As the old joke goes, “How do you get to Carnegie Hall?  Practice, boy, practice.”  Failing that, you could also always get engaged to the eldest daughter (Lugene Sanders) of a wealthy businessman (Harry Fleer), like Richard Carlson does in Bert I. Gordon’s 1960 ghost story Tormented.

Carlson plays a supposedly gifted jazz pianist, though I thought what he is clearly pantomiming to is almost too bland and white to be called “jazz”.  Really, he should never have been engaged to Sanders, even if daddy is paying for that Carnegie gig.  The pianist is just a boy toy for her, with emphasis on “toy”.  She seems to regard him as just another of her possessions—something to wheel out at parties to impress friends and her father’s business associates.

Instead, Carlson should have stuck with Juli Reding, even if she didn’t have money.  This former lover of his is blackmailing him to stop the impending nuptials.  Even taking that into consideration, Reding is still superior in every way to Sanders. 

It seems people in this town would stop meeting at the top of the abandoned lighthouse on the rocky shore as this is where bad things keep happening. This is where Reding meets her demise, courtesy of loose railing.  Carlson doesn’t do anything directly that kills her; however, he doesn’t offer a literal helping hand when she’s dangling over the edge of the platform.

Fortunately for us, that isn’t the end of Reding in the picture, as she haunts the shit out of Carlson for the remainder of it.  The actress seems to be having a ball tormenting the pianist, often through just a disembodied head or hand.  One especially neat effect has her laugh mockingly while he holds her talking head at arm’s length by her hair. 

Nobody else sees these manifestations, but different people seem to detect other aspects of her presence, especially the scent of the perfume Reding used to wear.  One person who comes to realize an actual spirit is involved is Carlson’s blind housekeeper, played by Lillian Adams.  Really, the only reason this character is vision-impaired is as a set-up for a decently suspenseful bit when she confronts Reding’s ghost. No prizes this scene is set in that abandoned lighthouse.

Carlson is also having to deal with a blackmailer played by Joe Turkel.  He is one of those character actors who was never a lead, but who I enjoy seeing in supporting roles in the numerous pictures in which he appeared.  He was most memorable as the spectral bartender in The Shining and the head of the humanoid corporation in Blade Runner.  Honestly, he seems a bit uncomfortable here.  Maybe it’s the role or maybe it’s just how young he was at the time.  He looks remarkably like a young Lou Reed, though I doubt the future Velvet Underground founder ever smiled as much.

A surprisingly strong performance here is courtesy of a ten-year-old Susan Gordon, the daughter of the director, Bert I. Gordon.  She’s cast here as the younger sister of Sanders, and also happens to be pretty chummy with Carlson.  Her performance is more assured at this young age than it would be six years later in her dad’s Picture Mommy Dead.

The filmography of father Gordon is almost entirely comprised of very low budget films, of which this is one.  Some of his work is quite dreadful, such as the giant grasshopper horror film The Beginning of the End.  I doubt the budget of this picture was considerably more than that had, but a ghost story like this tends to fare better with limited resources.

The island location, with its beach, is especially conducive to some simple effects that are surprisingly effective.  After Carlson and Sanders walk across a stretch of beach, some cross-fade effects are used to add a third set of footprints in the sand behind them.  I don’t want to spoil the ending, but there are numerous interesting effects in a climactic scene at the wedding where the ghost decides to pull out all the stops.

Tormented has a vibe similar to a couple of other low-budget, black-and-white, supernatural films of the time, like Carnival of Souls.  It isn’t as good as that movie, but it is frequently more effective and quirkier than I expected.   Bert I. Gordon is frequently compared to Roger Corman, and I would say this is akin to one of that producer-director’s better early works.

Dir: Bert I. Gordon

Starring Richard Carlson, Julie Reding, Susan Gordon

Watched on Film Master blu-ray