Review of Eyes Without a Face (1960) by David D — 23 Oct 2008

A quietly creepy, yet beautiful, horror film about a doctor, his daughter who has been disfigured in a car crash and his assistant, devoted to him because he restored her face after an accident, but itâ??s mostly about the doctor and his obsessive quest to â??heterograftâ?? living tissue (i.e., another young womanâ??s face) to his daughterâ??s face and restore her beauty.

The film is eerie and meticulously crafted. The simplicity and stillness of the operation scene as the doctor cuts a young womanâ??s skin away from her face is bloody and all the more horrible because of the calm, scientific brutality. Most affecting, however, is the mask of the daughter, Christiane, which hides her face (described as an â??open woundâ??) and her emotions. She is like a ghost passing through the movie. Even when her father is able to temporarily create a â??new faceâ?? for her, it is still a mask. He asks her to smile, then scolds her for smiling â??too muchâ??. Unfortunately her new skin begins to die on her face and itâ??s back to the mask.

The ending of the film, with Christiane finally free of her father and his assistant walking out of the house into the woods, surrounded by the animals sheâ??s freed from her fatherâ??s laboratory, is so hauntingly beautiful I canâ??t forget it â?? it probably bumped the film up a star.