Sexploitation whodunnit, in which a stocking masked creep commits a series of rapes and murders...but is the perpetrator the lothario doctor with a younger mistress and a ball busting, drunk wife? Or his patient? A raving misogynist who has been having a little too vivid dreams about the murders? Or the Edgar Allan Poe lookalike police inspector?
Around half way through the film tires of concealing the killer's identity and drops that angle in favour of lifting ideas from The Manchurian Candidate. A bit of pilfering that the filmmakers obviously felt guilty enough about to explicitly acknowledge the Manchurian Candidate influence in the dialogue. Director Robert Vincent O'Neil would soon after be making another sexploitation-noir "Blood Mania" for Crown International, and if anything The Psycho Lover feels like O'Neil's calling card to Crown International. It's very much in their slick, shot in L.A. style, with the rape-murder nastiness sharing the screen with trippy psychedelic flourishes, gyrating bewbs, T&A make-out scenes and romantic strolls around California beaches scored to soft rock songs. The screenwriter's idea of hip dialogue includes nuggets like "your ego hangs between your legs" and "the hairs on my ass stand on end every time I catch his scent". The doctor's flash car is also a sight to behold, and may temporary bamboozle you into thinking that The Psycho Lover is meant to be a futuristic film. The film overflows with so much love for that vehicle every time it's onscreen...you just know it had to be either someone's pride and joy, or that they'd been slipped a generous backhander to plug it in the movie.
