Behind Locked Doors (1968) - in Full

I did this one as a 'Random Movie Trailer' a couple of years ago, as I'd been intrigued by the trailer, which, at the time, the American Horrors Roku channel seemed to play incessantly between movies, and I'd been unable to track down a copy of the complete film.  Well, thanks to another of those dodgy Roku channels I spend far too much time watching, I was finally able to see Behind Locked Doors (1968) in all of its sleazy glory.  Checking back on what I'd written about the trailer, I noted then that the trailer was so magnificently tawdry that the actual film could surely never live up to the low rent thrills it promised.  Sadly, my past self was proven right: Behind Locked Doors in its entirety turned out to be a disappointingly tame nudie pic, never delivering on the sort of kinkiness both it trailer and premise seem to promise.  It is also painfully slow moving, taking an age to get properly started and, not surprisingly, full of clunky dialogue delivered by wooden actors.  To recap from the earlier post, the film concerns two girls from the city, Terry and Ann, who find themselves stranded in a remote rural area after attending a party in a barn and find shelter with the mysterious Mr Bradley (who had earlier rescued Ann from being sexually assaulted at the party and sounds as if he doing a bad Noel Coward impersonation), his sister and their mentally impaired handyman.  They quickly realise that they are prisoners in the Bradleys' house, where Mr Bradley plans to use them as his latest subjects in his 'sexual experiments' - all part of his quest for the perfect mate.  

Unfortunately, these 'experiments' seem to be very tame, generally consisting him of getting them naked, tying them to a bed and forcing them to have sex with him.  None of the sex is graphic and there is no full frontal nudity, just lots of bare bums and boobs.  There is also absolutely no kinkiness on offer - the closest we come to that is Ann getting a stroke of the whip from Bradley's sister when she is unco-operative - but even this isn't actually shown:  we just hear the crack of the whip and Ann's scream before a quick cut to the whip in the sister's hand.  Otherwise, the only other perversion on show is some implied necrophilia as the handyman touches up three embalmed previous victims down in the basement.  These three victims provide the film's only particularly effective moment, as they seem to come back to life as Bradley burns to death in the cellar, slowly turning their head to watch his agonies.  The film's problem is that it really doesn't know what it wants to be: on one level it seems to want to be a sexed-up and pervy 'Old Dark House' type of horror thriller, complete with something nasty in the cellar, but it simply isn't thrilling enough to achieve this, with zero suspense and plodding pace that telegraphs every plot development well in advance. On another level, it clearly wants to be some kind of kinky porno film, hinting at S&M and all sorts of other perversions, but fails to deliver on all counts, instead offering only coy sex and nudity and some very tame lesbianism.  Even the ending, where the girls escape, but the story then goes back to that party, implying it was all a dream, (although whose we're not sure, unless both Ann and Terry experienced a shared nightmare), with them making different choices than before (presumably as a result of their dream experiences) feels fumbled. Terry now hooks up with another girl, while Ann goes off with the guy who tried to force himself on her at the start of the film, (having, presumably, decided that being raped by a young bearded guy she knows is preferable to being raped by a strange weirdo who speaks like a bad Noel Coward impersonator).  

So, is there anything of merit about Behind Locked Doors?  Well, it is unintentionally quite funny, what with Bradley's bizarre faux-English accent and over-acting, not to mention the stereotypically lumbering and clearly sexually frustrated handyman.  Some of the scenes in the house are occasionally atmospheric, largely due to the claustrophobically cramped rooms and the over-poweringly oppressive red decor in the hall ways.  There is also a sequence where Terry is chased across a field by the handyman which is actually quite well filmed and surprisingly effective.  As already alluded to, the colour palette is interesting, with the house's interior contrasting between the deep red corridors and pale, anemic looking decor of most of the rooms, (although this could simply be the result of a poor quality print - the version I saw looked distinctly washed out in the exterior scenes and was badly scratched, which, perversely, always seems to enhance the viewing experience where exploitation films are concerned, making watching them seem even more of a furtive pleasure).  I'm glad to have finally seen Behind Locked Doors in its entirety, even if it was predictably disappointing, as it remains a good example of this sort of softcore, non-explicit, sexploitation film that teases rather than delivers.