Film

Ivy

Name: Ivy
Genre: Drama, Crime, Thriller
Released: 1947
Cast: Joan Fontaine, Patric Knowles, Herbert Marshall, Richard Ney, Cedric Hardwicke

A cunning Edwardian woman plots to eliminate two inconvenient men—her husband and her lover—through poison. This 1947 thriller wraps a blackly entertaining murder scheme in period elegance and moral ambiguity, letting Joan Fontaine charm us while she commits calculated atrocity. It's nasty fun, not reassurance.

TMDb rating

3.3

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like period crime stories driven by a cool, scheming heroine and a slow build of unease, where the pleasure is watching a clever mind at work in tight drawing rooms.

Skip it if you need brisk plot momentum, since this one lingers on manners and mood more than on action, and its black-and-white stagey restraint can feel dated.

What it asks of you: Its shape is unhurried and talky across its 99 minutes, with long stretches of polite conversation that build pressure instead of delivering jolts, rewarding patience over quick attention.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Gaslight1944

Ingrid Bergman and Charles Boyer in a masterclass of psychological manipulation and misdirection. A woman's reality is systematically questioned by someone she should trust most. Tense, immaculate, and morally ruthless.

But Slow by modern standards, and the emotional violence can feel claustrophobic if you're watching for plot momentum rather than character destruction.

In a Lonely Place1950

Humphrey Bogart as a violent screenwriter accused of murder, watched by the woman who loves him. It asks whether charm and talent absolve cruelty. Noir without sentimentality, examining the person beneath the performance.

But Bogart's character is actively repellent. If you need to like your protagonist, this will exhaust you.

The Innocents1961

Deborah Kerr in a period ghost story where evil—if it exists—wears the face of children. Beautifully composed, psychologically unnerving, and built on what you're *not* entirely sure about. Elegance and dread together.

But It moves quietly and trusts you to feel unease without jump-scares. Some find it frustratingly ambiguous rather than scary.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Ivy

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Kind Hearts and Coronets1949

Both are Edwardian murder tales where the killer's charm is the whole point, and where systematic poisoning is treated as a solution to social entanglement rather than atrocity.

Dennis Price methodically murders his way up a family tree to inherit a dukedom, with Alec Guinness playing eight victims. It's witty poisoning—literally and tonally. British satire about class as a kind of disease, played with the darkest charm.

But The comedy is so refined that some never register that this is genuinely cruel. Others find the tone too clever to be truly disturbing.

Suspicion1941

Another Fontaine—this time she's afraid of her husband, played by Cary Grant at his most charming and sinister. Alfred Hitchcock making ordinary domesticity seem dangerous. A masterpiece of misdirection about where threat actually lives.

But The ending is famously compromised by studio interference, which softens what the film had earned. You'll feel the wrong note when it lands.

The Servant1963

A servant and master in a London townhouse, their power relationship slowly inverting through seduction and manipulation. Dirk Bogarde is terrifying in stillness. James Fox becomes a prisoner in his own home. Baroque and claustrophobic.

But It's deliberately artificial and theatrical—nothing feels naturalistic. If you want grounded drama, the style will distance you.

Laura1944

A murder detective investigates a woman he's never met but becomes obsessed with through her portrait. Gene Tierney presides over the film even in her absence. Stylish, clever, and built on the perversity of desire and fixation.

But The mystery is less important than the mood, which some find more atmospheric than satisfying plot-wise.

Hush... Hush, Sweet Charlotte1964

Bette Davis as a fragile Southern belle haunted by a decades-old murder, watched over by her cousin in a decaying mansion. Gothic melodrama with genuine menace underneath the hysteria. Olivia de Havilland is devastatingly malevolent.

But It's operatic and overwrought, and the twist, though earned, requires you to accept a lot of contrivance beforehand.

The Picture of Dorian Gray1945

A beautiful man's moral corruption hidden inside a portrait while his face stays unblemished. Hurd Hatfield's cold magnetism and George Sanders's witty predation. It asks what a person owes the world if no one can see their ugliness.

But Wilde's wit doesn't always translate to screen as effectively, and the film's moral anxiety can feel dated rather than timeless.

Unfaithfully Yours1948

Rex Harrison imagines elaborate murders of his wife while conducting orchestras. Darkly comic, baroque in its fantasy sequences, and built on the gap between what we think and what we'd ever do. Deliriously inventive.

But It's deliberately artificial and doesn't land as a thriller. The tonal whiplash between fantasy and reality won't work for everyone.

Proof2015

Both hinge on whether a woman's story—her account of events, her sanity, her trustworthiness—should be believed. Both make that question the entire architecture.

A limited series about a woman haunted by hallucinations and the man investigating her. Directed by Karyn Kusama, it's psychological suspense where truth keeps collapsing. Alien as a lead you've never seen in a thriller like this.

But It's deliberately destabilizing and never offers certainty. Some viewers find it frustrating rather than unsettling.

Arsenic and Old Lace1944

Same historical period, same method (poison), same premise—undetected murder hiding behind respectability. Ivy takes the darkness seriously; this takes it as cosmic joke. Watching both shows you how tone rewrites morality.

Two sweet elderly aunts poison lonely men out of mercy using home brew and window-seat graves. It's the comedy version of what Ivy does seriously. Cary Grant screaming while his family murders people. Baroque, absurd, anarchic.

But The humor depends entirely on performance and style; the plot is deliberately nonsensical. If you're looking for structure, you'll only find chaos.