Reel Britannia

Taste Of Fear / Scream Of Fear (1961) "You say my mind is affecting my legs. You're wrong. It's my legs that are affecting my mind." Taste of Fear, released in 1961 and also known in some territories as Scream of Fear, is one of those wonderfully chilly British thrillers that shows just how much tension can be created without a drop of gore. Directed by Seth Holt for Hammer Films, it stands slightly apart from the studio's more famous horror output of the period. Instead of Gothic castles, vampires and lurid supernatural shocks, this is a sleek, sinister psychological suspense picture, elegant and unsettling in equal measure. The story centres on Penny Appleby, a young woman confined to a wheelchair, who arrives at her estranged father's Riviera home only to discover that he is mysteriously absent. Waiting there are her father's new wife Jane, the family doctor, and a coolly attentive chauffeur, all of whom seem polite on the surface but quietly difficult to trust. Almost at once, Penny begins to experience