1958 SF/horror, dir. Kurt Neumann, Al (David) Hedison, Patricia Owens:
IMDb. Hélène loved her
husband. So why did she kill him in a hydraulic press?
Yes, that's Kurt Neumann who'd been making genre films since the
1930s, and directed Tarzan for nine years. And Rocketship X-M. But
he died five weeks after filming finished and didn't know this was his
most successful film. There's a surprising name on the script, too:
James Clavell, while he was still trying different genres looking for
success. This was his first filmed screenplay.
In the cast, Al Hedison would go on to act as David Hedison, and is
probably best known as Felix Leiter in Live and Let Die and Licence
to Kill. Patricia Owens (daughter of Arthur Owens, agent "Snow")
didn't do much else of note. And Vincent Price is, of course, Vincent
Price; this was one of the films that made him a horror star, I think
because of how much he does with a thinly-written part. (For example,
I don't think there's anything in the script to suggest that he is
restraining a passion for his brother's widow, but I'm certainly not
the only person to get that impression from the film.)
But I think what made this less enjoyable for me was the story
structure. Half an hour of this 90 minute film is building the
mystery: why does Hélène admit she killed her husband but refuse to
say why? Why is she obsessed with a white-headed fly? That's fine as
far as it goes, but once we get to the flashback the pace flags. André
has developed a teleporter, but he's still working out the details.
Hedison does a good job of the wonder of scientific discovery; Owens
doesn't quite match it.
But since André has no sense of ethics—yes, I do find it hard to
forgive him for the casual slaughter of a family pet—he tries it on
himself, and a fly has got into the chamber with him. The whole
concept is a nonsense of course; if my body over here and the fly's
body over there inside the box can get mixed up, surely my brain and
my heart can similarly get mixed up. But hey, never mind.
André gradually becomes more fly-like, with the big reveal of the
prosthetic; I'm impressed on a technical level, but it's not exactly
conducive to a job of actually acting. And then we're back to the
present day, and the hopeless quest to track down the André-brained
fly.
I've liked a lot of films like this. Why didn't I get on with this
one? I think it's because of the structure and pacing; the
introduction establishes tension, the middle section is decent but
lets the tension drain away as it really only has the one punch, and
the end is frankly risible.
This was a success (less so Space Master X-7, its partner on the
original release double bill) and spawned two sequels.
I talk about this film further on
Ribbon of Memes.