The Fourth Victim — The Fourth Victim( Blu Ray)
The Fourth Victim is a Spanish Giallo/thriller set in the UK. The film is from the early ’70s and is very much more on the mystery/ gore-less side of the genre- and I must say it was a most intriguing, slowly twisting ‘n’ turning film regarding a man whose wife’s keep dying. Here from Severin is a Blu Ray release of this rarely seen film/ lesser-known Spanish Giallo.
The Fourth Victim (Death at the Deep End of the Swimming Pool, The Fourth Mrs Anderson, La última señora Anderson) appeared in the year 1971. It was directed by Ceuta, Spain born Eugenio Martín- who had a good grounding in genre films- taking in titles like Spanish/ German Krimi Hypnosis(1962), on the train horror with Christopher Lee and Pete Cushing Horror Express (1972), and killer in a guest house horror/ thriller It Happened at Nightmare Inn (1973). The Fourth Victim is an evenly-paced, and well enough acted film, which really does pull you in with its wonderfully twisting ‘n’ turning plot.
The film kicks off with mystery straight away- as we see a blond-haired woman floating on a see-through inflatable in a grand outdoor swimming pool. It seems she’s just fallen asleep, as she has a lit cigarette in her hand- in time this presses against the side of the inflatable- it pops, and the woman is left face down in the water, meaning she’s just died somehow. We see a middle age and woman coming out to the pool, saying nothing but dragging the body out taking the corpse inside a nearby mansion- removing the bathing suit, and dressing it in a brown dress- next the doctor comes in and signs the death certificate. We find out soon enough that the man is Arthur Anderson(Michael Craig) the wealthy owner of the house, and the woman is his long severing housekeeper Felicity(Miranda Campa).
Next, we see Mr Anderson bury the woman from the pool- who we find out it's his third wife. Just as the ceremony is finished, up pops moustached and hatted Inspector Dunphy(José Luis López Vázquez) who on the English soundtrack is dubbed with a rather dodgy sounding Welsh accent. He informs Mr Anderson that there is doubt about how/why his wife died- so she has to be dug up, next thing he’s under arrest- landing up in court under a murder charge, as we find out his other two wives have died suspiciously- after some back and forth he’s found not guilty.
Some weeks pass, and he's returned to the marital home- and while looking at a portrait of his last wife-he’s startled by a splash in the swimming pool- he rushes down to see who it is, and finds a woman who introduces herself as Julie Spencer( Carroll Bake), and she lives in a nearby mansion which she calls Dracula’s castle. All this happens in the first fifteen or so minutes of the film, and from here we go through the is he/ isn’t the killer plotting, and find out who exactly is the strange woman who turned up at the pool.
The film unfolds most intriguingly- with both the mystery and plot twists appearing in a nicely paced manner. As mentioned in my introduction the film is totally goreless (aside from a very brief flash) and the few deaths largely appear off camera. So The Fourth Victim very much sits on the edge of both traditionally thriller and Giallo- and I must say I was very captivated by what’s on offer here, finding it one of the more engrossing thrillers/ Giallo I’ve seen in some time.
Moving onto this Region A locked Blu Ray- and we get a nice clean and clear 2k scan of the film, which nicely enhances both the largely English countryside setting and the glamorous/ creepy gothic interior of the two mansions in the film. We get both Italian and English dubs for the film. On the extras side, all we get is Eugenio Martín, Auteur- this is a fifteen-minute on-screen interview with Eugenio Martín Biographer Carlos Aguila- this is worth a play, as he gives a good insight into how talented a director was and the many different genres he made films in- going from westerns, horror, thrillers, comedies, period films, etc. We get a two-minute cut scene dubbed in Italian and an original trailer of the film.
If you dig the more mystery focused side of the Giallo genre, you need to check out The Fourth Victim- as it’s a most compelling example of the genre- featuring some great/ surprising plot twists along its length. With Severin giving a great new presentation of the film- it’s a pity it’s a little light on the extras side, but I know this isn’t always possible/ feasible- when films like this are so rare/unseen.