UnowPriceless hyped garbage

Catangro After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Ezmae Chang This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Juana what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Michael_Elliott Hysteria (1965) ** (out of 4) Nice direction and fine performances can't save this Hammer thriller, which owes a few things to fellow Britishman Alfred Hitchcock. Chris Smith (Robert Webber) wakes up after a near fatal car crash and realizes that he can't remember a thing about himself. After getting out of the hospital he tries to learn about his past and starts with a magazine photo he had of a woman. It turns out this woman was brutally murdered but soon Chris sees the woman and something just isn't right. HYSTERIA owes a lot to VERTIGO and if you're seen that Hitchcock movie then this here is just going to feel like a very cheap rip-off. Around the fifteen-minute mark I realized that there were only two ways this story could work out. There was going to be a true way or there was going to be a cheat. I won't reveal which one actually happens but I found this film to be well made but its story was just so lazy and boring that I often found myself losing focus. Director Freddie Fisher does a very good job keeping the film moving at a nice pace and this here is something that's pretty hard to do when the story is boring. He also brings a nice touch of style to the scenes but there's only so much he can do. Webber, best known for his role in 12 ANGRY MEN, offers up a good and believable performance as does supporting players Anthony Newlands, Lelia Goldoni and Jennifer Jayne. The biggest criticism would have to go to the jazz music score, which is so wrong for this picture that I'm amazed that no one cut it. If you've ever seen a silent picture from a cheap public domain company you know they'll just throw any jazz score on it even if it doesn't fit the picture. Well, it seems like Hammer did that here.

kidboots Beautiful Lelia Goldini looks as though she has just stepped off the cover of a 1965 edition of Vogue!!! This terrific movie was produced by Hammer films in the style of "Charade" (the movie with Audrey Hepburn and Cary Grant) which happened to be in the style of Hitchcock but was directed by Stanley Donen. Anyway "Hysteria" was directed by Freddie Francis and seemed like it should have been written by Brian Clemens (it was written by Jimmie Sangster who wrote the screenplay of "The Nanny" and a lot of those Hammer chillers from the late 1950s). I didn't know anything about this movie, only that I could vividly remember Robert Weber being the brash Madison Avenue ad man in the original "Twelve Angry Men".Weber plays Chris Smith, also a brash opportunist (maybe a bit of typecasting)!! There is one sequence where he has to get out of France in a hurry so he insinuates himself into the good graces of an English girl who is driving back to Britain (it was definitely Sue Lloyd). She smuggles him out of the country at great risk to herself and he repays her at a service station by.....!!! I kept wondering whether this was the way Britain viewed the Americans in their country and if so they obviously didn't like what they saw.The movie starts out as Weber, an amnesiac victim, grasps for clues to his identity from a patient psychiatrist. A mysterious benefactor is paying for his medical bills and for a luxury penthouse apartment (the estate agency is clearly displayed on a sign, wouldn't it have been easier just to make inquiries off them)?? But no, Chris hires the services of a quirky private detective (Maurice Denham) and when a mysterious beauty (Goldini) keeps appearing, the same girl whose picture was found on Chris and who was, presumably, killed a few weeks before, nobody believes him. There is also the problem of raised voices that Chris hears from the vacant flat, always late at night!!Just when you think you know where the plot is going, Chris's confession turns everything on it's head. Jennifer Jayne as the nurse plays the film's only sympathetic character. This movie has such a swinging sixties London look from the opulent penthouse to Goldini's wardrobe to the offbeat jazz soundtrack.

Coventry Hammer studios gained fame and fortune by producing tons of eerie horror films, filled with monsters, madmen or classic gothic influences. In short, films high on adrenalin and action. Hysteria is one of their least known films just because it's the exact opposite. It's a mysterious, slow-moving thriller that requires a little more thinking and involvement from the viewer. An American (Robert Webber, known from cinema classics like `12 Angry Men' and `Bring me the Head of Alfredo Garcia') wakes up in a British hospital after a car-accident. He suffers from a bad case of amnesia and he has to start digging into his own past and personality. The only thing he was carrying at the time of the accident was a picture of a stunningly beautiful, mysterious girl! Also, someone is paying for his hospital bills and arranged an apartment for him but he has no idea who that is.Hysteria contains a few nice and unpredictable twists and the screenplay is overall solid and realistic. Alfred Hitchcock influences are never far away. Jimmy Sangster, who delivered many decent scripts for Hammer productions in his career, wrote the film and co-produced. There's a compelling atmosphere to detect and the cheap black and white photography helps increasing the suspense. Too bad about the constant guiding Jazz music which isn't really appropriate for this type of film. Judging by modern standards, the film is now pretty dated and heavily flawed, but with the right state of mind, you'll be enjoying this old-fashioned, low budgeted film. Freddie Francis is a professional director, not afraid to bring a little diversity in his career. He directed famous Hammer stories (Dracula has Risen from the Grave, the Creeping Flesh) as well as modest, more story driven tales like this one but also `Paranoiac' and `Nightmare'. Good acting as well! Robert Webber is very convincing and the gorgeous beauty Lelia Goldina (Invasion of the Body Snatchers) portrays a terrific muse. Recommended!

jamesraeburn2003 Hysteria concluded the trilogy of psychological thrillers that Freddie Francis directed for Hammer. The series began with Paranoiac (1963) and Nightmare (1964). The plot concerns an American amnesia victim Chris Smith (Robert Webber), whom is being used as a tool by the ruthless Dr Keller (Anthony Newlands) and his beautiful mistress (Lelia Goldoni). Between them they plan to frame Chris for the murder of Keller's wife, but their clever plan proves to be their own outdoing. In 1965, it was poorly received by critics and the public, but it's a gripping thriller and Freddie Francis directs the somewhat far fetched script by Jimmy Sangster with pace, building it neatly to it's climax. The black and white Cinematography by John Wilcox manages some decent compositions of a gray and dank 1960's London. The only criticism is the somewhat unsuitable music score by Don Banks, which is too jazzy for this type of film.