Footsteps

Mollie has been left with highly sensitive hearing after an attack. In her boarding house room she "witnesses" a murder by hearing strange footsteps.

Gemma Jones stars as a woman suffering from hyperacusis, which affects the muscles of the ears. As a result she has become highly sensitive to noise, a condition that is only exacerbated by living in a crowded boarding house. Traumatised by past events and unable to sleep, one night she hears loud footsteps and noises upstairs. Can she trust her ears this time? This short thriller helped launch writer-director Alan Parker’s career in feature films.

This was the second of two short films commissioned by EMI boss Nat Cohen. The first was Our Cissy (1974), which Alan Parker also wrote and directed. Parker made his feature film debut two years later with Bugsy Malone (1976).