My Name is Julia Ross (1945)

Cult figure and B-movie auteur Joseph H. Lewis directed this taut exercise in film noir. Julia Ross (Nina Foch), an American receiving medical treatment in London, finds herself short on money and takes a job as secretary for Mrs. Hughes (May Whitty), the matriarch of a large estate. Julie meets Mrs. Hughes' son Ralph (George Macready), a mysterious gentleman with a facial scar, shortly before eating lunch and falling into a deep sleep. When she awakes, she's in a different home with a high fence, and everyone around her insists that she's Ralph's wife, just home after a stay in a mental institution. My Name Is Julia Ross was one of Lewis' first prestige productions; begun as a ten-day B-picture, studio heads were so impressed with the results that they expanded the schedule by eight days to give the picture more polish.