Very well executed

This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

This is a complex, involving thriller which requires immediate attention from mystery fans. The clues and puzzles build up thick and fast in this disturbing masterpiece which will have you hooked right from the beginning. The tension builds slowly to breaking point at the film's conclusion. Then comes one of those twist endings which totally changes your perception of the rest of the film.As you might have guessed, I absolutely loved this film. It has the same style and atmosphere as many Italian-made gialli which is somewhat surprising, seeing as it's a British film. The Italian links are even stronger seeing as it shares the hero of one of Argento's best films, DEEP RED, namely David Hemmings. There's a definite feeling of the "swinging sixties" in the jazzy, upbeat music which plays frequently and the crisp colour photography really brings the surroundings and characters to life.David Hemmings is a charismatic and talented actor who conveys well the haunting expressions and outbursts of a disturbed man. He is supported by a good cast of British stalwarts, popping up in minor roles are the seemingly-omnipotent Wilfrid Hyde-White, plus Daniel Massey, Arthur Lowe and others. Fans of recent conspiracy thrillers will enjoy the conspiracy and paranoia surrounding Hemmings in this film, and it's one of those movies in which you aren't really sure what's happening, so needs to be seen at least twice. This is a thoroughly entertaining, intelligent thriller which remains riveting from start to finish.

For the most part, "Fragment Of Fear" is a gripping film. Although sometimes it can get too talky, it cleverly builds an atmosphere of justifiable paranoia, as we can see both why the hero feels so trapped and scared and why it is difficult for other people to believe his stories. But in the last 5 minutes or so, the film goes all vague and ambiguous on us, leaving us to interpret it all in our own way. The problem is that either way leaves too many unanswered questions. What does hold the film together is a committed central performance by David Hemmings; in what is largely an one-man-show, he creates a believable Everyman, a regular guy who gets in over his head. And an amusing credit for those who stick to the very end: "Colombus" is played by....a London pigeon. Who would have guessed? **1/2 out of 4.

Richard Sarafian is a decidedly underrated director. After finally seeing this, it's satisfying to report his VANISHING POINT was not a flash-in-the-pan. FRAGMENT...does not move at the same pace, nor does it get the viewer involved quite as quickly, but once you're about twenty minutes in, you're hooked until the end as Sarafian and screenwriter Dehn continually manipulate reality and our perceptions of it, along with lead character David Hemmings' perceptions of it. Really brilliant in the way it portrays a matter-of-fact unfolding of events that seem like a conventional, yet still insidious conspired-murder-by-blackmail-ring plot. But then we're constantly shown by the dialogue and actions of other characters that these events we've just witnessed may never have occurred. As an audience, we're constantly being shifted back and forth, momentarily convinced that recovering-addict-turned-successful-writer Hemmings is undergoing paranoid delusions, then the next moment convinced there really is a vast conspiracy against him and his investigation into his rich aunt's death. Disturbing and constantly involving, sucking the viewer in until the shocking conclusion. Unfortunately, the film's one real liability, which may in fact be the reason for some viewers' antipathy toward this film, is its totally inappropriate music score. Not only is the score mixed too loud on the soundtrack, it repeatedly draws attention to itself, often diffusing the effects Sarafian is trying to achieve. If only they had gotten someone like John Dankworth who could have composed a similar jazzy score but much more subtly and in keeping with the film's rhythms. Of course, even better would have been Ennio Morricone, someone who had already scored many Italian giallo thrillers that had attempted to play with reality in a similar way. Whomever hired Johnny Harris made a big mistake. His score is the one thing that keeps this from being a genuine little masterpiece.

I thought that this was a brilliant thriller. Hemmings's character is the perfect foil, an admitted addict. He is like a mute who cannot scream at the horror enveloping him. Paranoia and fecklessness bounce off a genuine conspiracy. The tension is almost unbearable.