Carol Lynley and I go way back. Oh, I've never actually met her, but when I was a young teen in 1959 and saw her in 'Blue Denim', I fell in love with pretty Ms Lynley. This movie was made 10 years later, and starts off with Ms Lynley walking out of the surf, in a green bikini, and carrying a spear gun. Seeing her that way, I was hooked, even though the movie was shown on the Golf Channel, with commercials.
The focus of the story is a pro golfer, Jerry (Paul Burke), who seems is a perpetual second to the happy go lucky number one. But tied after 72 holes, along with another golfer, they all plan to go back the next morning for a sudden death playoff. (Never mind that sudden death playoffs don't wait until the next day.) But sweet, young, and pretty Diana (Carol Lynley) enters the picture, and has a proposal that she hopes |Jerry can't refuse.
This is a film noir of sorts, with Lynley playing a real psycho character with no sense of morality. The golf is there to set up a premise and a motive. It is clear that the actors were not good golfers and, mercifully not much golf is shown. Still, it was enjoyable seeing Lynley in a different role. Martha Hyer was Lee, the wife of Jerry and, even though she was in her 40s still was quite the beauty.
SPOILERS. Diana has psychotic tendencies and even though she has been receiving therapy for a year, her doctor is about to order her hospitalized, again. So she tricks Jerry into a deal that she secretly videotapes, pretending it was only a game. She would kill the pro golfer who was |Jerry's nemesis, and in turn he would kill her psychiatrist. Since neither would have a motive, they would not be suspects. Jerry didn't take her seriously, until the golfer failed to show up the next morning, and he was found behind the 7th green, dead. The ending scenes of the movie were not as interesting but, eventually the police learn the truth, and they wait for her on the beach, in a scene like the first, coming out of the water in a green bikini.
