Persecution

Once one of the queens of melodrama ("Peyton place " "imitation of life") and of the film noir ("the postman always rings twice") , Lana Turner whose career had waned in the sixties , followed Bette Davis' and Joan Crawford 's footsteps :she tried her hand at horror movies ;so you get what you expect: a festival of camp .

The most memorable scenes are to be found at the beginning and at the end of the film:the Xmas night , enhanced by carrols , in the gloomy room where Davis finds his presents, while the sound of mechanical soldiers is heard ; then his final revenge "I said : lap up!"

The screenplay is disjointed, the flashbacks -which feature Trevor howard,all the same!)are badly introduced in the story ; the atmosphere is rather disturbing , with the principal and her beloved cats that seem to be her real family , for she has her way to destroy her human one. An aging Turner's face adds to the lugubrious Gothic house .

A note about Olga-Georges Picot who plays Monique :in the late sixties/early seventies,this polyglot embassador's daughter was one of the most promising French actresses and played opposite very famous partners ; but her physique and her good looks went against her ,and by the mid-seventies ,she was relegated to soft porn material : in "persecution" ,her role already "predated" her future career:despondent about her failed career,she threw herself out of a window at the age of 57.

Halloween is upon us so the TV companies dust off a few horror films for late night showing . Last night saw the BBC broadcast THE WOLFMAN while tonight ITV transmitted a clichéd horror movie called LONG TIME DEAD with BBC 1 showing PERSECUTION

As a horror film / psychological thriller totally fails because it uses something ridiculous as the focus of fear . The bringers of terror are

CATS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That's right . Cats . You know these fluffy cute mammals that sit in your lap making purring noises when you tickle their chin ? Well that's what the creatures of horror are in this movie . I'm not making this up and I also wish to point out that they're not ten foot tall mutant demon possessed killer cats , they're the type of moggy you see sitting out on window ledges in the summer .

I know some people have an instinctive fear of felines , it's to do with the way they look at you , almost like the cats are planning something when you're back is turned . I don't know how anyone can believe this because I find cats the most affectionate type of pet and no matter how hard the director tries he just can't make moggies appear menacing in any way

I feel rather sorry for the late Ralph Bates since he also appeared in an awful horror movie shown on BBC 1 a few nights ago called I DON'T WANT TO BE BORN and looking at the actor's resume he has appeared in a lot of crap early 70s Brit horror movies . To give you a taste of how bad PERSECUTION is check out this sample of dialogue

" You killed your mothers cat "

" Yes I drowned it . In milk "

" Oh darling "

Believe it or not the above lines weren't meant to induce a laugh , though inevitably they did

I believed I was knowledgeable of movies like this. I thought I was on top of all the B exploitation efforts by faded Hollywood actresses, from the high profile flicks of Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, and Olivia De Havilland to forays by the likes of Ava Gardner, Jeanne Crane, Ann Southern, Veronica Lake, Ruth Roman, and Wanda Hendrix. I thought I knew most of the misfires from these faded ladies from Hollywood's golden era. Except for this one. I've never heard of this one. Ever. Not in my readings of tomes on exploitation and horror films, not in the film commentaries on DVDS, not mentioned in passing by ANYONE on YouTube or in chat rooms. Zilch. Which surprises me, because this film is ripe for that kind of thing. Lana Turner is not a name that springs to mind in regards to this kind of movie, but she made at least another exploitation title(THE BIG CUBE), so she dabbled in this genre a little. The movie itself is rather slow-moving, more like a gothic soap opera than a full-on horror movie. Turner herself looks great (think a late 1950s Lana, as she looked in her IMITATION OF LIFE/PAYTON PLACE era), and a large chunk of the production budget probably went into keeping Ms. Turner coiffed and dressed in the high Hollywood style to which she was accustomed. Turner does an admirable job as the icy Carrie Masters, an overbearing mother who dominates her adult son. It's more psycho-drama than camp, which makes for a slog of a viewing experience. This may be why it isn't remembered today.

It's so sad to watch Lana Turner who made amazing drama and romance to do a horror movie at England in twlight's career, as l'd read somewhere that the most of critics deemed the 70' as lost decade to the cinema, l don't agree certainly but they had some reasons to said that, like this movie that is so unexplainable and disturbing, Lana plays a machiavellian mother who mishandle your son in extreme way of without regret, acceptable plot although it wasn't to every taste indeed, while the results in final could be understood as insane is funny to see a horrible revenge, probable the audience will be glad to see it!! the official DVD released here in Brazil's market was a bad copy, needs a upmost new restoration!!

Resume:

First watch: 2018 / How many: 1 / Source: DVD / Rating: 6.25

If you like seeing sick, narcissistic folks destroying each other, then I have a film for you..."Persecution"! It's a movie about two very sick people and the twisted relationship they have together.

The story begins with a young boy drowning his mother's beloved cat in a bowl of milk! Apparently, the cat was loved more than he was and he was sick of it and killed the poor animal. Animal lovers might not want to see this as it's pretty realistic.

Many years pass. The boy has grown up and is married with a baby. For some inexplicable reason, he brings his family to see his mother...a cold, uncaring manipulator...full of snide comments but no love whatsoever. Soon she hires a sexy new maid and you realize the 'maid' is basically a prostitute coming to destroy the son's marriage. But before this can happen, one of his mother's cats suphocates the baby...and this, combined with the seduction lead to very bad things...at which point the son snaps and spends the rest of the movie tormenting his soulless mother.

While the film is well made and Lana Turner is excellent as the evil mother (in fact, it's one of her best performances), you might wonder WHY...why would anyone want to watch it? After all, it's a very unpleasant film...though an odd and intriguing character study of the evil mom and her adult son. In fact, if the film was intended to be a prequel to "Psycho", it would have fit very nicely into the Hitchcock film...showing what led to Norman becoming such a dangerous psychopath.

By the way, there is a goof that made me laugh. The son digs up a grave and the body is a skeleton...yet the bones of the hand are fully articulated...like a college model. Real human skeletons completely fall apart as there is nothing to hold these bones together.