A Taste of Excitement ** (1969, Eva Renzi, David Buck, Peter Vaughan, Francis Matthews, Sophie Hardy, Paul Hubschmid, Kay Walsh, Peter Bowles) – Classic Movie Review 13,906

Don Sharp’s 1969 British thriller film A Taste of Excitement is based on Ben Healey’s 1965 novel Waiting for a Tiger, and stars Eva Renzi, David Buck and Peter Vaughan.

Director Don Sharp’s 1969 British thriller film A Taste of Excitement is based on Ben Healey’s 1965 novel Waiting for a Tiger, the first in his series of thrillers about artist Paul Hedley, and stars Eva Renzi, David Buck and Peter Vaughan, along with Francis Matthews, Sophie Hardy, Paul Hubschmid, Kay Walsh and Peter Bowles.

Police Inspector Malling (Peter Vaughan) investigates when a young English woman named Jane Kerrell (Eva Renzi) believes that a killer is setting out to murder her in a series of attempts on her life and that an artist called Paul Hedley (David Buck) is involved in a deadly espionage plot.

Despite its spirited intentions, this is perhaps only a moderate, over-familiarly themed thriller with just a tiny taste of excitement. But the performances are entertaining, and there are plenty of tantalising misleading clues and false trails along the way to enjoy, and it comes with with an exciting climax to top it all off. Director and co-writer Sharp does his darndest to whip it up into a tiny little frenzy, and it is prettily shot on location around Nice on the French Riviera.

Sharp said that it was ‘rather a nice thriller’ and that it had ‘quite a nice cast without any big names’. Unfortunately, four days before shooting was to begin, the film’s American backers Westinghouse announced it had done a survey that revealed comedy thrillers rated better than straight thrillers. So they sent writer Alec Coppel to turn the film into a comedy thriller. Sharp said Coppel rewrote ‘reams of stuff out of context’, which he then had to rewrite and cut the night before filming ‘getting it into the right shape. You wouldn’t believe the chaos and confusion.’ Sadly, the roles played by Peter Bowles, David Buck and Francis Matthews were greatly reduced.

Cast: Eva Renzi as Jane Kerrell, David Buck as Paul Hedley, Peter Vaughan as Inspector Malling, Francis Matthews as Mr Breese, Peter Bowles as Alfredo Guardi, George Pravda as Dr Forla, Sophie Hardy as Michela, Paul Hubschmid as Hans Beiber, Kay Walsh as Miss Barrow, Alan Rowe as police inspector, Alan Barry as Mr Camot, Tom Kempinski as French police officer, Yves Brainville as hotel proprietor, Catherine Berg as receptionist.

It was shot in France in 1968 around Nice on the French Riviera. It is  a co-production between American backers Westinghouse’s Group W company and UK’s Trio Films, and produced by George W Willoughby (1913–1997), a Norwegian film producer who worked for many years in Britain and worked for Group W, a division of the American Westinghouse Broadcasting Company.

Release date: 16 November 1969. It had an X certificate for ‘moderate sexualised nudity’.

German actress Eva Renzi (born Evelyn Renziehausen; 3 November 1944 – 16 August 2005) was married to Swiss actor Paul Hubschmid from 1967 until 1980, and they appeared in several films together. She starred with Michael Caine in Funeral in Berlin (1966), the second Harry Palmer film, but declined a leading role in the James Bond film You Only Live Twice, saying that ‘Bond pictures are good for pretty girls but not for actresses. I would rather sell shoes.’

© Derek Winnert 2026 – Classic Movie Review 13,906

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