Summer of Secrets (1976) User Reviews

Lifeless Film Lacks Stylistic Touch.

[rsoonsa · 2/10 · 2 April 2007]

The director of this film, Jim Sharman, gained renown following his 1975 piece, ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW, a quaint work that, several years after its release, became a cultish favourite. However, this Australian film's poor narrative balance dooms it from its opening scenes. A young couple, Steve and Kym (Andrew Sharp/Nell Campbell), after enjoying a frivolous day of boating, go ashore upon an apparently deserted island where they intend to use an abandoned house, once lived in by friends of Steve's family, as a spot for romance, unaware that an unbalanced scientist, Dr. Beverley Adams (Arthur Dignam), resides nearby, his existence vitiated by the death of his wife, Rachel. An assistant to the doctor, Bob (Rufus Collins), espies the pair, kidnaps Kym and takes her to the mad doctor's home wherein she is drugged and subsequently coerced into role playing as Rachel, the girl having taken the eye of both Adams and Bob, the former intending to infuse her into his filmed record of the deceased woman. Since Adams has not wished to fully accept the death of Rachel, he has cryogenically preserved her body. Connecting threads of the story weave an enigmatic relationship between Bob and the preserved Rachel. While Adams watches old films of Rachel as an Apache dancer in a Rio de Janeiro nightclub, the bewildered Steve and Kym attempt to flee the doctor's lair. When Beverley strives to demonstrate that he can restore life to his late spouse, she disappoints him by obviously being largely interested in physical involvement with a possibly guileful Bob. A film that begins as an uninspired open air adventure is transposed into an uninspiring fantasy tale burdened with several ancillary plot lines that lead to nowhere, a production that has been properly ignored by those fey types responsible for converting ROCKY HORROR into a long-running faddish event. There is naught here that a viewer will find particularly offensive, but the screenplay provides thin material for the cast, although the players work hard at creating their roles, with Dignam gathering in acting laurels for his accomplished turn as the deranged Adams. A fine score is contributed by Cameron Allen.