The film's opening has a fictive quote from a supposed book by Dr. Judd, who apparently survived his seemingly fatal encounter with Irena (for the character, still played by Conway, shows up in the later Lewton film The Seventh Victim), and the film ends with a quote from John Donne's "Holy Sonnet V".
Yet, at its center is loneliness, and Simone Simon's eyes, vaguely feline as they are, are the perfect receptacles for that lack, and why the film can be watched over and again, and seen anew each time. With that fact in mind, it may have enough going for it that greatness as a pure film can be claimed, even outside of genre. I, for one, will watch it again to see if it does. So should you.
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