It is hard to evaluate this film without comparing it to the superior 1931 version (directed by Rouben Mamoulian). To me the 1941 version feels pedantic and stodgy, largely because of Spencer Tracy's performance. Tracy plays Jekyll like a sitcom Dad and consequently there is zero chemistry between him and Lana Turner and him and Ingrid Bergman. Fredric March, who played Jekyll in the 1931 version, actually made you believe his Jekyll was capable of great deeds but also evil deeds. There is no such depth to Tracy's Jekyll performance. When he pontificates about good and eivl the film feels very leaden and talky, because the film is actually taking this nonsense seriously (in the 1931 version, March used these scenes to highlight how grandiose the Jekyll character is).
Ingrid Bergman is pretty good in the thankless role of Ivy Peterson (when she realizes her predicament, her depseration is visceral), but to be honest, Miriam Hopkins, who played Ivy in the 1931 version gives a better portrayal of a working-class British woman living in the Victorian era. Come to think of it, Hopkins made the 1931 version much more racier than this one. Which raises the obvious question, why on earth did MGM feel the need to remake this film? It uses the exact same story structure as the 1931 version (both the 1931 and 1941 versions are more directly related to Thomas Russell Sullivan's 1887 stage adaptation than the actual Robert Louis Stevenson novella) and it really doesn't add anything unique that the 1931 version did not have. I originally thought that Mamoulian's use of subjective photography was ostentatious, but after seeing this version, I have come to appreciate Mamoulian's experimental techniques. His diagonal split screens are very memorable (especially the one where Jekyll-as-Hyde runs off into the park while his fiancee is stood up at her party) but the camera work here feels more workmanship than anything else.