Paranoiac (1963)

Paranoiac (1963) was part of Hammer's cycle of sixties psychological thrillers, originally inspired by the success of Hitchcock's Psycho (1960), but with later entries drawing inspiration variously from the likes of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? and Les Diaboliques.  Paranoiac comes from the early part of the cycle, which, in homage to Hitchcock, generally sported single word titles alluding to psychological disturbances and were shot in black and white.  In terms of content, however, it has far more in common with the sort of black and white British thrillers of the late forties and fifties (many of the lower budgeted of which had been produced by Hammer).  Which shouldn't be surprising as it is actually an uncredited adaptation of Josephine Tey's 1949 novel 'Brat Farrar', which Hammer had the rights to for several years, but could never come up with a satisfactory adaptation.  Jimmy Sangster's script takes the book's basic plot and reworks it into the sort of grand guignol melodrama expected from their psychological thrillers, complete with hook-wielding maniacs in grotesque masks, midnight organ playing in crypts, deep dark family secrets, murders and murky goings on in an old house.   The film retains some of the character names from the novel, along with the Dorset coast settings, but, much as his scripts for Curse of Frankenstein (1957) and Dracula (1958) had dome, Sangster strips away sub-plots and complications, pares down the cast of characters and simplifies their relationships to create a lean, purposeful script that gets straight to the central essence of the book.  

The film is notable for giving Oliver Reed another leading role (after playing the title role in Curse of the Werewolf (1961), he had stepped back down to supporting roles in his subsequent Hammer appearances), which he clearly relishes.  Unfortunately, effective though his portrayal of Simon as an absolute bastard might be, it makes it absolutely obvious from the outset that he is the villain of the piece - obviously psychologically disturbed and prone to violent outbursts.  His utter contempt for his siblings, both living and supposedly dead, immediately marks him out not just as callous, but an obvious suspect in the disappearance of his brother when they were boys.  Not that the script doesn't do its best to throw in various red-herrings, most notably a looney aunt, but also an embezzling family lawyer, as flaky younger sister with suicidal tendencies and, of course, a mysterious stranger who might, or might not, be the missing brother grown to adulthood.  Indeed, this latter character is deployed early on to mislead the audience into believing that Paranoiac was going to be one of those thrillers about young women being driven mad (another favourite variation of Hammer's for these types of movie), as at first only the disturbed sister sees him.  But it quickly gets back on course after he rescues the girl from an attempt to drown herself in the sea, revealing himself to the rest of the family in the process.

While Paranoiac ultimately doesn't spring any real surprises, with the identity of the villain and his crime telegraphed early on, it does look reasonably stylish, although it is far from director Freddie Francis' best work for Hammer.  There aren't quite the number of interesting shots and angles one might usually expect from Francis (there is, however, an effectively shot murder by drowning from the victim's perspective), he does make good use the shadowy sets, contrasting them effectively with the open and sunny Dorset exterior locations.  Despite the obviousness of villain and outcome, Francis does manage to build some suspense and tension, even throwing in the odd jolting surprise.  Mainly, though, the script relies upon piling incident upon incident at such a frenzied pace that the viewer never has the chance to realise how absurd it all is as the film plays out.  Certainly, it packs a lot of incident into just eighty minutes of running time.  An enjoyable entry in Hammer's psychological thriller cycle, Paranoiac is lifted above the average by Reed's typically forceful performance.  With its plot hinging on buried family secrets, masked assailants and disturbed relatives, you can't help but feel that, shot in garish colour and with Italian locarions, Paranoiac might have made a great proto-giallo.