Experiment in Terror

In San Francisco the bank teller Kelly Sherwood is grabbed in her garage as she gets home. The man's voice is asthmatic and rasping. He wants her to steal 100,000 dollars from the bank and says he will kill her sister if she does not. She calls the FBI anyway and Agent John Ripley takes the case. What follows moves between finding out who the man is and Kelly having to behave normally while knowing she is watched. Blake Edwards directed. Glenn Ford plays Ripley, Lee Remick plays Kelly, Stefanie Powers plays her sister and Ross Martin plays the killer, Garland Lynch. Henry Mancini wrote the score. It was released by Columbia on 13 April 1962. It was shot entirely on location in San Francisco. The finale is a chase through Candlestick Park after a night game between the Giants and the Dodgers, with Lynch shot on the pitcher's mound. The reviews divided. One assessment called it a dark and heavily atmospheric suspense thriller; another criticised Edwards for far too many arty, self-conscious, cutely angled shots. Leonard Maltin gave three stars out of four, praising the taut suspense and the photography. Rotten Tomatoes sits at 100 percent from eight reviews. Ross Martin was nominated for the Best Supporting Actor Golden Globe. Who it is for: viewers who like the passage from noir into the thriller and menace built out of a voice. Who it is not for: anyone wanting pace. The film gives a lot of time to procedure and sags in the middle.