Someone at the Top of the Stairs (1973)
Article 5597 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-16-2018
Directed by John Sichel
Featuring Donna Mills, Judy Carne, David de Kayser
Country: UK
What it is: Strange happenings in a boarding house.

Two female students take a room in a boarding house, but there are clues of suspicious activity and the other boarders are a creepy lot. And who is the mysterious tenant in the top floor….?

I’ve seen several movie-length episodes from the British TV series “Thriller”, and in terms of the fantastic content, they’ve mostly been a bit on the marginal side. This is one of the exceptions; the revelations in the final third of the movie take the story in the direction of the supernatural. There’s a few plot holes, and the story doesn’t stand up to close inspection, but the first two-thirds of the movie are creepy enough (and a little depraved as well) that I was almost expecting the final act would be a let-down; fortunately, it doesn’t disappoint in this regard. It’s not the best episode I’ve seen so far, but it’s a good entry in the series.