The Giallo Files

The Girl in Room 2A

"Evil can only be handled on its own terms. To forgive is to absolve it."

After spending two weeks in jail on a trumped-up charge, Margaret Bradley (Daniela Giordano) rents a room from Mrs. Grant (Giovanna Galletti). But she soon finds herself haunted by strange occurrences - a bloodstain on her floor that re-appears after it's washed away and terrifying visions of a mysterious figure in a red cape and mask. Before long, she is approached by Jack Whitman (John Scanlon) who is investigating the disappearance of his sister, another troubled young woman who once rented the same room. Margaret and John's search leads them to an asylum and to a mysterious cult, led by a man only known as Mr. Dreese (Raf Vallone). Who is the killer in the red vestments? Why does the cult kidnap troubled young women? Will Margaret be their next victim?

With its creepy nighttime visions, spooky apartment setting, cast of weird neighbors, and a plot that centers on an evil cult, The Girl in Room 2A has more in common with Rosemary's Baby than with traditional gialli like The Black Belly of the Tarantula. We're clued in pretty early to the fact that the killings involve a sinister cult, but clues, motives, and identities are revealed gradually in this rather deliberately-paced film. But if you want a better movie in a similar vein, check out Short Night of the Glass Dolls.

When Margaret arrives to live at Mrs. Grant's house, she notices the photo of the deceased Mr. Grant sitting on the piano. This is an interesting reference to a similar scene in The Girl Who Knew Too Much. That scene led me to believe that Mr. Grant would make a surprise appearance at the end of the film, like in Bava's classic. This was, unfortunately, too much to ask of The Girl in Room 2A.
This is the last film directed by William Rose, who is best known for such campy skin-flicks as 50,000 BC (Before Clothing), Rent-A-Girl, and The Hookers. As an actor he also appeared in Werner Herzog's acclaimed film Fitzcarraldo.
This movie was produced by Dick Randall, whom you may remember as the bombastic writer, producer, and actor in The French Sex Murders.
Giovanna Galletti's name is mis-spelled in the credits.
For the purposes of the check boxes above, I'm counting the prison as an "all-girl institution." We don't see any other patients, but the psychiatric hospital might also be for women only.

What the Hell Am I Watching?

The version of the film that I saw had a weird effect throughout, where the backgrounds would occasionally warp and wobble but the foregrounds stayed still. I don't know if it's in the original movie or if there was a problem with the digital transfer, but either way, it's a spooky effect.

In a scene right out of Dario Argento's bag of tricks, Margaret sneaks into Mrs. Grant's son's room to look for clues and finds an eerie collection of snakes, specimens in formaldehyde, and doll heads.

Jack rents a room in the building next door and, apparently, pays his rent in scotch.

Margaret is eventually kidnapped by the cult and, in a moment of compassion, Mrs. Grant's son, Frank, gives her a key to help her escape. One scene later, we watch her cell door swing open as she makes her exit. So was the door locked from the inside? Then how did they lock her in? This makes no sense.

While searching Mrs. Grant's house, Jack discovers a machine pumping blood (or some red liquid) through a hole in the ceiling, into the floor of Room 2A. It explains the mysterious re-appearing stain, but what was the point of all that? All that effort just to unnerve Margaret?

Fashion Moment

Margaret almost always appears in red and white. Mrs. Grant almost always appears in violet.

Margaret's social worker, Alicia (the great Rosalba Neri) gets some really interesting clothes, but here's something weird:

In this scene, Margaret's life is in chaos and the pattern on her blouse features orderly, organized rows of tiny polka dots (not visible in this photo). Alicia is being calm and reassuring, but the pattern on her blouse is wild and jarringly chaotic. They seem to be wearing each other's clothes.

Finally, a fashion tip for the gents:

There's never a valid reason to tuck your tie into your pants. It makes you look like a dufus. And for the love of God, put on a belt.

An Ideal Place to Kill

"You're under the delusion that you can handle a delicate situation my yourself."

Dick Butler (Ray Lovelock) and Ingrid Sjorman (Ornella Muti) are a freewheeling young couple, paying for their romp through Europe by smuggling and selling porn out of their groovy yellow convertible. But after getting busted by the police in Pisa, getting robbed by a biker, and being mistaken for German bank robbers, the couple seeks refuge in a country estate. At first, the house's owner, Barbara Slater (Irene Papas), is terrified by her unwelcome guests but they soon charm her and things get very friendly. But what dark secrets is Barbara hiding? The situation quickly turns as Dick and Ingrid take Barbara prisoner in her own home... or is Barbara the one in control, keeping the young couple trapped for her own purposes?

