Rating: 4.5/5
— Anyone with you? — No, just my camera.
Mark Lewis (Carl Boehm) is a man obsessed with terror, driven to capture it on camera. To fulfill his desire, he finds women to murder and films their dying expression
Mark’s neighbor, Helen (Anna Massey), lives with her blind mother (Maxine Audley) and has a crush on Mark. Mark and Helen grow closer, with Mark determined that she never be one of his victims, but Helen’s mother senses something off about Mark that no one else sees
I don't trust a man who walks quietly.
Compared to Camera Buff, both movies are about men obsessed with the camera’s ability to make sense of their lives. The warning is less subtle here, but both explore the isolating and masturbatory nature of the camera — the way the camera does not capture life but interferes with it, perhaps taking it away
Here, the camera itself is the weapon — one leg of the tripod hides a blade. For each murder, the knife is extended in front of the camera so that the lens can capture the faces at the moment of death
The movie does not avoid discussing the neurosis at play — the role of Mark’s father in introducing him to constant fear and filming, as well as Mark’s awareness of what he is and what he does, acting not on pure pleasure but on compulsion. And, I mean, a camera with a protruding blade is maybe the most overtly phallic weapon conceived on film
The movie also layers the reflective nature at play with the murder. We are watching, and thereby participating, in the murders — perhaps the underlying reason the film was critically panned and ended Powell’s career. But also, characters photograph each other photographing each other. And most importantly, one more facet of the camera weapon that is left unknown until the final scene
Powell’s command of color already elevates the movie into a hyper-real space. The opening scene, where Mark picks up a sex worker, looks like a sound stage. The world is aglow with deep reds and greens at the edges of darkness. Helen’s blue dress is so rich that it demands your attention
Speaking of Helen, Anna Massey’s performance is incredible. She reflects the whole world of emotions on her face, making Mark’s interest in her all the more believable
Carl Boehm’s performance is so repressed, on edge, barely able to let emotion leak out the sides of his locked expression of neutrality
Whatever I photograph, I always lose.
Overall, this movie holds the blueprint for the American slasher, complete with our “final girl,” Helen. While I didn’t find an emotional connection that would make me love this movie, I appreciate just about every choice this movie makes
Stray Thoughts
- the dragonfly pin piercing her dress drives him crazy
- the studio worried about losing a day interviewing folks
- haunted distant piano in the soundtrack
- the director yelling “Ye gods!” is so good
- scoptophilia - the morbid urge to gaze