THE UNKNOWN

Jim Bannon, Jeff Donnell, Mark Roberts

THE UNKNOWN (1946). Director: Henry Levin. 

An old Southern family is shattered when daughter Rachel (Karen Morley) tells her parents that she has married Richard (Robert Wilcox of Mysterious Dr. Satan) instead of the fiance who had been chosen for her. After accidentally shooting Rachel's father, he flees the house. Decades later, Rachel and Richard's daughter, Nina (Jeff Donnell), arrives at the creepy old Confederate mansion for the reading of her grandmother, Phoebe's (Helen Freeman) will. Accompanying her are a lawyer (Mark Roberts of Exposed) and two private detectives (Jim Bannon of Dangers of the Canadian Mounted; Barton Yarborough). Rachel has been a bit batty for years and doesn't realize Nina is her daughter, and her two uncles (James Bell; Wilton Graff) are grumpy and unwelcoming. Then someone is found stabbed in the family crypt. 

Robert Wilcox

The Unknown is a modestly entertaining and rather suspenseful variation on an "old dark house" mystery. In addition to crypts and murders, we've got babies crying in the night, a wandering cat, secret rooms and cobwebby passageways, but all in all it's a trifle far-fetched and doesn't add up to that much. The back story of the secret marriage and its repercussions is not without interest, but most of the modern-day story has very little to do with that. The acting is a bit stilted at times. The Unknown was the third of three films based on the "I Love a Mystery" radio series. Jim Bannon played Jack Packard in all three (the other two were I Love a Mystery and The Devil's Mask). 

Verdict: Pleasant but unspectacular time-passer. **1/2.