The box proudly proclaimed this to be Michael Winner's best film.
It isn't. In fact, it's the worst I've seen of his yet, an appallingly bad, unfunny, excruciatingly scripted vigilante thriller based on a once-controversial novel. You can immediately sense Winner's interest: after all, this is little more than a version of DEATH WISH with a female vigilante instead of a bloke. But somewhere along the line, Winner's talent for direction faded and he was left making misogynistic movies that usually sank without trace.
There are two things I like about this film: the Brighton setting, which is different, and the cast. Somehow, in his later directing days, Winner was able to convince lots of once-weres to star in his low budget movies, and this is no exception. David McCallum turns up here, along with a blacked-up Ian Richardson, Christopher Ryan, Sylvia Sims, and best of all for me, Rufus Sewell in one of his earliest turns as a creepy pervert who enjoys making prank calls to the heroine. Lia Williams, as the businesswoman turned vigilante, is passable in the role if no great shakes.
The worst thing about this film is the script. It revels in crudity and offensiveness, without ever offering up anything new. The thrust of the storyline closes with the sub-plot involving Rufus Sewell's stalker, and from then on it gets more and more inane, more and more unbelievable. The scene in the car with David McCallum has to be the utter nadir of the film and I still feel ashamed to think of him taking the role. No wonder we don't see him on the screen much anymore. Realism goes out of the window and the point is lost entirely, along with the viewer.
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