The Penthouse – 1967 | 96 mins | Drama, Thriller | Colour

Plot Synopsis

A pretentious exercise in grim exploitive sadism based on the original stage play The Meter Man by Scott Forbes. The story of Peter Collinson’s debut feature isn’t opened up for the big screen and is predominantly set in a claustrophobic and dimly lit penthouse flat.

Married estate agent Bruce Victor (Terence Morgan) has access to an unfinished penthouse flat and this becomes the love nest for his trysts with mistress Barbara Willason (Suzy Kendall). Early one morning the illicit lovers are awoken by two intruders posing as gas board workmen; Tom and Dick (Tony Beckley and Norman Rodway), a knife-wielding pair of villains. They bind Victor to a chair and fill Willason full of whiskey, encourage her into a striptease, then each rape her in the bedroom as her bound lover looks on helplessly.

As Victor is listening to the self-justifying monologues and musings on the sad state of the world from the two manipulating psychopaths; then after over a day of physical and mental torment they let themselves out and slip away. Then the doorbell rings again, this time it’s Harry (Martine Beswick), the frequently related-to colleague of Tom and Dick. Harry claims she is the duo’s parole officer and that she has brought them back to under guard to apologise. Against their better judgement, Miss Willason and Victor allow them inside the apartment once again. The trio once again bind Victor and Miss Willason to a chair before dancing around them, and once again flitting out the door.