The Man with a Cloak

In 19th-century New York, villainous housekeeper Barbara Stanwyck schemes to murder Louis Calhern and cheat innocent young Leslie Caron out of her inheritance. Mysterious stranger Joseph Cotten arrives on the scene to save the day, turning out, quite inexplicably, to be Edgar Allan Poe. A bemusing period farrago, directed by Fletcher Markle, that would deserve to sink without trace were it not for Stanwyck's characteristically strong and admirably uncompromising performance.