As the story opens, a psychiatrist is found dead in his London home. Presumably it's suicide, but his 14-year-old daughter (Pamela Franklin) is convinced that it was murder - by one of his four current patients, all of whom suffer from severe neuroses. No one will listen seriously to Franklin except for Stephen Boyd, whom she convinces to look into the matter. Boyd plays a nationally-known American news commentator living and working in London, a convenient fact for it allows him to easily make contact with all the patients/suspects; since they recognize him, they are willing to meet and talk. And as he visits them, their personal stories play out as mini-movies of their own. There's Richard Attenborough as an art gallery owner with a mighty suspicious painting that he himself created; Jack Hawkins as a judge with some terrible secret in his past; and Diane Cilento as an unstable secretary. The fourth patient is Boyd himself, meaning he has his own private turmoil and is himself a suspect. (Originally there was a fifth patient, played by Patricia Neal; her role was filmed but ultimately deleted.)
Boyd's character takes on a role of amateur detective, but he ends up as a de facto shrink, able to pull out the other characters' inner demons. The film in this way equates detective with psychiatrist, not necessarily an unfounded notion but representative of the movie's simplistic and outdated approach to mental illness. That can be forgiven in a movie which is really a mystery after all, and not a treatise on psychiatry, but the episodic style of the film doesn't help matters. The theatrical dialogue and overall approach tend toward the pretentious, especially in the depiction of Boyd and Franklin's strangely developing friendship.
What The Third Secret does have going for it is a mystery that is nonetheless intriguing enough, as well as interesting, offbeat locations - notably the Thames riverbank scenes - and beautifully composed black-and-white CinemaScope photography, courtesy of director Charles Crichton and master cinematographer Douglas Slocombe. This is simply a beautiful movie to look at. Richard Arnell's score is also suitably creepy yet pretty, reflecting the fact that the picture tries not for cheap thrills but for steady ominousness.
Young Pamela Franklin, who debuted in The Innocents three years earlier, is asked to carry a great deal of The Third Secret, and while she has been praised for her work here, this reviewer found her a bit overwrought. Stephen Boyd, who had done Ben-Hur (1959) five years earlier and was about to do another huge epic, The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964), has his moments here but is also too over-the-top, often going from a whisper to a shout and back again in the same speech. Perhaps some better overall modulation by director Crichton would have helped.
The three "guest stars," as they are billed, fare better. Hawkins' gravelly presence injects welcome energy, and his scene with Boyd in his judge's chambers is truly excellent. What an actor Hawkins was. Attenborough, too, is memorable as a meek, insecure character - all the more remarkable when one considers he was acting in a lot of war movies around this time which called on him to deliver something quite different. Diane Cilento, who was married to Sean Connery at this time, is attractive and vulnerable in her role, and the fine British actor Nigel Davenport registers in the tiny part of a TV producer.
The Third Secret is also the movie debut of Judi Dench, who handles an inconsequential role as Attenborough's assistant very well. Just think - From Russia With Love (1963) opened mere months before this movie, and it's a safe bet that never in a million years would Judi Dench have imagined that she would one day play Bernard Lee's character, "M"!
Fox Home Entertainment's DVD maintains the anamorphic aspect ratio and comes with the original trailer, a still gallery, and an interactive original pressbook. Picture and sound quality are tops.
For more information about The Third Secret, visit Fox Home Entertainment. To order The Third Secret, go to TCM Shopping.
By Jeremy Arnold
