|
Peeping Tom (Wednesday, Sky Movies Gold, 10pm)
Michael Powell has long been known as one of this country's most
distinguished film-makers.
But when, in 1960, he made a horror film, I hated the piece and,
together with a great many other British critics, said so.
Today, I find I am convinced that it is a masterpiece.
If in some afterlife conversation is permitted, I shall think it my
duty to seek out Michael Powell and apologise.
Something more than a change of taste must exist.
The original story and screenplay come from Leo Marks;
at their centre is a cameraman (played by Carl Boehm) whose scientist
father used him in childhood in a study of fear.
The boy grows up obsessed
|
by images of the human face frozen in extremes of terror.
He multiplies them by himself photographing death, and, in fact,
becoming a multiple killer.
With so gifted a director this can hardly be anything but a frightening
movie, but its object is the examination of emotion and not titillation.
Interesting that it should be revived now when there has been much concern
about the influence of cinema.
All the more reason to distinguish between the serious and the merely
sensational horror.
Reading now what I wrote in 1960 I find that, despite my efforts to
express revulsion, nearly everything I said conceals the extraordinary
quality of Peeping Tom.
See it, and spare a moment to respect the camerawork of Otto Heller.
|
