The doll killer

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Movie
German title The doll killer
Original title The psychopath
Country of production United Kingdom
original language English
Publishing year 1966
length 83 minutes
Age rating FSK 18 nf
Rod
Director Freddie Francis
script Robert Bloch
production Max J. Rosenberg
Milton Subotsky
music Phil Martel
camera John Wilcox
cut Oswald Hafenrichter
occupation

The Puppet Killer (Original Title: The Psychopath ) is a 1966 thriller directed by Freddie Francis . It is a film by the British film production company Amicus Productions for Paramount Pictures . The leading roles are starring Patrick Wymark , Margaret Johnston , Alexander Knox and John Standing .

action

Four men who are friends are murdered one after the other. The first victim, the London-based lawyer Reinhardt Klermer, is blinded by a small car in a narrow alley and killed in a gruesome way while he is on his way to a chamber music evening with his three friends with his violin. Next to him is a doll that shows his facial features. Scotland Yard's Inspector Holloway , who starts the investigation, first questions Frank Saville, a wealthy retired businessman, who treats him with a certain arrogance. He has a daughter named Louise who has been with a poor American medical student for about five weeks. The other two friends are the sculptor Victor Ledoux and the embassy employee Martin Roth.

Frank Saville is the next to die. With a doll in hand that is his likeness and that was sent to him shortly before, he rushes down the stairs. However, this is not due to his sick heart, as his daughter first assumes, but prussic acid , which is found in the medicine prescribed for him. The third victim is Victor Ledoux dangling from a rope and next to him a doll, his image, also with a rope around his neck. And Martin Roth was not spared either, he was set on fire and burned beyond recognition, and the same was done with the doll that bears his features.

The inspector learns that the four men were members of an Allied commission that Maugham, an armaments industrialist, charged with fraud against the state after the end of World War II . He was convicted and his property confiscated. The industrialist then committed suicide. The inspector also learns that the dolls were bought by his widow, who lives in her London home and is in a wheelchair. Everywhere you look there are dolls with which the woman talks as if they were her children. Her son Mark also seems to have neurotic disorders and strikes the inspector as strange. After narrowly escaping an attack on himself, another person dies. Gina, who worked in a doll's shop and was known to Mark, is found stabbed to death. There is also a doll by her side who, like her, has a knife stuck in her throat. When Holloway visits the young man at his place of work, a shipyard where he works as a security guard at night, to question him, the latter perpetrates an attack on him. Holloway is able to jump aside at the last second, but is shortly afterwards attacked so violently by Mark Maugham that he collapses unconscious. Just as Maugham is about to kill him, his mother appears in a wheelchair and insists that he give her the knife he is aiming at Holloway. When Mark tries to run away, a terrible accident overtakes him.

The inspector, who got away with a slight concussion, talks to Louise Saville and Donald Loftis and tells them that there is still no trace of Mark, even his mother claims that she does not know where her son is. Then he tells Louise that the Maugham case had been re-examined by the War Department and found that Maugham was indeed innocent. The commission set up at the time had actually falsified the evidence. Mrs. Maugham had been informed of this in writing two weeks ago. Saville, who had worked in the procurement office at the time, had committed the embezzlement and awarded the armaments contracts. Klermer, Roth and Ledoux were bribed by Saville to participate.

Louise Saville responds to Amelia Maugham's request to visit her because she has to show her a letter. Louise tells the old woman that her son kept the letter a secret from her and that the police wanted to make believe that she, his mother, committed the murders out of revenge. Because he could no longer stand it with her and the dolls and saw this as his chance to get rid of them. Only now has she found the letter. Amelia Maugham manages to guide Louise, who has come very close to the truth, into a chamber where there is a doll that is her likeness. Mark wanted to kill her too, says the old woman. When Louise draws back a curtain, she meets Mark. The young man has been draped in a chair like a doll. Louise thinks he is dead when she unexpectedly hears him saying "Mama, Mama". The young woman anxiously wants to flee, but is faced with Amelia Maugham, who suddenly gets out of her wheelchair and approaches her threateningly with a knife. She manages to push the old woman aside, who then loses her balance and falls to her death. Then the door opens. Inspector Holloway and Donald Loftis enter the room. Holloway tells Louise that she no longer needs to be afraid that the spook is over now. The inspector then stands in disbelief in front of the living doll Mark, from whose mouth the words "Mama, Mama" repeatedly sound, with tears running down his cheeks.

Production notes

In the United Kingdom, the film, produced in 1965, first appeared in February 1966, and on May 25, 1966, it premiered in Minneapolis . In the Federal Republic of Germany, The Puppet Murderer was shown for the first time on August 26, 1966 in the cinema.

The most productive studio for horror films from 1960 was Hammer Films . Competition was made to the studio by Amicus Productions, a studio founded in England by the two Americans Milton Subotsky and Max Rosenberg. Today the studio is best known for an anthology of seven films, starting with the film Dr. Terrors House of Horrors (1964) to From Beyond the Grave (1973). The Puppet Killer is the only film in the studio to borrow from Hitchcock , which is logical since the script was written by Bloch, the author of Psycho , whose book Hitchcock filmed in 1960 under the same title . Freddie Francis, the director of the film, was one of the most important cameramen in film history. He was awarded two Academy Awards for his work on the camera. As a director, he mainly devoted himself to filming horror films for Hammer Studios and their “rival company” Amicus Productions.

In some film descriptions, the German names Ilse and Mark Von Sturm are used for the Maughams, and mother and son are referred to as Germans. Therefore there must be different synchronizations. In the film credits, the role name is given for Margaret Johnston as Mrs. Von Sturm , for John Standing as Mark Von Sturm .

criticism

The lexicon of international films spoke of a "thriller with horror elements and clear borrowings from Hitchcock". The script came from psycho-writer Robert Bloch.

TV Spielfilm rated the film with a thumbs up; Cinefacts found: "Effective horror from England in the Hitchcock style."

Scifilm's judgment also pointed to certain similarities between the film and Psycho , with reference to Robert Bloch. But the film also has “surprises” in store, as you can never be sure who the killer really is until the end. The performance of Margaret Johnston was criticized, which was "too shrill and not convincing".

Dennis Schwartz felt that the story had become unnecessarily complicated and that the characters would not experience any development in the film.

The evangelical film observer comes to a devastating verdict : “Scary and shocking film of the cheapest production. The absurd direction and above all the illogical story leave no entertainment value missing. Completely superfluous. "

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Amicus Production zauberspiegel-online.de
  2. ↑ The Psychopath Articles at TCM (English)
  3. ^ The puppet killer filmdienst.de
  4. ↑ a b The Puppet Murderer in the Lexicon of International FilmsTemplate: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used
  5. ↑ The Puppet Murderer  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. tvspielfilm.de@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.tvspielfilm.de  
  6. ^ The puppet killer cinefacts.de. Retrieved August 17, 2015.
  7. ↑ Der Psychopath ( Memento of the original from September 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. scifilm.org  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.scifilm.org
  8. ↑ Dennis Schwartz: Der Psychopath - Creepy Brit horror mystery tale that involves a series of grisly murders in London. In: Ozus World Movie Reviews
  9. ↑ Evangelischer Presseverband München, Critique No. 222/1967