John Phillips

Three Dangerous Ladies

There is no framing narrative, but each segment is introduced by an off-screen narrator who emphasizes the link of "dangerous ladies": Mrs. Amworth (Directed by Alvin Rakoff; written by Hugh Whitemore based on Ms. Amworth by E. F. Benson, from the 1923 collection Visible and Invisible.) Mrs. Amworth (Glynis Johns) is a vivacious, sociable middle-aged woman in a small English town which is currently experiencing a mysterious anemia epidemic. Amworth presides over neighborly garden parties and card games, but Francis Urcombe (John Phillips), a local student of the occult, suspects she may have something to do with the mysterious ailment which has begun afflicting a friend's nephew and others in the village. After he discovers her reaching through the young man's window, he reveals that he believes she is a vampire. He confronts her, resulting in her apparent death when she is struck by a passing car. She reappears to inflict further harm, however, leading Urcombe to the local cemetery, where he waits for her spirit to return to her grave and then exhumes her body and impales it with a pickaxe, killing her. The Mannikin (Directed by Don Thompson; written by Robert Bloch based on his story The Mannikin, first published in the April 1937 issue of Weird Tales) Folk musician Simone (Ronee Blakley) returns to the house of her estranged mother, who is recently deceased. She refuses to attend the funeral or take any belongings, explaining that her mother subjected her to sinister ritualistic elements as a child, before she was removed from the home. Shortly thereafter, she begins experiencing unexplained phenomena; she hears her mother's voice calling her name, starts suffering from disorienting dizzy spells and comes down with an excruciating pain in her back. She is referred to psychiatrist Dr. David Priestly (Keir Dullea), who believes her symptoms to be psychiatric in nature. Eventually, Simone returns to her mother's home, where the strange housekeeper Miss Smith (Pol Pelletier) conducts a ritual which causes a grotesque, childlike creature to crawl out of Simone's back. When Dr. Priestly arrives looking for her, Simone tells him to leave in a stilted manner. When he does, he is attacked by the creature in his car. The segment features Blakley playing her song Need a New Sun Rising. The Island (Directed by Robert Fuest; written by Robert Fuest based on The Island, by L.P. Hartley, first published in his 1924 collection Night Fears) A soldier named Lt. Simmonds (John Hurt) travels to the island mansion of his married lover Mrs. Santander (Jenny Runacre). Upon arriving, however, the evasive butler (Graham Crowden) tells him that Mrs. Santander will not see him immediately, and while waiting he encounters an "electrician" (Charles Gray) who eventually reveals his true identity: Mr. Santander, the cuckholded husband of Simmonds' lover, who Simmonds had believed to be in South America. Santander invites Simmonds to a drink, where he rants at him that his wife had many other lovers before revealing Mrs. Santander's lifeless body. Simmonds, attempting to leave, notices that his revolver is missing a bullet, and suspects that Santander used it to murder his wife while Simmonds bathed. As he searches the house for the murderous husband, the butler informs him that the police are on their way. When he demands to know where Santander is, the butler replies, "Mr. Santander, sir? Why, he's in South America," implying the two have conspired to frame Simmonds for the murder.