9. Nightmare (1964)
Janet is a young girl at boarding school. She has severe nightmares about her mother whom she witnessed killing her father as a child. Janet is sent home to her guardian - lawyer Henry Baxter - who hires a nurse for her. Janet begins having more nightmares - this time about a woman with a scar on her arm and a birthday cake. These dreams get ever more horrific for Janet. Baxter brings his wife to meet her during birthday celebrations and the combination of a scar on a woman's arm and a birthday cake makes Janet go bananas and stab her with a knife, in the same fashion as her mother killed her father. Janet is sent packing to the nuthouse and the nurse and Baxter chuckle to themselves, glad to get rid of her. But I sense some retribution ahead... Grim viewing from Hammer this time with not a jot of mirth in the script. The film looks very bleak and haunting - it is set in the depths of a harsh winter. Poor Janet is an isolated soul with only adults like Henry Baxter - who are twice as old as she is for company. The film is so morbid and stern, you might actually laugh out loud with nervousness when you watch it. Freddie Francis - a Hammer stalwart - directs the film with a lot of capability. It is a depressing film - but some people (like me) can groove on that and find it inexplicably cheery and life affirming in our bizarre parallel world. A fantastic film to seek out for lovers of psychological horror movies and a film Hammer can be rightly proud of.