White of the Eye

Cammell transforms a stalk'n'slash thriller into a complex, cubist kaleidoscope of themes and images. Paul and Joan White (Keith and Moriarty) lead a happy enough life in a quiet Arizona mining town, until Paul suddenly finds himself chief suspect in a police investigation of a series of violently misogynistic murders. Matters are complicated by the reappearance of Joan's gun-crazy ex-husband (Rosenberg). A determinedly offbeat murder mystery, delving into dotty Indian mysticism and throwing up symbols, red herrings, and Steadicam flourishes for the asking, this nevertheless remains oddly effective. Imbued with a brooding, oppressive atmosphere and coloured by vivid performances, though often murkily motivated, it is genuinely nightmarish in its portrait of relationships where love is blinding and the past casts an intolerably heavy spell.