‘Mr Wrong’ gets it right

Press, 10 March 1986, Page 14

‘Mr Wrong’ gets it right

MR WRONG Directed by Gaylene Preston Screenplay by Preston, Geoff Murphy and Graeme Tetley. Gaylene Preston has to be admired for her intent with “Mr Wrong.” She has taken the horror film genre and turned its vicious misogeny back on itself. That is what horror movies are about, after all. The victims are invariably women, often young naked women, with an underlying sexual hatred that would not be out of place in a “snuff’ movie. “Mr Wrong” fights

back, with a strong feminist statement in what is still an assured, gripping thriller. Meg (Heather Bolton) is the “victim” who buys an old Jaguar, only to discover that it is haunted. The car seems to have a will of its own; and she believes that she hears someone in the back seat being choked. One rainy night Meg

Meg (Heather Bolton) is the “victim” who buys an old Jaguar, only to discover that it is haunted. The car seems to have a will of its own; and she believes that she hears someone in the back seat being choked. One rainy night Meg offers a lift to a young woman, and suddenly finds her companion (David Letch) in the front seat beside her. As they drive the man becomes increasingly . threatening — and the woman in the back disappears.

Meg eventually stops at a garage and forces the stranger from the car.

Later, she learns that the Jag belonged to a murdered young woman, who looked exactly like the wet passenger. And the strange man begins to stalk her...

Bolton and Letch give fine performances, as do all the actors given that “Mr Wrong’s” small budget must have made it a one-take wonder.

Letch is particularly good as the simmering psychopath who breaks into Meg’s flat at night in search of prey. Preston explores fear from a woman’s point of view. Meg is vulnerable to male violence, both murderous and domestic. Her flatmate’s former boyfriend lunges at her simply because she is female and alone.

These are dangers that every woman has to come to terms with from adolescence on. The threat of rape or physical harm restricts freedoms that men take for granted; to dress and to act and live independently. That “Mr Wrong” can drive this point home as seemingly incidental to the action is no small feat.

The film is not without flaws. The odd bit of shaky acting slips through, and the humour is too smug for its own good. Technically, “Mr Wrong” is sharp, with excellent night photography and a soundtrack that can add to cliches like howling wind with inspired little touches such as a creaking barbed wire fence which chills the spine.

Preston knows the cinematic techniques of instilling terror, and this is inadvertently a troubling aspect of the film. Meg retaliates, but what impression lingers in the audience’s mind: the 85 minutes of watching a woman being scared silly, or the five-minute catharsis at the end? Perhaps that is one for the psychiatrists to ponder. For now, it is enough that Preston attacks the beast, and she had to do so on its own ground. “Mr Wrong’s” best testimonial comes from off the screen. Preston says that when she approached Elizabeth Jane Howard about filming her novel, the author mentioned that only one other director had expressed an interest — Alfred Hitchcock. Now, with probably ten times the money, Hitchcock would have made a worse movie. Brilliantly innovative and polished, maybe, but with a bodycount reeking of the sick sexism that he made a trademark. “Mr Wrong,” for all its roughness, has gusto and a good heart. P.S. A build-up of tension is vital to a thriller. The Academy does nothing to help the film by stopping it for intermission. Surely the break can be taken beforehand? —Bob Irvine.

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