Watch The Third Secret For Free

One of my all time favorites.

Your blood may run cold, but you now find yourself pinioned to the story.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

Just to elaborate on certain comments about Pamela Franklin; she was born in 1950, and 'The Third Secret' was made in 1964, which made her... 14. Not 18, although she may have seemed precociously mature for her age - but then, that's very much part of the fabric of the film. Her scenes with Boyd carry a sexual tension that film-makers and society in general were brave enough to confront at that time. Indeed, don't films from the 60s and 70s (until Star Wars brought serious cinema crashing down) seem terribly grown up? Although Charles Crichton was an Ealing man, his work here is more reminiscent of the Woodfall school of British realism, and light years away from his comedic timing in 'The Battle of the Sexes'. It's hard to deny that the dialogue gets a bit stodgy at times - a pity, since the screenplay contains a great many sly clues to the solution which can get lost amidst the psycho-babble. This was made at a time when much of the UK's cinema was in the hands of serious craftsmen and women - their films are exemplary lessons in thoughtful, considered cinema. However, in this case, fine technique fails to overcome a wordy screenplay, although it's a close-run thing.

It was not that Stephen Boyd was a second stringer performer. He did do splendidly in those films that were written well, such as "Messala" in "Ben-Hur", or as the Irish agent for the Nazis in "The Man Who Never Was". He is an admirable foil for Tyrone Power in "Abandon Ship!" But much of his work was in second rate films. His last movie was called "Graf Dracula", and he played the Count.But in 1964 he turned in what may have been his saddest, most poignant performance as "Alex Stedman". He is one of several patients being treated by a psychiatrist named Dr. Whitset. He is roused by the police one day - his psychiatrist was murdered. The patients of Dr. Whitset are the ones who are the suspects, because in his private files Whitset mentions one of them as having a dangerous twist of their personality. The ill-fated Doctor felt he could control this twist and save the patient. The problem is that the patient remains unnamed, so the Doctor's patients are all under suspicion.They are a mixed bag and Stedman begins his own investigation. He does this because he discovers the Doctor had a daughter named Catherine (Pamela Franklin) who is apparently upset but not letting out her emotions. They form a close attachment, and Stedman discusses his investigations with her. He sees (among others) a high court justice ( Jack Hawkins); a woman's clothing dealer (Richard Attenborough); and Diane Cilento. In the end he gradually finds out who was the killer - and it destroys the stability he has been creating by his investigation. A little knowledge proves dangerous to Boyd in more than one way. The conclusion of this, his best movie role, is unforgettably sad and bleak.

Pamela Franklin is at her precocious best in this tale of "psychoanalytical" intrigue with boundary-crossing sexual overtones. Precocity often took her into territory it's now fashionable to call "inappropriate," such as the schoolgirl love interest she played with a randy old artist in "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie." Though understated and implicit in "The Third Secret," her emotionally-troubled character's relationship with Stephen Boyd's character is in this same vein. All of 18 when I saw this in theatrical release, I was captivated. The movie is still a guilty pleasure, though you have to suspend a lot of disbelief to get back in that naive early-60s groove when sexuality was still portrayed indirectly through characters who were not exactly the Free Spirits that populated such films later in the decade.Look for a spooky cinematic trick toward the end of the film, when Stephen Boyd's character is just starting to unravel the big Secret. Pamela makes a statement about how many patients her father had-- Stephen thinks he misheard her, and asks her to repeat what she said. Watch carefully for the "subliminal" trick, which could easily go unnoticed-- it made the hair on my arms stand up.Hokey in parts, and based on some then-commonplace misconceptions about psychiatric disorders, the movie still works if you can accept it on its own terms. At the very least its understatement is a refreshing change from the noise-saturated frantic bombast of today's not-so-spooky films, with their mindless reliance on sensory overload and oh-so-special effects.

I first saw this as a kid, in 1970, on tv, and thought the nightmare sequence at Diane Cilento's home to be one of the scariest scenes I'd ever seen on film. After 29 years the impact is somewhat diluted, but overall the film holds together pretty well. Take a look at the extraordinary Douglas Slocombe panavision cinematography, the driven performances of Franklin and Boyd - an underrated actor if there ever was one - the striking set pieces on the Thames riverbank. It should be restored and re-issued on a VERY big screen. Scorsese, where art thou?