Children's Hour

By J. C.

THE SAILOR WHO FELL FROM GRACE WITH THE SEA

Directed and Written by

LEWIS JOHN CARLINO

This unsavory brew of landlocked lechery and homicide has something --although not enough--to do with a Yukio Mishima novel. The book's spiritual narcissism and level tone of nightmare has been replaced here by the flossy look of soft-core porn, the pulpy dementia of a horror flick.

Jonathan (Jonathan Kahn) lives in an English village near the sea with his widowed mother, Anne (Sarah Miles). When he is not watching her undress through a knothole in his bedroom wall, he spends his time with a group of boys whose leader, known as the Chief (Earl Rhodes), is intent on molding his playmates into a fine bunch of kinky cryptofascists.

Jonathan's mother starts a perfervid affair with an American seaman, Jim (Kris Kristofferson), which her son also observes intently through his knothole. Jonathan liked Jim when they first met, thought him strong, worldly and commanding, but soon has a new viewpoint. Mom's sailor may have been fine on the ocean, where he was part of "the pure and perfect order of things," but away from his rightful place, he becomes an imperfect creature, a subject of jealousy and contempt who must be done away with. Jonathan consults the Chief, who had previously persuaded his minions to dispatch the family cat. The Chief sees no reason why the boys should not broaden their murderous horizons.

These rotten little kids are meant to carry the freight of the novel's frenzied bully-boy philosophy. In this hapless screen translation by Lewis John Carlino (a scenarist making his directorial debut), they just come off looking like second-class citizens of The Village of the Damned. Fortunately, it is impossible to take the movie seriously on any level. A film maker who uses pounding pistons and dripping hoses for phallic symbols is a threat only to himself.

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