Jacques Tourneur: The Cinema of Nightfall

At least three of director Jacques Tourneur’s films–Cat People, I Walked with a Zombie and The Leopard Man–are recognized as horror classics. Yet his contributions to these films are often minimized by scholars, with most of the credit going to the films’ producer, Val Lewton.

A detailed examination of the director’s full body of work reveals that those elements most evident in the Tourneur-Lewton collaborations–the lack of monsters and the stylized use of suggested violence–are equally apparent in Tourneur’s films before and after his work with Lewton. Mystery and sensuality were hallmarks of his style, and he possessed a highly artistic visual and aural style. This insightful critical study examines each of Tourneur’s films, as well as his extensive work on MGM shorts (1936-1942) and in television. What emerges is evidence of a highly coherent directorial style that runs throughout Tourneur’s works.