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The Third Secret (1964) More at IMDbPro »

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14 comments in total

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17 out of 18 people found the following comment useful :-
Suspenseful, 25 October 2002

Author: Joan Daniels from Washington, DC

I was the edge of my seat! A suspenseful Who Done It with compelling performances by Pamela Franklin and Stephen Boyd in challengingly complex roles. The plot is fairly progressive for its time - the topic of mental illness still somewhat taboo in our society. I read somewhere that Stephen Boyd was so taken with the story and the character, he took a sizeable pay cut to play the role of Alex. Versatile actor that he was, he seemed to most enjoy those demanding and unusual character roles with substance and depth that really challenge an actor and in which he performed so notably well. And Pamela Franklin, at the age of 14, is an incredible actress taking on a role that veterans would not have managed nearly as well.

Great story - great film - great acting!

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12 out of 13 people found the following comment useful :-
Memorable English Thriller, 17 April 1999
Author: Merv Lowe from Auckland,New Zealand

I first saw this movie-a 16mm print- at the Auckland Grammar School film club in 1967, and it left an indelible impression on me: first-class performances by Stephen Boyd and Pamela Franklin; the black and white photography accentuated the 'brooding' atmosphere of the movie; the surprising twist with rising tension and panic near the end - all combine to make this a stand-out British thriller in the genre of 'The Wicker Man'. The last scene is very moving: condensation running down the window is symbolic of tears of despair, regret, remorse, inner turmoil and paradoxically - 'release'

A haunting (not in the horror sense) and unsettling film - a classic film noir.

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11 out of 13 people found the following comment useful :-
Striking psychological thriller, 5 July 1999
Author: Grasse from Rome, Italy

I first saw this as a kid, in 1970, on tv, and thought the nightmare sequence at Diane Cilento's home to be one of the scariest scenes I'd ever seen on film. After 29 years the impact is somewhat diluted, but overall the film holds together pretty well. Take a look at the extraordinary Douglas Slocombe panavision cinematography, the driven performances of Franklin and Boyd - an underrated actor if there ever was one - the striking set pieces on the Thames riverbank. It should be restored and re-issued on a VERY big screen. Scorsese, where art thou?

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8 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
A taut, brooding mystery, with Stephen Boyd well-cast in the lead., 30 April 1999

Author: Aldanoli from Ukiah, California

A British psychologist has apparently committed suicide, but his teenage daughter is convinced it was murder and asks one of his patients (Stephen Boyd, as an expatriate American journalist) to investigate. Somber, brooding, introspective tale, with Boyd well-cast in the lead; elegantly written (worthwhile just for the dialogue), and moodily shot in black and white. Regrettably, the film is inaccurate in its portrayal of psychiatry; despite what the script says, people suffering from paranoid schizophrenia are no more likely to be murderers than anyone else, and people with schizophrenia cannot hide their illness as though they were undercover spies. That small suspension of disbelief aside, the film ruminates on all sorts of interesting ideas that fit together like inlaid wood.

The film is enhanced by an excellent cast, including Jack Hawkins, Richard Attenborough, and Diane Cilento as the three suspects, the now-legendary Judi Dench in her first credited role, and the much under-rated child actress, Pamela Franklin, as the psychologist's daughter. In particular, though, Attenborough's performance as an awkward, insecure art dealer stands out as a remarkable contrast to his performance in another film of 1964--"Guns at Batasi," in which he plays a tough, almost indestructible British Army sergeant.

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7 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
Spooky and erotic, 26 December 2005

Author: foxfirebrand from United States

Pamela Franklin is at her precocious best in this tale of "psychoanalytical" intrigue with boundary-crossing sexual overtones. Precocity often took her into territory it's now fashionable to call "inappropriate," such as the schoolgirl love interest she played with a randy old artist in "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie." Though understated and implicit in "The Third Secret," her emotionally-troubled character's relationship with Stephen Boyd's character is in this same vein. All of 18 when I saw this in theatrical release, I was captivated. The movie is still a guilty pleasure, though you have to suspend a lot of disbelief to get back in that naive early-60s groove when sexuality was still portrayed indirectly through characters who were not exactly the Free Spirits that populated such films later in the decade.

Look for a spooky cinematic trick toward the end of the film, when Stephen Boyd's character is just starting to unravel the big Secret. Pamela makes a statement about how many patients her father had-- Stephen thinks he misheard her, and asks her to repeat what she said. Watch carefully for the "subliminal" trick, which could easily go unnoticed-- it made the hair on my arms stand up.

Hokey in parts, and based on some then-commonplace misconceptions about psychiatric disorders, the movie still works if you can accept it on its own terms. At the very least its understatement is a refreshing change from the noise-saturated frantic bombast of today's not-so-spooky films, with their mindless reliance on sensory overload and oh-so-special effects.

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4 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :-
Stephen Boyd Best Performance, 11 December 2004

Author: leopardgirl99 from USA

This is an excellent movie featuring actor Stephen Boyd who once again exhibited his ability to perform well with a mediocre script. The movie has a great story line and good suspense. This is one of Boyd's best performances. The actor made about 50 movies.

