Charity's Place.com

REFLECTIONS OF MURDER

REVIEWED BY CHARITY BISHOP

Our rating: 3 out of 5

Because of: mild sensuality, violence, thematic elements

Rated:

When someone recommended this film to me, I was skeptical about it. I wasn't sure I wanted to see one of my favorite actors play a bad guy. But I found a cheap copy online and was surprised at how well-crafted this psychological thriller is. Its images are profoundly unsettling at times, making it a film that Hitchcock would be proud of.

Normality for the boy's school on a small island off the cost involves the daily outdoor exercises, indoor piano lessons, and avoiding the sharp reprimands of their cruel headmaster, Michael Elliott (Sam Waterston). Having married the owner of the property, Michael has become discontent in his marriage and wants a divorce. He is insisting on half the value of the property, which surmounts to a million dollars. He refuses to leave his wife Claire (Joan Hackett) until she agrees to have it sold to realtors, who intend to tear down the house she was born in and install high-rises to lure in expensive renters. Mentally manipulating her and wearing her down over long periods of time, Michael also keeps a mistress, Vicky (Tuesday Weld), who he occasionally uses as a punching bag. It comes to such a point that both women are terrified for their lives, and Vicky convinces her newfound confidante that they must take action against him.

The plan is perfectly calculated. They intend to lure Michael to the city on the promise of signing divorce papers. They will drug and drown him in a bathtub, then dump the body in the swimming pool and allow it to surface. Everyone will think he drowned. Then plan starts failing. The drugs don't completely knock him out. Claire is on the verge of a mental breakdown. The neighbor knocks on the door while they're holding him underwater in the bathroom. They have a flat tire on the way back to the island. But worst of all, they wait for the body to surface from the murky depths of the pool and it never does. Haunted by what she has done, Claire becomes more and more convinced that the stiffened form they dumped into the pool has come back to haunt them. Because if he hasn't, where's the body?

Success in suspense films comes over time, with the slow building up of events that transpire into a series of events to keep viewers on the edge of their seats. The best in the genre include having the audience terrified that the main characters will be caught, even when they know in their heart that they should be caught. It's what sold Hitchcock's film Rope with such dramatic influence. The knowledge that the body was right there, in plain sight, and the mortal dread that someone was going to stumble across it. In this case, the body is nowhere to be found, bearing the question, is Michael really dead or is someone playing a cruel joke on them? I can see why adults have commented on the climax as being a "traumatic event" from their childhood. It has its diabolical implications, and more than one sequence that will linger with you.

Violence is the most troubling, as it involves fairly graphic attempts to drown Michael. The women drug him with a bottle of brandy, then dump him in a bathtub and hold him down. There are numerous creepy shots of his dead face, eyes rolled back into his head, at various points. Someone dies from a heart attack. Michael slaps Vicky and shoves her to the ground. He towers over and intimidates his wife. When getting the cold shoulder from Claire one night, he crosses the hall gets a little rough with Vicky. The two wind up struggling on a bed, before she scratches him and runs out. There are a couple mild sexual references, and one or two profanities. It's implied that Vicky and Michael have been involved in an affair for a long time. It's an interesting study in psychology because once you know the ending, you can see the complicated steps that lead up to it. I did guess the outcome, but only moments before it transpired. If you enjoy ethically questionable films that make you think and send a shiver up your backbone, consider Reflections of Murder.