Having the somewhat dubious distinction of being ‘Britain’s first sex film’, Her Private Hell was made in response to the popularity of the risqué European titles which flooded British screens during the 60s. Warren went on to direct some highly successful low-budget horror films in the 1970s but his feature debut reflected an interest in art cinema rather than exploitation. Incredibly tame by modern standards, the film has many pleasures – a swinging jazz score, some tightly edited montage sequences and an unsettling atmosphere. Its Italian star, Lucia Modugno, was not quite the sylph-like maiden beloved of the glossies at the time and she struggles to convince as the innocent abroad who falls into the hands of the corrupt and corrupting media. But the rest of the cast more than compensate and there are compelling performances from musical star Terry Skelton, television actor Pearl Catlin and Robert Crewdson as Neville, the inscrutable magazine boss. Made on a shoestring, the film took a fortune at the box office and remained on London screens for several months. Warren’s follow-up, Loving Feeling (1968), benefited from relaxed censorship rules and was also a financial success, but he had grown tired of the genre and moved on to pastures new. （Josephine Botting）
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