This is an early British Hammer film, but it was filmed in Italy and co-scripted by future Italian director Antonio Marghareti, so it also in some ways anticipates the later Italian giallo thrillers, mostly in its enjoyably absurd plot. In the creepy opening scene a man (Peter Van Eck) puts on a scuba mask (it's technically not a "snorkel") and hides under the floor boards in order to gas his sleeping wife from inside her locked room. The police naturally think its suicide, but the murdered woman's teen daughter (Mandy Miller) comes home from school and immediately suspects the truth--naturally since she earlier witnessed her step-father drowning her father. Everyone thinks she's crazy, of course, (even after he bumps off her little dog, "Toto", too). Her governess (Betta St. John )meanwhile is torn between her loyalty her apparently delusional charge and her attraction to the suave, seemingly distraught widower.
Now if this were a giallo there would be many more, no doubt very bloody, murders, the couple would graphically consummate their relationship, and even little Mandy would probably get in on the erotic and/or violent action somehow (i.e. check out the later giallo "Smile Before Death" which has a very similar plot, but with all these elements added in). But don't expect anything like that here. Still, this is very entertaining and has some ironic and effective twists at the end (the very last scene, however, is a terrible cop-out, no doubt tacked on to ameliorate the douchebags, I mean censors). The acting is indeed very good, especially that of Van Eyck and Miller (I hope this isn't the same Mandy Miller who later appeared in David Sullivan's horrible "Emmanuelle in Soho", but that seems pretty unlikely). You definitely want to check this one out.
Now if this were a giallo there would be many more, no doubt very bloody, murders, the couple would graphically consummate their relationship, and even little Mandy would probably get in on the erotic and/or violent action somehow (i.e. check out the later giallo "Smile Before Death" which has a very similar plot, but with all these elements added in). But don't expect anything like that here. Still, this is very entertaining and has some ironic and effective twists at the end (the very last scene, however, is a terrible cop-out, no doubt tacked on to ameliorate the douchebags, I mean censors). The acting is indeed very good, especially that of Van Eyck and Miller (I hope this isn't the same Mandy Miller who later appeared in David Sullivan's horrible "Emmanuelle in Soho", but that seems pretty unlikely). You definitely want to check this one out.