I will never quite understand the mid-century obsession with psychoanalysis, especially the way that people seemed to imagine it had magic powers. I mean, hypnotism was not a new thing in 1950, but give it a coat of psychoanalysis paint, and people just kind of eat it up, I guess. Still, whatever. Whirlpool uses it largely as a hook to a mystery, and I just could not get that interested in the mystery itself. I found it just…unengaging.

Ann (Gene Tierney) is caught trying to steal some sm...