Excellent, Without a doubt!!

Beautiful, moving film.

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Director Pete Walker (whose 'Schizo' film was reviewed earlier) is notorious for his low-budget horror films throughout the 1970's. This, his first, is a horror in title alone, and a couple of mildly grisly moments. The film aims to be some kind of slow-burning psychological thriller concerning Marianne's crooked relatives attempting to kill her so to claim her vast inheritance, but contains too few surprises and a pace far too slow to sustain that.Susan George plays the titular character and is terrific throughout, her initially headstrong behaviour played as naïve and confused rather than as reckless as she first appears (also, for an exploitation picture, she wears her various skimpy costumes extremely well). Barry Evans is the good guy, Eli. Evans seems too fey for the role (Patrick Mower and Ian McShane were also considered), but his niceness is reassuring against the shenanigans of ratty Sebastian (Christopher Sandford). Judy Huxtable gives probably the best performance as Hildegarde, but the character's decline into madness is beyond even her talents.Sapphire and Steel composer Cyril Ornadel produces a memorable musical score (his theme was written so as to be in time with Susan George's stylish and much-discussed go-go dance routine during the opening credits) including a haunting, possibly 'cheesy' song illustrating Marianne's plight that is repeated at various intervals to arresting effect.Ultimately, like other Pete Walker ventures, the project might well have been improved if slightly shorter, possibly cut back to 80 or 90 minutes. Marianne's relentless plight becomes too elongated to care about, the most potent moment being a nicely staged slow poisoning in a sauna that Marianne cunningly defeats by climbing out of the window.

Not particularly gripping tale of a 'free spirited' Susan George becoming embroiled in a seedy crime racket, led by a 'defrocked' Judge.Not just *a* Judge, but 'The Judge' - Leo Genn's character who is continually accorded the definite article by sundry friends and enemies - who are largely interchangeable. This melodrama, with a heavy accent on the corrupt authority figures, bears some resemblance to Pete Walker's later baroque horrors. But the formula isn't developed as of yet - and he had yet to work with the waggish scriptwriter David McGillivray. Walker followed this film with the relatively interesting curio, "The Flesh and Blood Show" - collaborating with the talented veteran Alfred Shaughnessy of "Upstairs, Downstairs" fame - and then his fecund period began with "The House of Whipcord" in 1974.Susan George and Judy Huxtable are done a great disservice by Walker and scriptwriter Murray Smith here with their reductive portrayal of female characters. Such as shame for George in particular, subject of much brutality in Peckinpah's "Straw Dogs" the following year, but also Huxtable, who was the evocative beauty at the heart of the whimsical "Les Bicylettes de Belsize" two years earlier.There is always some degree of objectification of women in Walker's films, but what is lacking here is the suspenseful, charged context of his later films. "Frightmare" and "House of Mortal Sin" have something of the Hitchcockian about them: Hitchcock-meets-the Grimm Brothers-meets-British exploitation cinema of the 70s. This is a rather more humdrum affair, with even the exotic locations eliciting no more than a Gallic shrug in this viewer.

Saucy free-spirited tart Marianne (a sweetly disarming performance by the delectable Susan George) will inherit a sizable sum of money from her wealthy, but severely dysfunctional family on her 21st birthday. Susan will also acquire several documents about the illegal activities of her crooked judge father (well played by Leo Genn). Pretty soon Marianne finds herself in substantial danger. Director Pete ("Frightmare") Walker crucially fails to wring much tension or momentum from the standard woman-in-peril thriller potboiler premise. Moreover, Walker lets the pace crawl along at a sluggish rate, thereby ensuring that a dull quality hangs heavy throughout most of the movie. Norman Langley's pretty, picturesque cinematography makes cool use of fades, dissolves and split screen. Cyril Ornadel's lush, elegant score, the scenic Portugal locations and the haunting melancholy theme song are all likewise solid and effective. Nice supporting turns by Barry Evans as loyal boyfriend Eli, the lovely Judy Huxtable as bitchy half-sister Hildegarde, and Christopher Sandford as bitter ex-suitor Sebastian. Susan George's deliciously considerable pulchritudinous presence keeps the picture watchable: Susan does a memorably sexy go-go dance during the groovy opening credits sequence and looks absolutely smashing in a skimpy black bikini. Unfortunately, Murray Smith's tediously talky script, an off-putting glum tone and the slow-going, largely uneventful plot make this feature a really draggy chore to endure. A merely decent timewaster.

Somehow this film manages to be boring as hell even with the lovely Susan George all over it, and in her prime too.This disjointed relic from British Cinema's Bronze Age features George as a bonne viveuse who is keeping her distance from a dis-functional family which threaten to unravel her hopes of a normal romantic life, and all because she possesses within her mind the secret swiss bank account number which contains her inheritance, which will be entirely her's when she reaches the age of 21. Various losers try to get her to come across with the goods and they certainly take their time with it. And for some odd reason Maryanne tags along with their schemes right up till the last minute even though she knows who she's dealing with. It's kind of confusing.There is a cheesy song about Maryanne at the end, and the opening credits are rather dated, with Ms. George doing her best go-go dancer routine.