Susan George – The Magnificent 60s

Absolute cracking chase thriller spoiled by the central conceit and an overdose of whimsy. The standout chase is two cars, hemmed in by low walls, battering the hell out of each other at 50mph. We’ve also got motorbikes rattling down flights of stairs and a race through the catacombs.

There’s nothing new about a witness not being believed especially if he’s fingering a cop – check out a better version of this minus any of the thrilling chase sequences in Witness (1985). But when the witness, a child called Ziggy (Mark Lester), has an overactive imagination to the point of being considered a congenital liar and a grandfather (Lionel Jeffries) who encourages such playing about with the truth, it becomes a tougher watch, mostly because the bulk of the film is about the child squealing about not being believed whereas the deadly assassin he’s witnessed is scary enough – and a cop in a country where authority is not questioned – to make the whole picture fly with this complication.

Sometimes a picture can just unintentionally come off the rails when railroaded into such a corner. Ziggy persuades his equally young pal Ann-Marie (Maxine Kalli) to go to the cops on his behalf and when in consequence she’s brutally murdered it feels like we’ve entered another movie entirely.

There’s an odd cop, Inspector Galleria (Jeremy Kemp), in charge of the investigation. A notorious bully, he constantly upbraids his underlings for not being as clever as himself, even though it takes forever for him to string the clues together. The inspector adds nothing to the story.

Ziggy has caught sight of assassin Paul Grazzini (Peter Vaughan) and the assassin has caught sight of him. Probably even if Ziggy hadn’t been a lying little toad, nobody would have believed him anyway given Paul and his complicit brother Victor (Peter Bowles) are both cops, especially as the Grazzinis are determined to eliminate him and anyone else who gets in their path – or even helps them, a confederate ends up being chucked over a cliff.

It’s quite hard for the picture to accommodate a burgeoning romance between Ziggy’s big sister Pippa (Susan George) and passing tourist Tom (Tony Bloomer), except for her ability to scream on cue and clip Ziggy around the ear. Quite why ex-soldier grandpa has to be such an oddball is unclear except that this is one of those movies where subsidiary characters are required to earn their keep by exhibiting unusual characteristics. His military experience comes in handy, though, when it comes to fending off the bad guys with Molotov cocktails.

We soon realize why Tom, who’s done nothing much except upset stern housekeeper Madame Robiac (Betty Marsden), has been included in the plot – because he can drive like a maniac.

I wouldn’t say Mark Lester (Run Wild, Run Free, 1969) is out of his depth but the narrative is a bonkers version of the boy who cried wolf and given he’s spending so much of time crying wolf or running away, his character is never anchored.

Susan George certainly shines. She locked horns again with Peter Vaughan in the distinctly more venomous Straw Dogs (1971), a role that could not be more distant from the juvenile lead essayed here. Lionel Jeffries (Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, 1968) has been playing this role forever. I certainly wouldn’t want to cross Peter Vaughan on a dark night nor his sidekick Peter Bowles (Charge of the Light Brigade, 1968).

Director John Hough (Twins of Evil, 1971), in his debut, is determined to make his mark visually with shots taken at odd angles or through spectacles etc but all that artistic effort is wasted given the adrenalin of the car chase, which must rank somewhere close to Bullitt (1968) and The Italian Job (1969). Written by Oscar-winning Ronald Harwood (A High Wind in Jamaica, 1965) from the book by John Harris.

I kept on thinking how well this would have worked if it hadn’t centered on a small boy. Apologies for being so picky but when you can create such a heart-pumping car chase as this surely it needs something stronger to fill in the gaps.

I should point out before we go any further there’s a Raquel Welch connection. Husband Patrick Curtis was a producer and La Welch is down as an assistant producer, at a time when the pair were setting up their own production company Curtwel. Hard to see where Raquel would have fitted in but wouldn’t it have been sensational to have her as the devious mastermind?

The concept is better than the execution. There is an inconvenient truth about science. Successful experiments often require guinea pigs. Brain-washing was one such scientific notion, generally seen as an invention of those dastardly Communists a la The Manchurian Candidate (1962) although The Mind Benders (1963) suggested it was as common in the British halls of academe. As indicated by the title here brain washing could be termed modern-day witchcraft.

But where government scientists could hide behind the greater good, personal advantage is the notion here. And it did make me wonder how many scientists took vicarious pleasure in seeing guinea pigs doing their bidding, enjoying the power to inflict change on the potentially unwilling.

Professor Monserrat (Boris Karloff) and wife Estelle (Catherine Lacey) have invented a machine that through hypnotism can alter a subject’s mind in the longer term, make them prone to acts of savagery. Their chosen target is young man-about-town Mike (Ian Ogilvy). Bored with gorgeous girlfriend Nicole (Elizabeth Ercy) and ripe for adventure he is despatched on an orgy of violence, rape and murder.

What makes this potentially fascinating is that while the Professor draws back from the experiment, Estelle wants to continue. The sadistic female was coming into her own during this decade, Elke Sommer and Sylva Koscina as a deadly tag-team in Deadlier than the Male (1967), Suzanna Leigh in Subterfuge (1968), but these were sidekicks, pawns in the control of devious men.

Estelle wins a battle of wills against her husband and his weak opposition fails to deter her from authorizing ever more despicable acts, as if she is unleashing her own pent-up aggression. Not only can she control her husband but she is in command of the virile young Mike. Sensibly, the film stops short of setting her up as a James Bond-style megalomaniac, but there is something more infernal in committing these acts from a small run-down apartment rather than some underground space-age cavern.

Turning Boris Karloff into a bad guy tripped up by conscience is a neat casting trick. But making him prey to his initially subservient wife is a masterstroke. Her violence is gender-neutral, as happy to force Mike into battering a work colleague as attempting to rape a young woman.

And there is also a sense of the old taking revenge on the young. The old have been left behind in a Swinging London awash with discos and barely-existing morals. Why shouldn’t old people tap into base desire, and better still, not have to lift a finger, their victim carrying the can for every deed.

It’s stone cold creepy. And would been a much tighter – and scarier – picture if director Michael Reeves (Witchfinder General, 1968) had not wasted so much time with the dull youngsters, complete with pop groups performing in a nightclub. Ian Ogilvy (Witchfinder General) doesn’t bring much to the party, no more than your standard good-looking young fellow.

Boris Karloff (The Crimson Cult, 1968) is much better value especially when excitement at his new discovery wears off and he realizes he is playing second fiddle to his wife. For once, there’s nothing inherently evil in him. But Catherine Lacey (The Servant, 1963) is easily the pick, delivering a well-judged performance, assisting her husband in his endeavors until the time is right to take over. You might spot Susan George (The Straw Dogs, 1971) and Sally Sheridan, both a Fu Manchu and Bond girl. Tom Baker (Witchfinder General) co-wrote the script with Reeves.

Provides more to ponder than actually appears on the screen.

Tag: Susan George

Eye Witness / Sudden Terror (1970) ***

The Sorcerers (1967) ***