In the spring of 1971, American director Curtis Harrington (Night Tide (1961), Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet (1965), Queen of Blood (1966), Ruby (1977)) was ensconced in Shepperton Studios, his star from What’s the Matter with Helen? (1971), Shelley Winters, in tow. They were there to shoot something originally called The Gingerbread House for American International Pictures’ British wing and like Helen, it would follow in the footsteps of Robert Aldrich’s What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) which had established a new sub-genre in which older Hollywood female stars were turned into psychotic monsters – other titles of interest included Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964), Strait-Jacket (1964), Fanatic/Die! Die! My Darling (1965), The Nanny (1965), Whatever Happened to Aunt Alice? (1969) and others.
The story of Whoever Slew Auntie Roo? (the title was shortened to simply Who Slew Auntie Roo? for the American release) takes the now well-established Grand Dame Guignol business and splices it to the story of Hansel and Gretel. Winters plays Rosie Forrest, also known as “Auntie Roo”, a seemingly kindly older American woman living alone at Forrest Grange following the death of stage magician husband. As Christmas approaches, Auntie throws open the doors of her home to some of the residents of a nearby orphanage, staging a party for the best behaved of the children. But she has a bizarre secret – not only does she keep an eccentric psychic (actually an opportunistic charlatan, Mr Benton (Ralph Richardson) on hand to try to communicate with her late husband, but she keeps the mummified corpse of long-dead daughter Katharine in an attic nursery. This year, two of the orphans, Christopher (Mark Lester from Oliver! (1967)) and Katy Coombs (Chloe Franks, from The House That Dripped Blood (1970)) are excluded from the party for their unruly behaviour but are determined to take part, stowing away in the boot of the car in which Inspector Willoughby (Lionel Jeffries) transports the orphans to Auntie’s. They’re quickly discovered by Auntie is struck by how much Katy looks like Katharine and becomes obsessed with her. When she disappears, after the party, Christopher believes that Auntie has kidnapped her, believing her to be a witch. While trying to rescue Katy, the siblings are trapped in the house with an increasingly unhinged and violet Auntie Roo…
Winters seems to be having a lot of fun with her role (originally written with Bette Davis in mind), playing it with just the right amount of eye-rolling madness but bever quite goes over the top as one might have feared. Indeed, the entire film is more restrained than the Grand Dame Guignol films had become, reining in some of the hysteria making it a more downbeat and sombre affair that hasn’t sat particularly well with some. But its restraint allows room for the film’s moral ambiguity to find more room. Viewers sympathies are pulled this way and that throughout the film. Auntie isn’t a pleasant character and is clearly as unhinged as any other antagonist in the genre but there’s a sadness to her too, a very real sense of tragedy that the audience is invited to identify with. And as for the children – they’re manipulative and devious, their happiness at the climax coming only at the cost of great tragedy.
One of the most attractive things about the film is the remarkable cast, As noted, Winters is having a ball and the two youngsters, while never in line to win any awards for their work, do what’s needed of them (Franks gets an “and introducing” credit though she’d been acting for at least a year, having appeared in Trog and All the Right Noises, both released in 1970). But it’s the supporting cast of familiar faces – Richardson, Michael Gothard (as a blackmailing servant), High Griffiths (as “the pigman”), Judy Corwell, Marianne Stone, Jeffries, the latter about to move over to Pinewood to direct the marvellous The Amazing Mr. Blunden (1972) which also, at least in part, has a seasonal setting – that proves so welcome.
The script was the work of Robert Blees (a prolific television writer though he also had a hand in The Black Scorpion (1957), Frogs (1972) and Dr. Phibes Rises Again (1972)) and Jimmy Sangster, adapting an original screenplay by David Osborn. Sangster was an old hand at this sort of thing – while at Hammer he’d written (and sometimes directed) many a psychological chiller and had form in this particular strand of the genre having written The Nanny. That film’s star, Bette Davis, also turned up in Sangster’s made-for-television film Scream, Pretty Peggy (1973) which was in a similar vein.
But despite the impressive cast and Sangster’s pedigree, Whoever Slew Auntie Roo? is like a lot of Harrington’s films, in that it looks lovely (he can thank the great cinematographer Desmond Dickinson for much of that) and is built around a great idea but it doesn’t really hold together as well as one might hope. Even at a fairly standard issue 91 minutes there’s not really enough story to go around. There are some very fine moments here and there though, particularly a hair-raising bit of business involving a guillotine, but just not enough to elevate the film above the level of unspectacular but solidly entertaining. Which in itself is probably no bad thing.
Whoever Slew Auntie Roo? doesn’t enjoy the best reputation and it’s not, perhaps, hard to see why, It is flawed but it’s a decent enough stab at trying something a bit different in a sub-genre that was already pretty much played out by the time it was made. Harrington made better genre films (Games (1967) in particular is very good) but Whoever Slew Auntie Roo? shouldn’t be dismissed too quickly. See it for the terrific cast if nothing else and, in the right frame of mind, it might just pass an hour and a half harmlessly enough.
Crew
Directed by: Curtis Harrington; © American International Productions (England) Ltd. MCMLXXI [1971]; James H. Nicholson & Samuel Z. Arkoff present an American International/Hemdale production; Executive Producer: Louis M. Heyward; Produced by: Samuel Z. Arkoff & James H. Nicholson; Screenplay by: Robert Blees and James Sangster; Original Screen Story by: David Osborn; Additional Dialogue by: Gavin Lambert; Director of Photography: Desmond Dickinson; Film Editor: Tristam Cones; Music Composed & Conducted by: Kenneth V. Jones; Wardrobe Supervisor: Bridget Sellers; Make Up: Eddie Knight, Sylvia Croft; Hairdressing: Pat McDermott, Joyce James; Art Director: George Provis
Cast
Shelley Winters (Rosie Forrest); Mark Lester (Christopher); Ralph Richardson (Mr Benton); Judy Cornwell (Clarine); Michael Gothard (Albie); Hugh Griffith as the pigman [Mr Harrison]; Lionel Jeffries as [Inspector] Willoughby; Chloe Franks as Katy; Rosalie Crutchley (Miss Henley); Pat Heywood (Doctor Mason); Richard Beaumont (Peter); Jacqueline Cowper (Angela); Marianne Stone (Miss Wilcox); Charlotte Sayce (Katharine)
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