Il terrore non ha confini

Cheaply made and slow moving B movie, it even uses the sets from "Z cars", (which are supposed to be Scotland Yard - this is on the coast of France) twice, in two different locations, a police station and a morgue.

An American insurance agent investigates the death of a film star and suspects a psychiatric clinic in France. By a huge and unexplained coincidence he happens to find a well upholstered ex working there.

Dull, dull, cliche ridden film . Brainwashing has been used as a topic for many interesting films(IPCRESS FILE for one). This 1950s British film is not one of them. Instead we get a very basic storyline with no punches whatsoever. Rod Cameron sleepwalks throughout, looking like he would much rather be in a Western. There is an annoying love angle thrown in and some two dimensional characters(mad scientist, caring scientist, power hungry industrialist, rock jawed hero,psycho etc.). The result is a very boring film with no delivery whatsoever. Only the poor viewer is brainwashed.

In Charles Eric Maine's excellent (for its day) novel, a scientist invents a mind-tape-recorder (helmet on the head, bazillion-track tape), hoping to use it for Good, like studying mental disorders. A movie mogul gets hold of it and soon billions of people waste their lives and their savings in tanks "experiencing" recorded porn or schmaltz (ultraslow replay intensifies the sensations). The scientist decides to take drastic measures, batters the mogul to death and plays the recording to the billions, hoping to scare them back to reality. Instead they die and the book ends as he's about to be sentenced for the death of the mogul, raising the ethical question of the collateral damage.

Bear in mind that when Maine wrote this, brain waves were novel, magnetic sound recording was only about a decade old and video recording was still in the future.

In the Z-grade film, the WHOLE story is ripped out (daren't offend Hollywood) and we're left with an ordinary quarter-inch reel-to-reel recorder and a squawking electronic soundtrack that has nothing to do with the action on screen. I've completely forgotten the new plot, but vaguely remember people in leotards writhing around some cheesy gauzes to hint at forbidden pleasures.

I'd give it an award for Worst Adaptation ever.

Saw this movie in DC when it first came out. It Was called The dream Machine. Now the name has changed and the DVD of it has a Large amount a footage edited out.

British made - with scarcely a British accent evident, Escapement is an extremely corny B-Film yet somehow gripping. Rod Cameron's wooden all-american hero chews the scenery while Mary Murphy's natural beauty makes that scenery glow. This film would certainly not have won any awards for sound design as the soundtrack of primitive electronic 'music' is overdone and jarring, at times competing with the dialogue.