"SEANCE ON A WET AFTERNOON".......A WELL DONE, RARE MEDIUM......

Seance On A Wet Afternoon (1964)   For all his brilliance, Alfred Hitchcock was never one to delve too deeply into the psychosis of his villains......(unless you include the psychiatrist's laborious explanation of Norman Bates' behavior at the end of "Psycho".......)

                  So imagine, if you will, if Hitchcock had turned one of his thrillers inside out and concentrated the entire movie on the criminal perpetrators........with everyone else (cops, victims, assorted bystanders) kept strictly in the film's peripheral vision.......

                 And that's director Bryan Forbes' 'Seance On A Wet Afternoon', a quiet, moody two-character piece featuring two astounding performances by Kim Stanley and Richard Attenborough.....

                  We wouldn't dare spoil the pure pleasure of the film with any detailed description of the sad, strange backstory of the would-be villains they play,  Myra and Bill Savage.........a middle-aged couple who eke out a meager living from Myra displaying her supposed psychic power at seances she holds in their home.

                  In one of our perverse moods, we imagined that this is what Barbara Harris and Bruce Dern's 'Family Plot' characters might look like if they'd grown old together.......

                  Kim Stanley's Myra, veering back and forth from methodical calculation to complete madness, talks Attenborough's long-suffering, weak willed Bill into kidnapping a child. Not for ransom.....but to ultimately increase Myra's prestige (and income) as a medium, once she gains fame by correctly identifying the location of the abducted little girl.....

                 Of course, their grand scheme goes hopelessly awry in multiple ways........but the plot mechanics here, unlike a Hitchcock film, are not the main attraction.......if ever a thriller belonged only to its actors, it's this one.

                 You quickly realize that this is a film taking all its energy and suspense from the bravura work of two actors at the very top of their game......an intense character study of two damaged souls spiraling ever downward.  They're pathetic, scary and tragic......all at once.

                  Stanley and Attenborough stay center stage as they deliver a master class in superb performance. (We could hear ourselves visibly wincing at the recollection that Stanley lost a Best Actress Oscar for this......to Julie Andrews as Mary Poppins)

                  See for yourself.......perfect viewing for a cold, wet afternoon. Or any time. We happily, easily bestow this with 5 stars (*****) a BQ FIND OF FINDS.