This is a British film from the 1960\u2019s and reflects the filmmaking conventions of that place and time.\u00a0 This is seen in the realistic and drab scenery and even the look of the actors themselves.\u00a0 The atmosphere is depressing and claustrophobic in the extreme.<\/p>\n
Bill and Myra Savage are a middle-aged married couple.\u00a0 Myra is a professional medium who performs seances for a small circle of believers who would like to communicate with the dearly departed.\u00a0 Bill is a man who was forced to stop working because of health problems.\u00a0 Myra is the dominant partner in the marriage and berates and orders Bill around.\u00a0 But it is apparent that Myra is delusional about many things including her \u201cgift.\u201d\u00a0 She wishes to be rich and famous for her ability to speak to the dead.<\/p>\n
In support of this desire, she comes up with a plan.\u00a0 It\u2019s a carefully detailed plan to kidnap the young daughter of a rich man and hold her for ransom.\u00a0 But in addition, the plan calls for Myra to use her \u201cgift\u201d to allow the girl to be found unharmed after the ransom is delivered.\u00a0 And of course, Bill will have to perform all the active parts of the plan.\u00a0 He is to kidnap the girl, make the ransom demand, pick up the ransom and drop the girl off for the return.\u00a0 Myra\u2019s part is to set up the room for the hostage and act as a \u201cnurse\u201d for the girl in the fiction that they will try to maintain that she is a patient in a hospital.\u00a0 To that end they have a room painted white and a facsimile of a hospital bed set up in it.\u00a0 And finally, Myra will contact the kidnapped girl\u2019s family and claim that she is in contact with the girl through her spirit world contact, \u201cArthur.\u201d\u00a0 And when they have the money, Myra will tell the parents where to find their daughter after Bill has dropped her off at the pick-up spot.<\/p>\n
Surprisingly, the plan is remarkably successful.\u00a0 The girl\u2019s kidnap goes off without a hitch and the ransom is collected by a complicated and circuitous route that the father has to follow going in and around the London Underground Railway.\u00a0 But after the ransom pick-up the mother of the kidnapped girl shows up at one of Myra\u2019s afternoon seances and we have the nerve-racking experience for Bill of trying to keep the little girl quiet as she calls out in a delirium of fever for her mother who is right in the next room taking part in a s\u00e9ance that is supposedly in contact with her.\u00a0 At the climax of the s\u00e9ance Myra faints and the s\u00e9ance is stopped and the girl\u2019s mother departs without incident.<\/p>\n
But the excitement that Myra felt during this bizarre and dangerous charade has inspired a new and hideous change in the plan.\u00a0 Myra tells Bill that Arthur, her spirit partner has asked that the girl be sent to him in the spirit world.\u00a0 In other words, Myra wants Bill to kill the girl with chloroform and thus allow Arthur to have her spirit as his companion.<\/p>\n
This madness horrifies Bill and he tries to force Myra to confront her delusions.\u00a0 Arthur is the dead child of Bill and Myra but whereas Myra believed that Arthur was a child in their lives into his school age years the reality is that \u201cArthur\u201d was a stillborn baby.\u00a0 He tries to convince her that there is no Arthur and all these fantasies are her imagination.\u00a0 And that killing the girl is madness.\u00a0 But Myra raves on about her gift and Arthur and screams at Bill until he agrees to do her bidding.<\/p>\n
In the next scene we see Bill leaving the child\u2019s body in a wooded area and then rushing away to his vehicle.\u00a0 When he gets home Myra is delighted at the way the plan has worked out.\u00a0 But suddenly there is a knock at the door.\u00a0 Bill answers it and comes back with three plainclothes policemen.\u00a0 They ask Myra if she will perform a s\u00e9ance to help the police locate the girl now that the ransom has been paid.\u00a0 She agrees and begins the performance with Bill and two of the policemen forming the circle around the table with her.\u00a0 Myra goes into her trance and starts talking to and for Arthur and slowly she begins to repeat the conversation that Arthur must have had in her mind about killing the child.\u00a0 When she lapses into silence where she is pantomiming herself cradling a small child in her lap the senior officer looks at Bill and says, \u201cWhere did you hide the money sir?\u201d\u00a0 And Bill replies, It\u2019s in the coal cellar.\u201d\u00a0 Then Bill adds, \u201cYou found the girl alright?\u201d\u00a0 and the detective says, \u201cYes, she\u2019s alright.\u201d\u00a0 And there the movie ends.<\/p>\n
This is one weird and creepy movie.\u00a0 Myra is a deranged lunatic and Bill is a pathetic weakling.\u00a0 But he actually loves her.\u00a0 And the atmosphere and plot are quite effective at providing suspense and interest in the story.\u00a0 Interestingly, Bill was played by Richard Attenborough, the guy who played John Hammond, the man who built Jurassic Park in that movie.\u00a0 Taken all in all I recommend this movie to fans of suspense movies.\u00a0 It\u2019s not as shocking as Psycho but it is a similar experience.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This is a British film from the 1960\u2019s and reflects the filmmaking conventions of that place and time.\u00a0 This is seen in the realistic and<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[239,237],"tags":[3166,43,38,1355,3374,3373,3375],"class_list":["post-16614","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-reviews","category-reviews","tag-british-cinema","tag-movie-review","tag-review","tag-reviews","tag-richard-attenborough","tag-seance-on-a-wet-afternoon","tag-suspense"],"yoast_head":"\n