For the most part this is a fairly weak Monogram (read budget with a capital B) adaptation of the Bronte classic. Colin Clive is woefully miscast as Edward Rochester, a character so complex and filled with such passionate brooding that it takes the likes of an Orson Welles or a George C.Scott to really pull it off. Instead Clive plays the master of Thornfield like he is just some normal single dad on the make who just happens to have his unbalanced first wife locked up in the attic.Maybe director Cabanne thought that this interpretation would make the character seem more suspicious to the audiences of 1934. Unfortunately this reviewer writing in 2002 finds Clive's Rochester about as suspicious as a stained glass window. In a Lutheran church.Virginia Bruce is adequate as the title character but unfortunately her best lines are undermined by unnecessary stock music pulled from Monogram's Oliver Twist (released the previous year). However horror fans especially those who feel at home with the jump-out-of-your-skin style of Sam Raimi of Evil Dead fame should see this film for the well-timed SHREIKS emanating from that attic. Claire DuBrey's banshee routine is enough to make your heart jump out of your mouth and do the macarena on top of the TV. So see this Eyre for the Screamer not for Ward Cleaver.