The cast was superb and it tells the story of a psychiatrist and the few patients he had before he is murdered at the beginning of the movie. The patients are all successful and relatively normal people that on the surface seem to fit into society, but definitely have neurotic tendencies with self-esteem issues at best.

Boyd's character is that of a cynical American news reporter stationed in England where he mocks his own country-men on TV and his character is brilliant.

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3 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
I Love This Film!, 19 March 2006

Author: rockandrollhellcat from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Warning! Contains spoiler! I saw this movie on television many years ago. Being a Pamela Franklin fan, I just had to watch it. It was a very good movie with a wonderful surprise ending! Very suspenseful. The entire cast is great. It's a very unusual story. I can't get the scene of Ms. Franklin trying to stab Steven Boyd with a pair of scissors out of my head! Reminds me of the scene where she kills Dirk Bogard with a fire poker in "Our Mother's House." Pamela has done a lot of interesting film roles that are different from the norm. This is one of them and definitely worth seeing. I hope they will release this on DVD one day soon!

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1 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
Secret behind the wall, 17 May 2009

Author: dbdumonteil

Charles Crichron had already succeeded in the difficult task of having an adult and a child perform together :"the hunting" was one of the most moving British movies of the fifties as well as Dirk Bogarde's first important role .

The Stephen -Messala-Boyd/Pamela Franklin pairing may seem strange first but this girl was really a wiz kid for she had already proved it in such works as Clayton's "the innocents" and "our mother's house" .Some kind of Jodie Foster of the sixties,she didn't make the career she deserved.

A shrink has been murdered and his patients are all suspects;Boyd portrays one of them,investigating the others 'life and meeting his daughter (Franklin) ,a disturbed girl who writes strange lines on a wall and who seems to know things better left unsaid.Many scenes take place by the sea on a lugubrious beach children forgot a long time ago.

Intriguing.

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1 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
Exploits your expectations then disappoints., 11 March 2009

Author: Charlesc-5 from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

I didn't HATE this movie, but was grossly disappointed.

This movie does a very good job of leading you into thinking one thing is going to happen, something very intriguing and exciting, rather, something quite ordinary happens (in the world of films) instead.

"Local Hero" is perhaps the greatest movie which toys with the viewer's expectations. This movie, starting with its promotion, exploits them.

You'll be disappointed when "the twist" finally arrives. The joke will be on you, and not in a good way. It's more like, aha! You thought this was going to be an INTERESTING movie, didn'tcha! Instead, it's the movie you FEARED it was going to be - ORDINARY.

The film's only interesting performances come when it delves into the lives of the late doctors patients. These vignettes end up being episodic and feel completely detached from the main story. Again, you will feel exploited being taken down these roads then have your course changed to go down another dead end.

There are others here who take the girl's performance to of value, but her performance comes off as stilted even at the best of times. For the wooden Stephen Boyd to end up showing more depth of performance than this girl, is not a compliment to either. She was cast as being 14, but is painfully mature for that age. (she was actually 18, as I've read elsewhere, and she LOOKS 18) That discrepancy is made even more uncomfortable when at 14, she supposed to be too young to understand what sex is. It doesn't work.

Lastly, while I did love the period black and white photography, the quality of the sound recording was claustrophobic. Its lack of Foley depth, something which many English productions at the time lacked, has the dialog all sounding like you're sitting inside of a recording sound booth.

Fairly new to DVD, there might be some tempted, but you will be disappointed and understand why this hadn't been released to date. It's just not that good.

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1 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
Who killed the therapist?, 23 June 2008

Author: theowinthrop from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

It was not that Stephen Boyd was a second stringer performer. He did do splendidly in those films that were written well, such as "Messala" in "Ben-Hur", or as the Irish agent for the Nazis in "The Man Who Never Was". He is an admirable foil for Tyrone Power in "Abandon Ship!" But much of his work was in second rate films. His last movie was called "Graf Dracula", and he played the Count.

But in 1964 he turned in what may have been his saddest, most poignant performance as "Alex Stedman". He is one of several patients being treated by a psychiatrist named Dr. Whitset. He is roused by the police one day - his psychiatrist was murdered. The patients of Dr. Whitset are the ones who are the suspects, because in his private files Whitset mentions one of them as having a dangerous twist of their personality. The ill-fated Doctor felt he could control this twist and save the patient. The problem is that the patient remains unnamed, so the Doctor's patients are all under suspicion.

They are a mixed bag and Stedman begins his own investigation. He does this because he discovers the Doctor had a daughter named Catherine (Pamela Franklin) who is apparently upset but not letting out her emotions. They form a close attachment, and Stedman discusses his investigations with her. He sees (among others) a high court justice ( Jack Hawkins); a woman's clothing dealer (Richard Attenborough); and Diane Cilento. In the end he gradually finds out who was the killer - and it destroys the stability he has been creating by his investigation.

A little knowledge proves dangerous to Boyd in more than one way. The conclusion of this, his best movie role, is unforgettably sad and bleak.

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