After having unleashed no less than FOUR genuine cult-shockers upon the British horror market in collaboration with David McGillivray ("House of Whipcord", "Frightmare", "House of Mortal Sin" and "Schizo"), Pete Walker falls back on the writing skills of Murray Smith, with whom he made his very first horror film ("Die Screaming Marianne") as well as a couple of light-headed sex-comedies. Smith's imagination isn't as offensive or twisted as McGillivray's, and thus "The Comeback" is an overall politically correct horror effort. That DOESN'T mean it's bad or unmemorable, mind you! The story's subject matter is fairly original, the character drawings are morbidly eccentric and Walker masterfully alters long scenes of suspense with some of the grossest killings in 70's cinema I've ever seen. Real life singer Jack Jones stars as crooner Nick Cooper, working hard on making a comeback after he divorced his dominating wife Gail. His former record producer still believes in his qualities and even arranged for Nick to live in a large mansion, complete with two loyal albeit oddly behaving servants at his disposal. Troubles appear when the rotting corpse of Nick's ex-wife, who has been violently murdered in their former penthouse, begins to haunt him at night along with petrifying sobbing sounds of a small child. It soon begins to look like someone intends to boycott Nick's new career and even hurt him personally. Despite most of the red herrings and sub plots being implausible and far-fetched, the whodunit-element of "The Comeback" keeps you alert and interested up until the satisfying denouement (that I didn't see coming, I may add). The faster the ending approached, I began to fear that Murray Smith would make the same mistake as he did in "Die Screaming Marianne" loose control and drown in all the deceptive plot twists -, but experienced director Walker neatly fits everything back together during the shlocky finale. He also makes great use of terrifically sinister set pieces, like the creepy penthouse and the totally uncanny rooms in the mansion. The film contains multiple homage references to classic films (although some people tend to call them rip-offs), such as "Psycho" and "Citizen Kane" and I wondrously even loved the corny song called "Traces of a long forgotten tune". The acting is adequate, although Sheila Keith's performance is a cut above the rest as usual. "The Comeback" was one of Pete Walker's last achievements, followed by only two more movies. His work may very well be an acquired taste, but I definitely consider him to be among the most talented horror filmmakers that were active in Europe.
Review of The Comeback
