Let's Talk About Sexual Psychosis!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                             I mean, girls, what other kind is there? Because, when one stops to think, many mental disorders boil down to a sexually disturbed aspect.

                               But I am not here to play clinician.  Far be it from me.

                               I want to discuss sexual psychosis in films.  Not the really great ones, like "Psycho," but the more campy ones.  You see, while Hammer was doing their redos of Frankenstein and Dracula, with the likes of Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing, they were also turning out some campy psychosis films, only one of which, "Die! Die! My Darling!" was a genuine hit.

                                 The trio I will discuss were not hits, making them very obscure.  I had never heard of them, till recently, and what grabbed me were their titles.

                                   So, here we go!

                                                                           "Straight On Till Morning," 1972--You have got to hear this one, girls, to believe it.  Rita Tushingham plays a plain Jane named Brenda, living with her mother in Liverpool.  She writes fairy tales for children, which is one account for the title, which is straight out of J.M. Barrie's "Peter Pan."   Brenda, who is already disturbed, wants to leave home, and have a baby.  No, she is not pregnant, or near menopause, she just wants a baby, and does not care who the father is, just that he knocks her up! So, there is no full deck here, already.  She meets this mysterious, reclusive young man, named Peter.  She moves in with Peter, leaving her roommate, Caroline. Peter pursues Caroline, beds her, and kills her, because he cannot stand that she is beautiful.
He likes Brenda's plainness, and when Brenda buys a dog, and pretties it up, that is it for the dog.  She then wants to pretty herself for Peter, and when she does, he lures her into his bedroom, where he plays a tape of him killing the dog, and Caroline.  Later, Peter is alone in the apartment.  No sign of Brenda.

                                                                               What the movie seems to ignore is the why behind Peter's hatred of beauty.  I can tell you; it is simple! His mother was a tarted up prostitute, and he hated her for being one, so beauty became associated with trampiness.  Or maybe she just tarted herself up, and had incestuous relations with him, thereby abusing him.  This would set anyone off. But Rita Tushingham, seven years from "Doctor Zhivago," playing someone so desperate to have a baby, she does not who the father is?  Screws are loose already!!!!!!!!!!!  What a hoot!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Demons Of The Mind," 1972--Same year as 'Morning', and same leading player--Shane Briant.

Now, girls, if you remember the American film "The Mad Room," from 1969, with Stella Stevens, this may seem familiar to you.

In this film, a widower locks his two children in an attic, fearful they will go mad and die, like his wife.  He hires a doctor to supervise them, but guess what?  The children turn to each other, and incest results.  Somehow, they are set free, and murders begin to occur in the region.  What I want to know is whether the mother really was mad, or is it the father?  And who is doing the killings?  I bet it is the father who will blame his children, to go free in his own insanity!  Sick and twisted, this is a MUST for psychosis fans!!!!!!!!!!!!   A laugh riot!!!!!!!!!!!

"Fear In The Night," 1972--What a year for sexual psychosis!  Anyway, once I heard this had Judy Geeson, five years after "To Sir, With Love," I knew this one was for me. Here, Judy plays an emotionally fragile woman, just released from a mental institution, who goes with her husband, when he takes a job at an isolated boarding school, where she feels trapped and isolated, and is convinced she is being chased by a mysterious man with a prosthetic arm.  Now, if  this is not enough, get this--the headmaster and wife are played by Peter Cushing, and Joan Collins!!!!!!!!!!!!

That tells it all, right there.  Either Joan ripped Peter's arm, and now he vows vengeance on all women, or Joan is a woman hater killer, who refuses to be upstaged.  Judy was so good as Joan Crawford's crazy daughter, Angela, in "Berserk!," back in 1967, that I am sure she will be lively here, as she was there.  And Peter and Joan!  Oh, boy!  This should be Sexual Psychosis Supreme!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If you have seen any of these girls, tell me!  And if I ultimately see these, I will report back to you!

What could be more fun, than an evening of sexual psychosis???????????????????????