Charles Condomine (Rex Harrison) is an author working on his latest novel. Charles’ first wife, Elvira (Kay Hammond) died of pneumonia seven years ago. Five years ago, Charles married his second wife, Ruth (Constance Cummings). Charles and Ruth live in the village of Lympne, England in the county of Kent. Charles’ novel is about a homicidal medium. For inspiration and technical information, he decides to hire an occultist to perform a séance so he can observe them and figure out their tricks of the trade.
Charles hires a local medium, Madame Arcati (Margaret Rutherford) to conduct the séance. Also in attendance are family friends, Dr. George Bradman (Hugh Wakefield) and his wife, Violet (Joyce Carey). The only other people in the house are the cook (Marie Ault) and the maid, Edith (Jacqueline Clarke). Madame Arcati’s techniques and rituals strike the other participants in the séance as comical and have difficulty not laughing at the woman. During the séance, however, Charles hears the voice of his first wife, Elvira. No one else hears the voice.
Later that night Elvira materializes. Charles is the only person who can see the ghost. Eventually, when Ruth sees Elvira start levitating objects, she begins to believe. Ruth visits Madame Arcati hoping to find a way to send Elvira back to the beyond. Arcati is at a loss as to how to do that.
Elvira decides that she wants Charles with her in the ever-after, so she tampers with the brakes on the car. Her plan backfires when it is Ruth that crashes the car instead of Charles. Now Charles is alone in a house that is being haunted by both of his deceased wives. In desperation he turns to the ever-exuberant Madame Arcati for help.
“Blithe Spirit” was released in 1945 and was directed by David Lean. It is a British supernatural black comedy. The film was based on the 1941 play by Noel Coward. Coward does the film’s narration.
The title of the movie is a line from the Percy Bysshe Shelley poem “To a Skylark”. The line being, “Hail to thee, blithe Spirit! Bird thou never wert, that from Heaven, or near it, pourest thy full heart in profuse strains of unpremeditated art.”
This is one of those films where the stage play was better than the movie. The play was immensely popular, and the film did well but not as well as expected. It has since garnered accolades to the point where it is now considered a “classic”.
No one does crazy séance lady like Margaret Rutherford. She is delightful in her scatter-brained performance as the medium who manages to manifest all the trouble bestowed on the normally calm and sophisticated Harrison. The movie was a bit of screwball fun and mostly entertaining.
The ghostly special effects were done by using florescent green make-up and clothes while positioning a special filtered light on Hammond and then on Cummings when she is also a spirit.