Rated: NR

In his eagerness to make the first serious film about psychoanalysis, Alfred Hitchcock so diluted the fantastical elements in Francis Beeding's novel The House of Dr Edwardes, all that remained was a melodramatic plot and an awful lot of psychobabble. Not even a dream sequence designed by Salvador Dali could enliven the turgid script, made all the less palatable by the robotic performance of Gregory Peck as the amnesiac trying to unravel his troubled past with the help of sympathetic shrink, Ingrid Bergman. You know, early in Peck's career, before he had matured and perfected the quiet strong-jawed American intensity and resoluteness into a fine art his performances could be so lifeless as to make Jude Law look animated! This role is no exception.

Dali designed the dream sequence with all the aids of futurism and surrealism in his sets. The sets, chairs and tables have human legs and roofs slope at 45-degree angles into infinity.

Hitch himself was disappointed with the picture, but there are enough masterly touches to keep your attention.