Cinema: Tryst with a Twist

The Penthouse. An adulterous real estate dealer (Terence Morgan) and his bird (Suzy Kendall) appropriate his client's penthouse pad for a love-in. Next morning two men (Tony Beckley and Norman Rodway) arrive, ostensibly to check the gas meter. A moment later, one of them brandishes a switchblade knife and suddenly gives the tryst a dreadful twist. Introducing themselves as Tom and Dick—Harry, they giggle, is waiting downstairs—the men truss Morgan with ribbons, and force Kendall to down tumblers of Johnnie Walker and puff on a marijuana joint. Then, mind-blown and stoned, she is twice raped, while her lover writhes helplessly at knifepoint.

Eventually the party is joined by "Harry," a sadistic lesbian who, amid threats of murder, leads her partners round and round the couple, slapping and screaming at the victims. Without warning, the tormentors abruptly skitter out the door, never to return. By now, the real estate man's cowardice and his girl's latent nymphomania have surfaced. Shattered by the ordeal and its revelations, they cannot bear to talk to each other and end their affair.

Given the idea for a far-out Pinteresque horror story, British Writer-Director Peter Collinson soon bores it to death. Tom launches into portentous metaphors about abused alligators who cannot be blamed for devouring men, and ice that is taken for granted until it melts. Dick continually slavers and picks his teeth, as if the viewer needed to be reminded that he is disgusting. In the principal roles, Morgan and Kendall seem paralyzed—presumably less by fear than by the knowledge that they are supposed to be stretching a one-set drama into a feature film. Despite some flashy hall-of-mirrors camera work, Penthouse is as vacant as a house for sale, emptied by film makers who couldn't let hell enough alone.