Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a 1931 American pre-Code horror film, directed by Rouben Mamoulian and starring Fredric March, who plays a possessed doctor who tests his new formula that can unleash people's inner demons.

Dr. Henry Jekyll (Fredric March), a kind English doctor in Victorian London, is certain that within each man lurks impulses for both good and evil.

One night, while walking home with his colleague, Dr. John Lanyon (Holmes Herbert), Jekyll spots a bar singer, Ivy Pierson (Miriam Hopkins), being attacked by a man outside her boarding house.

When Sir Danvers takes Muriel to Bath, Jekyll begins to experiment with drugs that he believes will unleash his evil side.

After imbibing a concoction of these drugs, he transforms into Edward Hyde—an impulsive, sadistic, violent, amoral man who indulges his every desire.

But the next night, while walking to a party at Muriel's where the wedding date is to be announced, Jekyll again changes into Hyde upon seeing a cat stalk and kill a bird.

Lanyon recognizes the broken cane left at the crime scene and takes the police to Jekyll's home.

Source:[3] The film was made before the full enforcement of the Production Code, and it is remembered today for its strong sexual content, embodied mostly in the character of the bar singer Ivy Pierson, played by Miriam Hopkins.

In part, this look reflected the novella's implication of Hyde as embodying repressed evil, and hence being semi-evolved or simian in appearance.

March, following stage tradition, overplayed both Jekyll and Hyde to emphasize their contrasts,[7] and he won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance of the role.

Mordaunt Hall of The New York Times wrote an enthusiastic review, comparing it favorably to the John Barrymore version as a "far more tense and shuddering affair" than that film.

However, Greason credited March with "an outstanding bit of theatrical acting", declared the makeup "a triumph", and said that the sets and lighting alone made the film worth seeing "as models of atmospheric surroundings.

"[13] Film Daily declared: "Gripping performance by Fredric March is highlight of strong drama, ace supporting cast and direction".

The definitive version of the Robert Louis Stevenson novella from 1931, with innovative special effects, atmospheric cinematography and deranged overacting.