Kill Her Gently

"Martin" (Griffith Jones) is driving home one evening when he picks up two hikers. Once in his car, he realises that they are those wanted by police having just escaped from prison. They don't know he knows, and so are rather taken aback by his proposal. He will give them money and a path out of the country - if they agree to murder his wife "Kay" (Maureen Connell). The more brutal of the two - "Connors" (Marc Lawrence) readily agrees and his sidekick "Sven" (George Mikell) is soon on board as they arrive at his home where he concocts a plan to get their money whilst they do the deed. Of course, things don't quite go to plan - the police are looking for the escapees and his wife isn't quite the shrinking violet type. Is she toast or will they manage to get away with it? The premiss is quite interesting by virtue of the supposed spontaneity of the plan. Sadly, though, once they are all housebound the plot starts to unravel and there is just a bit too much hysteria as "Connors" decides killing is not the only crime he wants to get up to. The last ten minutes do have a certain vindication to them, but by then the thing had largely run out of steam. Though I did quite enjoy this, the narrative could have been better focussed around a cast of competent B-listers who do their jobs adequately in a feature that had more potential.

Two escaping convicts hitch a ride with someone who may be more disturbed than either of them. Griffith Jones is well cast as a cool, mannered and devious husband with emotional baggage to spare with Maureen Connell as his well-meaning and unfortunate spouse.

As one previous reviewer has noted, this is quite a brutal film in its sometimes violent treatment of both male and female characters. The film quality as seen on the estimable TPTV was far from perfect but didn't detract from the pace of the narrative. Although the casting of an American and a European as the escapees was obviously intended to attract a wider global audience, the latter role (George Mikel) was underwritten; the plaudits for the film mainly go to Marc Lawrence, who I had only really previously known in his roles in Diamonds Are Forever ("I didn't know that there was a pool down there "), and The Man with the Golden Gun.

Thus was it described by Chibnall & McFarlane in 'The British 'B' Film' in 2009. The evidently tiny budget actually enhances this raw little hostage drama which begins like Edgar Ulmer's 'Detour' (1945) with Griffith Jones giving a lift to two desperadoes. Not surprisingly the film was released only after delays and cuts.

One of the hitch-hikers is played by one of Hollywood's meanest-looking heavies ever, the ferrity-faced Marc Lawrence; who back in America himself later directed the similar 'Nightmare in the Sun'.

"Kill her gently" is another brilliant example of B toughness in british 1950's cinema. And I do not know any other movie by the director Charles Saunders who directs energically this psycho hostage story in the main setting of a house. Marc Lawrence is a powerful threatening badman, Griffith Jones is the husband taken in hostage with his beautiful wife Maureen Connell threatened by Marc Lawrence but always resisting (what a performance), and Marianne Brauns is another Marc Lawrence's victim. And virtuoso shootings in the main violent scenes. Don't grip on the few mistakes in the story.

In 1957's Kill Her Gently, Connors (Marc Lawrence) and Svenson (George Mikell), an American and a Swede, escape from prison and are picked up by a man, Jeff Martin (Griffith Jones) on his way home. He knows who they are and tells the police blockade that they are two friends.

The escapees don't quite understand why he's being so nice, until he offers them 1000 pounds to kill his wife. In exchange, he offers to get them out of the country that night.

The men put on an act of treating both Jeff and wife Kay (Maureen Connell) as hostages.

Turns out that the true looney-tunes in this group is Jeff. Kay cheated on him with the doctor who had him committed. Well, he doesn't seem to have fully recovered.

Kay is the one with the money, but when the monthly deposit hasn't yet arrived, tensions grow, and Jeff needs to sell his car. He's arranged for them to leave by evening, but they're not going anywhere without the money.

Eventually bodies start piling up in this violent and misogynistic film. Director Charles Saunders keeps the tension going. The American and British cast was for a wider distribution of the film. Marc Lawrence seems to be the biggest name, living in Europe due to being blacklisted.