Experiment in Terror (1962)

The opening scene has a bank teller (Lee Remick) pulling into her dark garage and being seized from behind as she exits her car. For several very long, way- too-close-up minutes, her captor whispers and wheezes threats designed to get her to steal for him. The effect isn't terrifying or suspenseful -- just kinda uncomfortable. The whole movie sort of feels that way: menacing eroticism being favored over tension created by the upcoming crime.

There are two really good scenes, in my opinion: 1) Remick being mistaken for a working girl when accidentally picking up the wrong guy at a scheduled meet and 2) a nervous woman waiting for the cops in her mannequin-stuffed apartment. Nothing else is really worth remembering.

I say this experiment fails.

B-