A London plastic surgeon called Philip Ritter (Paul Henreid) falls in love with American concert pianist Alice Brent (Lizabeth Scott) while on holiday in rural England. However, Alice is already engaged to be married to the well-to-do David (Andre Morell). Devastated, Ritter returns to London and is called upon to perform a charitable operation on a disfigured convict called Lily (Mary Mackenzie), whose face he recreates in Alice's image. Ritter then marries Lily thinking that her new face will cure her criminal tendencies, but this results in disastrous circumstances.
Before Hammer and director Terence Fisher reinvigorated the horror genre with their colour remakes of Frankenstein and Dracula, their main source of output was b-features, most of which were in the crime thriller genre and often featured American stars who were past their prime to bolster international sales. In Stolen Face, ex-1940's stars Paul Henreid and Lizabeth Scott were hired. Scott came to prominence after she appeared alongside Kirk Douglas in "The Strange Love Of Martha Ivers" (1946) and later Humphrey Bogart in "Dead Reckoning" (1947). The latter part saw her being compared to Lauren Bacall. However, by the 1950's, good parts worthy of her talents were proving difficult to come by and she made few films from there on. Henreid had appeared in such Hollywood milestones as "Casablanca" (1942) before he faded from the public eye.
Stolen Face is a very interesting film in that it marks a notable point for both Hammer and Fisher (here making his third picture for the company). The plot hints at some of the themes that they would focus on in their subsequent horror films. For instance, the premise of the surgeon transforming the disfigured girl into a beauty was exploited in more detail in the sublime "Frankenstein Created Woman" (1967). In this film Baron Frankenstein and his assistant cured Christina Kleeve's disfigurement but also transfered the soul of her lover (wrongly executed for murder) into her body. The result was a archetypal blonde beauty and seductress who then proceeded to seduce and kill the men who sent her boyfriend to the guillotine. The difference between Stolen Face and "Frankenstein Created Woman" is that the former was only treated as a domestic melodrama and had little to give conviction to it's absurdness, but the latter had a genuine Gothic fairy tale quality that transcended the daftness of the plot. There are also echoes of "The Revenge Of Frankenstein" (1958) in that both Philip Ritter and Baron Frankenstein both did charity work as well as running their own surgeries. And it was through this charity work that they acquired the raw materials for their own ends. It is also interesting to compare the two characters in that both Ritter and Frankenstein (although from different societies) believed that they could both create the perfect human being in their own way, but as in both cases something went drastically wrong. For instance, in "The Revenge Of Frankenstein", the creature became a disfigured dwarf although the Baron performed the operation on his hunchback assistant as a favour and for his own misguided reasons. The same applies to Ritter as he took pity on Lily's disfigurement and at the same time did it for his own ends. Another similarity is that both doctors were both so obsessed with what they were doing to understand the terrible consequences that would result.
In conclusion, Stolen Face can be seen as a run of the mill medical melodrama, but for those who have followed Hammer's output from the very beginning, it is possible to see that it paved the way for Hammer to do better things within a decade or so after this was made. The film also supports the theory that when a subject met with Fisher's approval, he would give the film all he had to give to it. Yet when he disliked a subject such as the science fiction film "Night Of The Big Heat" (1967), everything was indifferently done. Stolen Face is by no means a perfect film as Henreid is miscast as Dr Ritter and Andre Morell is rather uncomfortable as Alice Brent's boyfriend David. However, Lizabeth Scott is remarkable as once the operation scene is over, she is playing both Lily and Alice and it surprised everyone that she managed to put on a very acceptable cockney accent. The film is rather a routine affair, but it isn't possible to dismiss it as it is one of the very few films of Hammer's early output to show signs of the company's future. However, if Hammer hadn't gone on to do better things, Stolen Face wouldn't have warranted the reassessment that it's getting today let alone a reissue on DVD.
Before Hammer and director Terence Fisher reinvigorated the horror genre with their colour remakes of Frankenstein and Dracula, their main source of output was b-features, most of which were in the crime thriller genre and often featured American stars who were past their prime to bolster international sales. In Stolen Face, ex-1940's stars Paul Henreid and Lizabeth Scott were hired. Scott came to prominence after she appeared alongside Kirk Douglas in "The Strange Love Of Martha Ivers" (1946) and later Humphrey Bogart in "Dead Reckoning" (1947). The latter part saw her being compared to Lauren Bacall. However, by the 1950's, good parts worthy of her talents were proving difficult to come by and she made few films from there on. Henreid had appeared in such Hollywood milestones as "Casablanca" (1942) before he faded from the public eye.
Stolen Face is a very interesting film in that it marks a notable point for both Hammer and Fisher (here making his third picture for the company). The plot hints at some of the themes that they would focus on in their subsequent horror films. For instance, the premise of the surgeon transforming the disfigured girl into a beauty was exploited in more detail in the sublime "Frankenstein Created Woman" (1967). In this film Baron Frankenstein and his assistant cured Christina Kleeve's disfigurement but also transfered the soul of her lover (wrongly executed for murder) into her body. The result was a archetypal blonde beauty and seductress who then proceeded to seduce and kill the men who sent her boyfriend to the guillotine. The difference between Stolen Face and "Frankenstein Created Woman" is that the former was only treated as a domestic melodrama and had little to give conviction to it's absurdness, but the latter had a genuine Gothic fairy tale quality that transcended the daftness of the plot. There are also echoes of "The Revenge Of Frankenstein" (1958) in that both Philip Ritter and Baron Frankenstein both did charity work as well as running their own surgeries. And it was through this charity work that they acquired the raw materials for their own ends. It is also interesting to compare the two characters in that both Ritter and Frankenstein (although from different societies) believed that they could both create the perfect human being in their own way, but as in both cases something went drastically wrong. For instance, in "The Revenge Of Frankenstein", the creature became a disfigured dwarf although the Baron performed the operation on his hunchback assistant as a favour and for his own misguided reasons. The same applies to Ritter as he took pity on Lily's disfigurement and at the same time did it for his own ends. Another similarity is that both doctors were both so obsessed with what they were doing to understand the terrible consequences that would result.
In conclusion, Stolen Face can be seen as a run of the mill medical melodrama, but for those who have followed Hammer's output from the very beginning, it is possible to see that it paved the way for Hammer to do better things within a decade or so after this was made. The film also supports the theory that when a subject met with Fisher's approval, he would give the film all he had to give to it. Yet when he disliked a subject such as the science fiction film "Night Of The Big Heat" (1967), everything was indifferently done. Stolen Face is by no means a perfect film as Henreid is miscast as Dr Ritter and Andre Morell is rather uncomfortable as Alice Brent's boyfriend David. However, Lizabeth Scott is remarkable as once the operation scene is over, she is playing both Lily and Alice and it surprised everyone that she managed to put on a very acceptable cockney accent. The film is rather a routine affair, but it isn't possible to dismiss it as it is one of the very few films of Hammer's early output to show signs of the company's future. However, if Hammer hadn't gone on to do better things, Stolen Face wouldn't have warranted the reassessment that it's getting today let alone a reissue on DVD.