive film adaptation of this story, claiming to be based on the Jack the Ripper legend. I remember seeing the Hitchcock silent, and while it was good, it didn't capture the London-at-night atmosphere and the dark shadows, and it didn't have Laird Cregar, and his intense desperation. He was excellent! I can only imagine that he was probably a nice guy in real life, but his disturbing performance is practically the whole show. Merle Oberon is lovely and all, but her role is really a thankless or throw-away role, with very little to do but to just be there.Laird Cregar (and the movie) allows us to enter his mind and understand his motivations and even to sympathize with him. We're allowed to see things through his eyes. Especially at the end, when he's cornered by the crowd, when he looks so demented to the crowd, we see the crowd from his perspective. They must look so frightening to him.One quick note: Sara Allgood also was in "How Green was My Valley," and she deserves some recognition for her great part in "The Lodger" and her prolific career. She was an actress who worked without much fanfare, but always gave great performances.See this version of "The Lodger" and don't be taken in or fooled by imitations. Stay away from the new one, and don't even be curious about "Man in the Attic" with Jack Palance, a vastly inferior rip-off. "The Lodger" can be found on a Fox Horror 3-movie collection, and on TCM from time to time. Discover this version of "The Lodger," and you won't be disappointed, unless you want today's blood and gore. Its less-is-more technique goes a long, shiny way with your imagination.