Pete Walker was a maverick British producer/director who cut a name for himself with a series of harrowing shockers in the 1970s. Films like House of Whipcord, Frightmare and House of Mortal Sin were devastating and fiercely original thrillers. But his earlier films (aside from Die Screaming, Marianne) have been elusive and difficult to see, so this is a welcome 2-disc set of four of Walker’s early work from Kino Lorber.
Die Screaming, Marianne (1971) stars the sexy Susan George as Marianne, who has been fleeing across the globe from her corrupt Judge of a father, who lives in a beautiful villa in Portugal. Marianne’s late mother had hidden money and incriminating documents in a Swiss bank and only Marianne knows the passcode. She and her boyfriend Eli (Barry Evans) have been commandeered to the villa with Eli’s duplicitous friend Sebastian (Christopher Sandford). There, besides the Judge (Leo Genn) is Marianne psychopathic half-sister Hidegarde (Judy Huxtable) who will stop at nothing to echo the words in the title.
Cool It Carol (1970) Racy little sex comedy about two young people- a butcher’s son Joe (Robin Askwith) and local beauty contest winner Carol (Janet Lynn) who head to London to find their fortune. They get in over their heads in a sordid world of nude modeling, prostitution and even performing in an X-rated film before coming to their senses. What’s great about Walker is that there is little moralizing or remorse in his swinging London pair.
Moon (aka Man of Violence) (1970). Michael Latimer plays Moon, a rather unscrupulous man for hire who is working for two rival London racketeers. He is not sure of the end game when he meets Angel Weston (Luan Peters) who makes him realize it’s all about a shipment of stolen gold. They even end up in North Africa following a hippie rock band in a VW bus that might be connected with the smuggling. Surprisingly brutal and full of real shocking twists- the macho, womanizing Moon even picks up and beds a guy in a gay bar for information, which must have been a jaw-dropper in theaters at the time.
The Big Switch (aka Strip Poker) (1968). Walker’s inspiration was the film noir His Kind of Woman (1951), which starred Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell. Sebastian Breaks stars as John Carter, an advertising executive who is having a rough couple of days. He picks up a girl at a discotheque only to find her shot dead in her apartment. The next day he finds he has been fired and goes home only to find a gang of criminals playing strip poker in his apartment. They beat him up and force him to accompany a mysterious girl named Karen (Virginia Wetherell) to Brighton. It’s all part of a nefarious plot to sneak a notorious criminal into the country. The film finale is on a snowy amusement park boardwalk with guys eventually shooting at each other on a spook house amusement ride called “Ghost Train.”
The extras include many different interviews with the articulate and entertaining Pete Walker, not to mention chats with some of the actors in the film and technicians that worked on them. Moon and The Big Switch were both restorations by the BFI.
I am now one of the criminally insane. Good , ole 70s!