Fanatic (film)
- Tallulah Bankhead
- Stefanie Powers
- Donald Sutherland
company
- 21 March 1965 (1965-03-21)
Fanatic (U.S. title: Die! Die! My Darling!) is a 1965 British horror thriller film directed by Silvio Narizzano, and starring Tallulah Bankhead, Stefanie Powers, Peter Vaughan, Yootha Joyce, Maurice Kaufmann and Donald Sutherland.[1] It was written by Richard Matheson based on the 1961 novel Nightmare by Anne Blaisdell.
Released in theaters on 21 March 1965 in United Kingdom, it was filmed at Elstree Studios and on location in Letchmore Heath, Hertfordshire, during the summer of 1964. It was Bankhead's final feature film.
Plot
An American woman, Patricia Carroll, arrives in London to marry her lover Alan Glentower. Before tying the knot, however, Patricia pays a visit to Mrs. Trefoile, the mother of her deceased fiancé Stephen, who died in an automobile accident several years earlier. Trefoile resides in a secluded house on the edge of an English village. She is fanatically religious, and it soon becomes apparent that she blames Patricia for her son's death. Indeed, when Patricia reveals to her that she never actually intended to marry Stephen, Trefoile enlists the aid of her servants, Harry and Anna, in holding Patricia captive so she can exorcise the young woman's soul. After several attempts to escape the Trefoile house, one of which nearly results in Patricia's being sexually assaulted by Harry, she is rescued by Alan; and in the end, Mrs. Trefoile winds up dead with a knife in her back, the same knife with which she earlier attempted to murder Patricia.
Cast
- Tallulah Bankhead as Mrs. Trefoile
- Stefanie Powers as Patricia Carroll
- Peter Vaughan as Harry
- Maurice Kaufmann as Alan Glentower
- Yootha Joyce as Anna
- Donald Sutherland as Joseph
- Gwendolyn Watts as Gloria
- Robert Dorning as Ormsby
- Philip Gilbert as Oscar
- Winifred Dennis as shopkeeper
- Diana King as shopper
- Henry McGee as rector
Critical reception
Variety wrote that the film "should click with fright fans," praising Narizzano's direction as "imaginative" and the script as having dialogue that was generally "fresher than most pix of its class" while giving Bankhead "numerous chances to display virtuosity, from sweet-tongued menace to maniacal blood-lust."[2]
The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "Though uneven in tone (to put it mildly), this piece of extravagance is at least consistently enjoyable ... One suspects here a laudable determination in Miss Bankhead not to be outdone by Bette Davis' Baby Jane. Still, why cavil? There is enough here to give horror addicts a field day on various levels."[3]
A. H. Weiler of The New York Times wrote that although Bankhead "towers above the cast and story, her present effort adds little to her record."[4]
The film maintains a 50% rating on review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes based on 10 reviews.[5]
See also
- Looped, a 2010 Broadway play that uses the production of this film as its setting
- Psycho-biddy genre
References
- ^ "Fanatic". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 2 January 2024.
- ^ "Die, Die, My Darling". Variety: 6. 28 April 1965.
- ^ "Fanatic". The Monthly Film Bulletin. 32 (375): 51. April 1965.
- ^ Weiler, A. H. (20 May 1965). "The Screen: Tallulah Bankhead in a Horror Film". The New York Times: 52.
- ^ "Die! Die! My Darling! (1965)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved 15 June 2024.
External links
- Fanatic at IMDb
- Fanatic at AllMovie
- Fanatic at the TCM Movie Database
- v
- t
- e
- I Am Legend (1954)
- The Shrinking Man (1956)
- A Stir of Echoes (1958)
- The Beardless Warriors (1960)
- Hell House (1971)
- Bid Time Return (1975)
- What Dreams May Come (1978)
- Earthbound (1982)
- "Born of Man and Woman" (1950)
- "Button, Button" (1970)
- The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957)
- House of Usher (1960)
- "The Last Flight" (1960)
- "Nick of Time" (1960)
- "A World of Difference" (1960)
- "A World of His Own" (1960)
- Master of the World (1961)
- The Pit and the Pendulum (1961)
- "The Invaders" (1961)
- "Once Upon a Time" (1961)
- Night of the Eagle (1962)
- Tales of Terror (1962)
- "Little Girl Lost" (1962)
- "Young Man's Fancy" (1962)
- The Raven (1963)
- "Death Ship" (1963)
- "Mute" (1963)
- "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" (1963)
- "Steel" (1963)
- The Comedy of Terrors (1964)
- The Last Man on Earth (1964)
- "Night Call" (1964)
- "Spur of the Moment" (1964)
- Fanatic (1965)
- The Young Warriors (1966)
- "The Enemy Within" (1966)
- The Devil Rides Out (1968)
- De Sade (1969)
- Duel (1971)
- The Night Stalker (1972)
- The Night Strangler (1973)
- The Legend of Hell House (1973)
- Dying Room Only (1973)
- Bram Stoker's Dracula (1974)
- The Morning After (1974)
- Scream of the Wolf (1974)
- Trilogy of Terror (1975)
- Dead of Night (1977)
- The Strange Possession of Mrs. Oliver (1977)
- The Martian Chronicles (1980)
- Somewhere in Time (1980)
- Jaws 3-D (1983)
- Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983)
- "Button, Button" (1986)
- Loose Cannons (1990)
- The Dreamer of Oz (1990)
- Twilight Zone: Rod Serling's Lost Classics (1994)
- Trilogy of Terror II (1996)
by others
- "And When the Sky Was Opened" (1959)
- "Third from the Sun" (1960)
- Cold Sweat (1970)
- The Omega Man (1971)
- The Incredible Shrinking Woman (1981)
- What Dreams May Come (1998)
- Stir of Echoes (1999)
- "Dance of the Dead" (2005)
- "My Ambition" (2006)
- I Am Legend (2007)
- I Am Omega (2007)
- The Box (2009)
- "The Splendid Source" (2010)
- Real Steel (2011)
- Richard Christian Matheson (son)
- Chris Matheson (son)
This 1960s horror film-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
- v
- t
- e
This article related to a British film of the 1960s is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
- v
- t
- e