Canadian Det. Sgt. Jim Henderson (Christopher
Plummer) is called to the scene of a death that could have been suicide or
murder, and he’s leaning towards the latter. The body of a prostitute was found
on the ground outside a tenement building, in one hand a necklace with an
upside-down crucifix, in the other, a small round metal container on a chain.
Henderson quickly learns that the woman’s name was Elizabeth Lucy (Karen Black),
that she was a high-priced call girl working exclusively for a Montreal madam
and that she had a relatively severe heroin addiction. Following his leads,
Henderson’s suspects start turning up dead as well, murdered in perfunctory, if
gruesome, fashion.
Parallel to Henderson’s investigation, we witness
the last days of Elizabeth Lucy’s life. After an appointment with a regular
John, she helps a younger and similarly-addicted hooker escape the life to a
Catholic rehab clinic. Her madame, Meg, rewards her big-money score with a fix,
then tells her about an arrangement with a real high-roller who’d asked for
Elizabeth personally. She meets the reptilian Keerson (played by Jean-Louis
Roux, actor, playwright, staunch anti-separatist senator and, according to
Wikipedia, “briefly the 26th Lieutenant Governor of Quebec, Canada” ) on his
private yacht, driven there by his personal driver. Keerson tells her to strip
and then demands that she tell him personal facts about herself, her life and
her background, leaving her more naked than she’s ever been.
Clues lead Henderson deeper into
previously-unknown territory. The metal container, he learns, is a “pyx”, a
lunette used by Catholic priests to transport a consecrated host to someone
sick, in-firm or otherwise unable to physically make it to receive communion.
Combined with the inverse crucifix, Henderson uncovers a Satanic cult, with
Elizabeth right in the middle of an important ritual—one that may or may not
have succeeded, depending on how Miss Lucy died.
This is a pyx.
Based on the novel by Canadian author, John Buell,
and directed by casual Star Trek director
Harvey Hart, The Pyx is primarily a
straightforward police procedural, naturalistic in the pattern of Serpico or The French Connection. The viewer is never an active participant in
the investigation, always held back as if by some line of invisible police
tape. We watch Henderson interact with his partner, Det. Paquette (Donald
Pilon); we see him violently interrogate a frustrated suspect, but we’re not
part of the mystery.
Conversely, we’re much more involved with
Elizabeth’s story, drawn into her life with intimate close-ups, put at a
distance only when Elizabeth closes off to the people around her—particularly
when dealing with Meg—or when she’s shooting up. In these moments in
particular, the direction is to make us feel like intruders.
Whether or not this was intentional on the part of
the filmmakers is open to debate, of course. For my part, I had to stop after
Keerson’s interrogation of Elizabeth and restart the movie to see where or if
I’d missed something. It’s a definite misdirection and since the movie spent
many years in the public domain (I first found it as part of a multi-disk
horror collection), I started to wonder if this print was missing footage, or
if this was a different edit entirely. A quick glance at a second “official”
DVD told me otherwise; this was apparently the intended edit.
Strangely, the title character, the Pyx itself,
barely figures at all in the movie. Little attention is drawn to it in way of
close-ups; it is explained in almost off-hand dialogue (delivered by Pilon via
clumsy American dubbing), and its signature scene, featured so prominent in the
film’s trailers, is nothing more than a quick cutaway during the climax.
If the above weren’t enough to give one pause,
there’s also the matter of Karen Black’s inconsistent performance, which is
predominantly flat when she’s attempting to appear aloof and soul-dead. It’s
difficult to tell when she’s supposed to be smacked-out and when she’s just
shut off from Meg or another john. She only shines during her first scene with
Keerson, and it really is a powerful sequence which left me feeling as
emotional exposed as she was. On either side of this scene, however, it’s hard
to generate any sympathy or concern for Elizabeth. She’s just not that
interesting. (And speaking as one who could never get past Black’s wandering
eye, which I’ve always found distracting—my problem, not her’s—Black never
seems present in the film, as if she’s being directed by two conflicting points
of view, but not in service of the character.) 
Christopher Plummer is Christopher Plummer. If you
liked him in everything else he’s ever been in, you’ll like him in this. As
Henderson he’s alternately determined or blandly appealing. The scenes were he
attempts to be a tough guy fall flat. Pilon, for what little he has to do, is
far more intimidating, possibly because his character is in service of the
story and, as a result, a cypher. As stated, there are multiple prints of The Pyx floating around, some under the
title The Hooker Cult Murders and in
various degrees of watchability. It’s actually pretty easy to luck out and land
a widescreen copy on one of the numerous portmanteau collections, but there are
also some dreadful full-screen copies as well, with no panning-and-scanning to
speak of, so beware of versions focusing on tables with knees at either side.
It’s an unusual movie and, at risk of being racist, a very Canadian thriller as
well: low-key and lacking urgency, but getting the job done in the end.
