Knife in the Water (1962)

I would have been happier to have waited to watch an other Polanski movie until maybe next month but the bods in the picking dept. at LoveFilm are more unpredicable than Fate it's self.
Knife in the Water was Polanski's debut, made around 50years ago. To be fair, it must have been quite striking when it came out. It's very restrained and subtle, more so than anything he's made since and it usually works the other way around with creativity.
In a way he's intuitively set-up conditions perfect for a debut- a micro cast, basic plot, small space/set/location.
The plot of 'Knife...' is fairly familiar; in fact, it's almost a simpler retread of his 3rd or 4th film - Cul-De-Sac; it's about a couple made of a older man and a younger wife who pick up a younger man hitch-hiking as they go to their boat, presumably for the weekend. Does it seem obvious what might happen? I'm not supporting predictability but i think when you make something where the audiences preconceptions are weighty, you can play with that and that's what Polanski is doing here.
The young man is sullen, obstinate and naive. The older man is brash, competitive and imperious. The woman is self-aware, sultry and premeditated. All of them love playing mind-games and all throwing their intelligence around.
The sense of suffocation is brilliant in that it's never alluded to but these people have no place living in such close quarters yet they just want to show off and bumps heads to show who's superior.
In the end, you get the feeling that this kid has had an easy escape from this couple and I feel that the film would improve from ending 5mins earlier. But who is in to improve this level of black comedy claustrophobia class?...

I watched Knife In The Water (1962) on DVD via LoveFilm.
My 2011 in Movies will return with On Tour (2010)...