Shadows Of Fear was an early 70s anthology series of ten hour long thrillers and one thirty minute one revolving around notions of 'fear'. Strangely for the time it was made and with such an apt core concept and such a supremely creepy animated opening sequence featuring Roger Webb's terrifying theme music only one of the eleven episodes had a supernatural theme, episode four, 'The Death Watcher'
Psychologist, Emily Erikson (Judy Parfitt), riding high on the publication of her book, accepts the invitation of a Dr Pickering (John Neville) to visit with him to observe his experiments. There she discovers his work is far further out there than she anticipated and finds herself held hostage by the deranged Doctor and his unwitting assistant Dawson (Victor Maddern) and destined to be not just an observer but his subject.
Screened on January 26th 1971 there are shades of Nigel Kneale in the melding of science and the supernatural but Pickering always feels more bonkers than brilliant with his botched together death trap and half baked theories, reminiscing about ballroom dancing as he becomes increasingly deranged, leading to a chilling denouement.
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