Poor Mia Farrow.

It feels like she could never catch a break, whether that’s in movies or real life.

In See No Evil, she plays the recently blinded Sarah, who is staying with her uncle and aunt. As she goes on a date with Steve (Norman Eshley), she avoids being killed like everyone else. The next day, she has a carefree day in this manor home while the rest of her family is dead all around her, unseen thanks to her loss of vision.

The gardner, Barker (Brian Rawlinson), is somehow still alive. Well, not for long, but before he fades out, he tells her that the killer is coming back to find a bracelet they lost that has their name on it. We don’t see their face, but do get to see some distinctive boots as Sarah runs blindly into the woods before she’s saved by gypsies.

Tom (Michael Elphick), the leader of the gypsy family, sees the bracelet, which has the name Jack. He believes that it belongs to his brother, who was dating Sarah’s cousin Sandy (Diane Grayson). He tells Sarah that he’s taking her to the police, but instead, he’s locked her in a shed so that his family can escape.

I’m not going to reveal the killer, but Sarah is forced to fall down muddy hillsides before being saved and even then, she must endure one more near-death experience as she’s attacked while in the bath tub.

Writer Brian Clemens wrote the script on spec and Columbia Pictures told him “‘Well, if Mia Farrow plays the lead, we’ll buy it.” You can imagine what happened. He also wrote The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, And Soon the Darknes, Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde and directed and wrote Captain Kronos – Vampire Hunter.

This was directed by Richard Fleischer, whose career encompasses everything from blockbusters like Fantastic Voyage and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea to magnificent disasters like Doctor Dolittle and The Jazz Singer and odd efforts like Amityville 3D, Conan the Destroyer, Red Sonja and Mandingo. As the son of Max Fleischer, he was chairman of Fleischer Studios, which handles the licensing of Betty Boop and Koko the Clown. That’s why his last screen credit was creative consultant for The Betty Boop Movie Mystery in 1989.

Originally, this movie’s soundtrack was by Andre Previn, who was married to Farrow at the time. They wanted Previn to further change the music, but he was in Russia, which is why they tossed his music. Of course, Previn has a different story. The real one, probably, is that producer Leslie Linder disliked his score and hired David Whitaker to write a new one, which he also hated, and then Elmer Bernstein wrote the music. This helps in the ad campaign, as the movie was compared to Hitchcock.

Also known as Blind Terror, this starts with a walk past several marquees. While the movies Rapist Cult and The Convent Murders aren’t actual films, Torture Garden is playing on a TV.

See No Evil is a good suspense film that is better thanks to Farrow, who seems constantly on the verge of cracking. She’s so good at being an actual person when surrounded by the fantastic and the deadly, this being yet another great example of her abilities.

You can watch this on Tubi.