“Ladies and gentlemen, in view of the controversy already aroused, the producers of this film wish to re-emphasize what is already stated in the film, that there is no established scientific connection between Mongolism and psychotic or criminal behaviour.”

All together now! “Twist-ed, Twisted Nerve, Twist-ed, Twisted Nerve… Twist-ed, Twisted Nerve, Twist-ed, Twisted Nerve… Twisted, Twisted, Twisted Nerve…” 

Yes, Twisted Nerve is a one-off, a horror film with its own sing-along theme tune. Of course, you’re supposed to whistleit, but when the film’s title fits in with the tune so well you can’t fail to join in, much like when you hear the theme to Coronation Street (“Co-o-o-ron-ationsteet, Co-o-o-ron-ationstreet” No? Just me, then).

Bernard Hermann’s iconic score for this late 60s shocker got a very public airing in the noughties, thanks to Quentin Tarantino getting Daryl Hanna’s character to whistle it as she makes her way through the hospital in Kill Bill. So it’s fair to say that the theme song is far, far more well known than the film which spawned it.

Now, if I can just get that bloody whistling out of my head long enough to put together some coherent sentences…

Even amongst its similarly themed and rarely-seen peers (little-known “pretty boy psycho murderer” epics like Endless Night, The Road Builder, or Straight On Till Morning), Twisted Nerve is a shadowy, mysterious rarity. Courting controversy from the off with its determinably ill-informed views about mental disability made sure that it was practically buried on release, and has never really seen the late of day since. But the lack of showings on late night television gives the wrong impression – this isn’t some cheapo B-movie stuffed with forgotten thesps. The cast list is hugely impressive – Hywell Bennett, Hayley Mills, Frank Finlay, Barry Foster, Billie Whitelaw, Timothy West – all top-notch 60s talent. 

But having all this talent doesn’t really help when the film starts with a hastily tacked-on warning at the beginning, which was added due to “the controversy”: “There is no established scientific connection between mongolism and psychotic criminal behaviour.”

Oh yeah? So why did you make a film about it, then?

But anyway…

Martin (Bennett) is a disturbed young man. We know this because he’s already shown himself to be in full control of his faculties, yet when he meets Susan (Mills), he calls himself “Georgie” and acts like he’s got learning difficulties. Susan works in a library, innocently climbing ladders to fetch books for young boys, who are busy looking up her skirt. Being a sweet kind of girl, she takes pity on this attractive young man, who seems simple but harmless. Meanwhile, Martin has been thrown out of his home by his stepfather (Finlay), announcing on his exit that he’s off to Paris. His home life has already shown to be a mess – “mummy” is an overprotective nightmare, giving in to all his demands. But despite her sunny demeanour, Susan’s home life isn’t much better – her mum (Whitelaw) is single, having been left by Susan’s father for a “black woman of Africa”.  She has been forced to take on lodgers - Mr Henderson (Foster) a loudmouthed, sexist, racist idiot, and Mr Kumar, a highly intelligent Asian doctor who quietly takes the moral high ground by ignoring all Henderson’s unsubtle jibes.

Into this unhappy home comes “Georgie”, clutching a note from his “father” saying thanks for letting him stay. Susan takes one look at his idiotic face and takes pity on him. Which, as any connoisseur of late 60s / early 70s films could tell her, is a bad idea. “Georgie” immediately starts earning his keep, making sure that Susan’s mum, in particular, takes a shine to him.

Now, just in case we’d forgotten that “Georgie” is in fact the much more worldly-wise Martin, he shows his true colours to Susan’s boss (“Get stuffed!”) and then, Paris alibi firmly in place, takes a trip back home and stabs his stepfather to death with a pair of scissors. He slips back into Susan’s house and into the bed of her mum, claiming that he’s had a nightmare. Henderson, the usual sharer of the bed, finds his way barred by a locked door and makes the assumption that it is Kumar, not Georgie, who’s taken his place.

Next morning, the murder makes the papers, and the household are split over their views – Kumar advocates help for the psychopath who did it, Henderson, who considers himself the “civilised” one, would “top ‘im”.

The police are on the case, led by a typically British horror film staple – a tea-loving acerbic Inspector (Timothy West). But they’ve got investigative competition in Susan. She has begun to think that “Georgie” isn’t the innocent he’s made himself out to be, and eventually finds her way to his grieving mother’s house. Having discovered that Mrs Durnley had a “mongol child” (jeez…) before she gave birth to Martin, she visits Kumar, who just happens to be watching a lecture on chromosomes which links “mongolism” and psychosis.

Kumar speculates that Martin is probably autistic. But back at home, Susan’s mum has made the mistake of trying to seduce the subject of their discussion in the woodshed, and as we watch, he picks up an axe…

Twisted Nerve is an effective little psychological horror film, saddled with a (as it turns out, deserved) reputation for tastelessness. If it wasn’t for the laughably stupid linking of first Downs’ Syndrome, then autism, with extreme murderousness, it would be an intelligent, well-made little movie. Of particular note is the Rising Damp style relationship between the yobbish, slimy Henderson and the long-suffering “Mad Maharajah” Kumar (the Asian is a remarkably rounded ethnic character, considering the time the film was made). And the film itself is extremely good looking – towards the end there’s a wonderfully Hitchcock-style tracking shot from a ringing phone to the atrocity-holding woodshed, and the bloody ending, while undeniably grim, is brilliantly done.

But, you can’t get around THAT subject matter. It is stupid and offensive, it was stupid and offensive then, and it will only get more stupid and offensive as time goes on.