(this review originally appeared in 'Samhain' #57, July 1996)
Let's talk about icons. The history of Brit-shock has produced precious few - there's Christopher Lee's gaunt, imposing Dracula, of course, and that cultured masochist Pinhead, I suppose. Representing the distaff side, and peculiarly having surfaced during an age of Chelsea girls and dollybird starlets, one can only call to mind Sheila Keith, the domineering, heartless, matriarchal rock at the core of Pete Walker's malevolent, spiteful vision of suburban England. Undeservedly buried since their initial escape on to a fading, disinterested cinema circuit over twenty years ago, FRIGHTMARE and HOUSE OF WHIPCORD have been granted a welcome reprieve under the Redemption banner. Anyone expecting a home-grown equivalent to Redemption's staple glamorous Euro-vamp fare, however, is in for a very grim surprise - this brace of 1974 releases achieve the ultimate realisation of Walker's image of Britain as a dismal, dingy corner of the world, ruled by the senile and out-of-touch, a place where youth and free expression is to be stamped on. Sheila Keith's grasp of, and contribution to, this acutely accurate perspective is central to the success of the films, and there's little irony present in that the strident, insane, grey-haired harridans she seared into the celluloid bear considerable resemblance to our then-impending Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher.
Scripter on both WHIPCORD and FRIGHTMARE was Mr.'Doing Rude Things' himself, David McGillivray - McGillivray always takes great delight in quoting a contemporary review which described the former as a "feeble fladge fantasy"; he also claims that the sole positive notice the picture scored in the U.K. can be attributed to a well-known movie critic whose own behind-closed-doors peccadilloes were reflected in the subject matter! Since I'm about to rave over HOUSE OF WHIPCORD too, make what you will of that… Perhaps the most astonishing aspect of WHIPCORD is simply that it is British, considering its straightforward, matter-of-fact brutality and scandalous confrontational candour. It's a psychotic variant on the women-in-prison theme, a favourite with exploitation producers for decades, but Walker avoids the usual formula preamble whereby innocent girls become embroiled in some minor crime and wind up being hosed down behind bars - he side-steps the justice system altogether and sets the action in a privately-run institution, overseen by a barking mad prison governess and a doddery old magistrate, who have a series of pretty young 'offenders' kidnapped in order to put them on trial for such heinous misdemeanours as applying lipstick and being seen in public wearing mini-skirts. Keith here plays their loyal employee, a cruel warder amusingly named 'Walker', and the victims (including cute 'Are You Being Served?' regular Penny Irving) are frequently tortured and flogged before eventually encountering the hangman's noose. Basic, uncompromising, damn near unwatchable at times, and guaranteed to provoke a response from any viewer regardless of their philosophy or beliefs, WHIPCORD is an unforgettably bleak, bitter outrage.
Sheila commands centre-stage for FRIGHTMARE, an equally distressing and discomforting item. If WHIPCORD accidentally anticipated Thatcherism, this follow-up inadvertently predicts the shambles of our current 'care in the community' programme, and is a tad more subtle in its authority-bashing. Oops, I've just used the word 'subtle' in a piece about a deranged cannibal who opens human skulls using a Black & Decker power tool. Keith is magnificent as Dorothy Yates, the farm-dwelling tarot reader who lures potential lunch out to her remote smallholding via discreetly-placed ads in 'Time Out', and McGillivray's narrative appropriates a tabloid-worthy sensationalism, with Mrs. Yates' devoted husband and concerned daughter keeping her in fresh flesh following her premature discharge from the rubber room. A sub-plot relating the delinquent activities of a second, younger child ties in with all the meat-munching by the gruesome climax, and Walker and McGillivray take enormous glee in messily bumping off Hampstead sophisticates and liberal psychiatrists by the score. Two absolutely essential purchases. Just don't expect to enjoy them.
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