The Snorkel *** (1958, Peter Van Eyck, Betta St John, Mandy Miller, William Franklyn, Grégoire Aslan) – Classic Movie Review 12,851

Hammer Films’ commendable 1958 British thriller film The Snorkel stars Peter Van Eyck, Betta St John, and child actress Mandy Miller in her last film role. The story is either by actor Anthony Dawson or Italian horror director Antonio Margheriti. 

Director Guy Green’s 1958 Hammer Films production British thriller film The Snorkel stars Peter Van Eyck, Betta St John, and child actress Mandy Miller in her last film role.

Peter Van Eyck stars as evil Paul Decker, who attempts on his new wife Jean (Betta St John) a repeat performance of his special drowning technique with which he murdered his first wife, but is scuppered by his eagle-eyed teenage step-daughter, Candy (Mandy Miller). Police say Candy’s mother died by suicide, but she believes her step-father Paul murdered her.

With this commendable chiller, Hammer Films studios make an enjoyable move away from their traditional formulaic monster magic, in favour of an intelligent thriller screenplay by Peter Myers and Jimmy Sangster, based on the story by Anthony Dawson (allegedly perhaps aka Antonio Margheriti), and thoughtful acting, with especial plaudits awarded to Eyck in a rip-roaring portrait of wickedness, St John, and the appealing 14-year-old Miller (from 1952’s Mandy) as the step-daughter.

Guy Green handles it with smoothly proficient professionalism, it looks good thanks to Jack Asher’s extensive Italian location photography, and it starts and ends with a bang. Everybody can enjoy the thrilling long opening scene and the final surprise.

Also in the cast are Marie Burke, Irene Prador, Henri Vidon, Robert Rietty, Armand Guinle, and David Ritch.

It runs 90 minutes but the US cut version runs 74 minutes.

The story is credited to Anthony Dawson though has been attributed to Italian horror director Antonio Margheriti, who used the pseudonym Anthony Dawson, but the story author was probably actor Anthony Dawson, who appeared in Hammer’s The Curse of the Werewolf.

The film premiered on the liner Queen Elizabeth while crossing of the Atlantic in May 1958.

Release date: 17 September 1958.

Hammer Films released British science fiction horror film The Quatermass Xperiment [The Creeping Unknown] in 1955, but once they had released Dracula in London on 21 May 1958 they were then the House of Horror, no longer of British thriller films like The Snorkel.

Guy Green said Peter van Eyck ‘had to do a lot of difficult swimming and, one day after spending most of the morning manfully keeping up with a motorboat from which he was being photographed, Peter said, “You never asked me if I could swim before giving me the part.” It was true. I didn’t.’

English former child actress Mandy Miller (born Carmen Isabella Miller on 23 July 1944) made a number of films in the 1950s: The Man in the White Suit (1951) as Gladdie, I Believe In You (1952) as Child, Mandy (1952) as Mandy, Background (1953) as Linda Lomax, Adventure in the Hopfields (1954) as Jenny Quin, Dance Little Lady (1954) as Jill Gordon, The Secret (1955) as Katie Martin, Raising a Riot (1955) as Anne Kent, The Feminine Touch (1956) as Jessie, Child in the House (1956) as Elizabeth Lorimer, and The Snorkel (1958) as Candy Brown.

The cast are Peter van Eyck as Paul Decker, Betta St John as Jean Edwards, Mandy Miller as Candy Brown, Grégoire Aslan as Inspector, William Franklyn as Wilson, Marie Burke as daily, Irene Prador as French woman, Henri Vidon as Italian gardener, Armand Guinle as waiter, Robert Rietti as Station Sergeant, and David Ritch as hotel clerk.

Guy Green won an Oscar as cinematographer for Great Expectations in 1948. Among his films as director are Sea of Sand (1958), The Snorkel (1958). SOS Pacific (1959), The Angry Silence (1960), The Mark (1961), Light in the Piazza (1962), Diamond Head (1963), A Patch of Blue (1965), Pretty Polly (1967), The Magus (1968), A Walk in the Spring Rain (1969), Luther (1974), Jacqueline Susann’s Once Is Not Enough (1975), and The Devil’s Advocate (1977).

© Derek Winnert 2024 – Classic Movie Review 12,851

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com