Flanagan

After much frustration, I decided to quit *borrowing* DVDs and tapes from Blockbuster so am now just *buying* DVDs that I know I'll like or have already seen. Can someone tell me about "The Third Secret" (1964) with Stephen Boyd, Richard Attenborough, Diane Cilento, Pamela Franklin, and Jack Hawkins (introducing Judi Dench to movies!)? My main concerns are about how creepy/scary and/or sexy it might be. (I don't care to see women's breasts or read-ends in movies.)

This movie has a lot of my favorite actors and I'm excited to see a young Judi Dench.

Thank you.

Flanagan

Steve Crook

See the IMDb user comments.
They seem to (mainly) agree that it's quite thrilling rather than shocking and erotic rather than blatently sexy

Steve

D Cairns

You won't be likely to see any real nudity in a British film from 64. All I've ever seen from that period is an occasional photograph of a nude, and that's only allowable if it's very small in the frame, as in the weird porn mag Leslie Phillips is perusing in VIP. I think there's a semi-nude revue in INNOCENTS IN PARIS (54) but the girls are still partially draped.

So this one is probably safe. It's been screened on TV in the afternoon in the last few years, so it can't be TOO terrifying, either.

Flanagan

*Thank you* both! The "user comments" from imdb.com were especially helpful, exactly what I needed.

Many thanks,
Flanagan

merryowen

Quite

In 1964, most of the sex in the British Cinema was in the back row.

Simon Bermuda

Although some directors - Val Guest, for one - seemed eager to 'push the envelope', as it were, in scenes from THE DAY THE EARTH CAUGHT FIRE and 80, 000 SUSPECTS with, respectively, Janet Munro and Claire Bloom. And I've heard that Hammer used to make 'racier' versions of some films for foreign release.

There's also June Ritchie's topless bathtub scene in LIVE NOW, PAY LATER (1962) - although maybe that's an inadvertent side-effect of the film being shot open-matte and shown full-screen on TV, revealing rather more than either director or actress intended...

D Cairns

"Although some directors - Val Guest, for one - seemed eager to 'push the envelope', as it were"

That's true. Doesn't EXPRESSON BONGO have some saucy stuff in it too?

"And I've heard that Hammer used to make 'racier' versions of some films for foreign release."

The source for this seems to be the sub-Hammer company that made racier versions of THE FLESH AND THE FIENDS and one or two others. Hammer films were made in a single form, although some have been cut for different markets like TV.

"There's also June Ritchie's topless bathtub scene in LIVE NOW, PAY LATER (1962) - although maybe that's an inadvertent side-effect of the film being shot open-matte and shown full-screen on TV, revealing rather more than either director or actress intended..."

Wow! Never seen that. I think BODY HEAT was a bit more explicit on TV for the same reason, the bottom of the frame was cluttered with genitals and the top of the frame was full of boom microphones. Of the two, the microphones were more troubling.

Mr Cosmo

EXPRESSO BONGO has girls at a strip club with nipple covers and stockingtops which was I suppose daring in its day - but Val Guest also had Gilbert Harding in there to even things out. The DVD of THE DAY THE EARTH CAUGHT FIRE has Janet Munro topless in at least one of the gallery pictures - and Val refers to the topless scene in the audio commentary sayng that 2 versions existed, one for the USA and one for the UK. I think you have to be pretty sharp eyed to see anything in the DVD. (Janet Munro apparently wanted the scene in to prove to everyone she was grown up and wanted away from the little girl roles she had had up until then.)
I remember being surprised at seeing so much of June Ritchie on LIVE NOW PAY LATER when it showed up on TV, but in terms of mainstream, I think BEAT GIRL in 1960 may have given a very brief topless glance at one of the dancers just before there is an interruption from a gunshot. I know this is how it shows on TV now, but it may have been cut from the version that was issued.
I think we also had a naked female bottom in Ken Russell's film FRENCH DRESSING and I remember the British Catholic Herald advising everyone to avoid that film which probably did it some good.

dylan

June's nipples were quite visible when I saw the film in the cinema in 1962. In The Master of Ballantrae (1953) a gypsy dancer's nipples were visible through her transparent blouse although this was cut from the version shown on TV.

D.

tvden

in 1962 this would have been very erotic I can remember going to the Brighton Hipperdrome to see the follies as a lad and they were not allowed to move in the topless bits

Simon Bermuda

THE DAY THE EARTH CAUGHT FIRE is a favourite of mine. And BEAT GIRL - even if this one comes into the so-bad-it's good category. (Although the John Barry soundtrack, his first, is genuinely impressive, hinting at the origins of the '60s Bond sound.)

Maybe my memory's playing tricks - as I haven't seen it in two decades or more - but didn't Janet Munro also reveal a little more skin than was customary at the time in BITTER HARVEST (1963)?

Surprising that the UK censor - John Trevelyan, wasn't it? - could be so lenient. Of course, foreign arthouse films by directors such as Ingmar Bergman had been 'getting away with' nudity for years.