– Director: Freddie Francis
– Writers: Jimmy Sangster
– Stars: Janette Scott, Oliver Reed, Sheila Burrell
– Run time: 1 Hour, 20 Minutes
– Amazon Link: https://amzn.to/38tENqS
Synopsis
We open in a cemetery where we see the tomb of John and Mary Ashby and their son, Antony. There’s a memorial service inside the church; it has been eleven years since their deaths. We hear how John and Mary died in a plane crash and then Anthony later killed himself out of grief. The other son, Simon, is still alive. Simon is playing the organ at the service when a strange man walks in. Simon’s sister, Eleanor, faints at the sight of him.
She saw Tony, who isn’t really as dead as everyone expected. He jumped over the cliff, and they never found a body but they all just assumed he smashed himself of the rocks and was washed away. Simon and Aunt Harriet argue, mostly because he isn’t upset about the ceremony. He’s very much over his parent’s death, but he drinks way too much. Simon thinks his sister is insane and would like to see her locked up.
Eleanor sees Tony outside her window again. The family later finds her outside wandering in the garden. She certainly *does* look insane. Later, we see that Eleanor’s nurse and Simon have a thing going on. Simon screams and rants when they tell him he’s out of brandy. Kosset, the executor of the estate cuts off his alcohol allowance, but that’s going to end in three weeks when Simon comes into his inheritance. There’s a lot of people yelling at Simon to behave himself, but he’s Oliver Reed; of *course* he’s gonna drink a lot.
Eleanor freaks out and jumps off a cliff too, but Tony rescues her and brings her home. The nurse and butler see him, but they don’t know him. The butler thinks it may be Tony from the old pictures, but no one believes him. Simon nearly runs him over out on the street, and he recognizes his own brother. Aunt Harriet knows who he pretends to be, but she doesn’t believe it.
He says he never jumped off that cliff. He just left a note and disappeared. He accuses Aunt Harriet of doing something to Eleanor to make her crazy, but she denies it. Both Simon and Harriet are skeptical of the whole thing, but Eleanor is all in for having her brother back.
There seems to be a lot that Tony is unsure about, and it looks like he’s an imposter. The family lawyer, Kosset, comes by with a list of questions and gives Tony a “test.”
Turns out, he’s *not* Tony. He’s in league with Cosset’s son, Keith, to defraud the family and get a share of the inheritance. Keith even suggested some of the questions on his father’s test. Tony doesn’t like what he’s doing; he especially like Eleanor. Simon tells Tony that he doesn’t believe he’s for real, but Tony doesn’t care.
Late that night, Tony hears singing coming from somewhere. He follows it outside, where he’s attacked by someone in a mask. He gets cut but it’s not serious.
Simon overhears Eleanor and Tony making picnic plans, and he does something to the engine of the car they plan to take. They go to the picnic without incident, but when Eleanor tries to turn the car around afterwards, the brakes fail, and she almost drives off the cliff. Tony barely pulls her off the car before the car goes off the cliff. Simon is shocked when he sees Eleanor and Tony returning in a taxi.
That night, Tony hears the music outside again. They see Sion playing the organ with a little boy singing. They boy wears a mask. The singing is coming from a record, and we see that Simon is as crazy as his sister. Then a masked person comes out and almost attacks Eleanor, but Tony pulls the mask off, unveiling Aunt Harriet, who explains that she was trying to keep people from realizing that Simon is insane. He felt responsible for Tony’s death, and he’s never been quite right since then. Tony realizes that it must have been Simon who messed with their brakes, and the nurse overhears the whole conversation.
Tony and Eleanor kiss, and he forgets himself that he’s *supposed* to be her brother, and he gets a little *too* romantic. She’s in love with him. He admits he’s an imposter. The nurse tells Simon she’s leaving him, as she knows what he did to the brakes. He kills he and dumps her in the pond.
Tony goes to see Keith and tells him to be careful. He thinks he knows where the real Tony is. He tells Eleanor to pack her things, as they’ll be running away later tonight. Tony then breaks into the organ-house and looks around. Aunt Harriet finds him there and orders him to leave. He finds the real Tony, dead, behind the pipe organ. That’s why Simon and Aunt Harriet were so sure that “Tony” isn’t really “Tony.”
Simon admits to killing the real Tony and trying to kill Eleanor and the imposter Tony. Simon knocks him out and goes berserk. Aunt Harriet comes in and sends Simon to bed. She sets the building on fire with both the live and the dead Tonys inside. Eleanor comes in and unties the live one, while Simon rushes back inside to rescue the dead one but is trapped and dies.
Commentary
It wasn’t clear until about halfway through what actually was going on, and even then, it wasn’t clear who knew what. Still, it all does resolve itself in the end, more or less. It’s not clear whether the fake Tony inherited the money or not, and, we don’t know if there was any justice for Aunt Harriet.
It’s creepy. It’s mysterious. If you like Oliver Reed, he’s at his Reediest here. Still, the story isn’t much. There’s an old house, and a family secret, and we’ve all seen this story, or one just like it, a dozen times by now. It’s well done, but it’s just not a particularly captivating story.