An Ideal Place to Kill (also frequently called Oasis of Fear) gets rolling with a lot of potential, showing Dick and Ingrid's Bonnie-and-Clyde adventures, breezing through Europe and flaunting the law. Then it slows to a halt when the action is confined to Barbara's house. The movie has a few good moments of suspense and is sexy and stylish, it's not a great giallo if you're into blood and murder scenes. The first murder occurs before the action of the movie starts and isn't revealed until 54 minutes in. The girl killed in a car accident is incidental to the plot and isn't shown. Instead, this movie aspires to be one of those claustrophobic mind-game suspense movies like The Cold Eyes of Fear or Sleuth but, sadly, doesn't achieve their sustained level of tension.

The movie isn't great, but the cast is spectacular. You may remember Ray Lovelock, who would go on to star in Lucio Fulci's Murder Rock. Ornella Muti is best known as Princess Aura in 1980's Flash Gordon and Irene Papas was in Zorba the Greek, The Guns of Navarone, and Fulci's giallo Don't Torture a Duckling.
This movie includes an excellent example of "inept police," too lazy to follow up an important lead in the garage after a simple distraction.
There's a lot of yellow going on in the costumes and production design - the car, the clothes, the wallpaper, flowers, art... tons of yellow and gold. There's so much that it doesn't really serve a storytelling function (like in a Lamberto Bava movie), rather, it's a constant remind to the viewer that this is a giallo movie.
The title makes ironic sense. Most of the other titles make more literal sense – except maybe for the Japanese video title, Love Stress.

What the Hell am I Watching?

Living free and flush with cash at the beginning of the movie, Dick and Ingrid celebrate life by going to a fancy restaurant and throwing birds at the other patrons.

Fashion Moment

During that drunken fowl-chucking escapade in the restaurant, the couple parties Donnie and Marie style in matching white fringed bell-bottom leisure suits.

Here's their awesome yellow roadster, covered in daisy decals.

...and one more point of interest: Do those yellow curtains look familiar? That swirling wrought iron bannister on a spiral staircase in a circular foyer? That's because this same house was used as a set for both Lucio Fulci's Perversion Story and Dario Argento's Cat O'Nine Tails.

A White Dress for Marialé

Maybe we're not all innocent?

As a child, Marialé (Ida Galli, credited as Evelin Stuart) witnessed her father murder her mother and her mother's lover before turning the gun on himself. Now, years later, she finds herself in a crumbling pallazo married to Paolo (Luigi Pistilli), a rich brute who secretly sedates her. To ease the boredom and seek help, Marialé invites friends over for a raucous party. Guests include her former flame, Massimo (Ivan Rassimov), Semy (Shawn Robinson) and her racist husband Gustavo (Edilio Kim), and Mercedes (Pilar Velasquez), Joe (Giancarlo Bonuglia) and Sebastiano (Ezio Marano), who form their own open love triangle. Passions are unleashed over dinner, but things soon turn serious when one by one, the guests start turning up dead. Is Paolo offing his unwelcome visitors? Has Sebastiano's jealousy finally gotten out of hand? It all leads to a bloody conclusion!

In its first half, A White Dress for Marialé is one of those freak-out gialli like Death Falls Lightly or Spasmo, where a dream-like stream-of-consciousness narrative skips around, disorienting the audience until we're dizzy and confused. In the second half , the movie sobers up and sticks its landing as a standard drawing-room whodunnit. If you find the crazy psych-out style tedious like I do, just watch the first 15 minutes and then skip ahead to the movie's midpoint.

It's not a great movie by any stretch, but there's some real talent on both sides of the screen. Ida Galli, Ivan Rassimov and Luigi Pistilli are Giallo all-stars. Editor Francesco Bertuccioli worked on Sister of Ursula and Strip Nude for your Killer and Bruno Nicolai, one of the best composers of giallo scores ever, goes uncredited here.
The movie was filmed at the Palazzo Borghese in Rome.
We breeze quickly through character introductions at the beginning of the film, so it's easy to get confused about who's who and how they're all connected. On top of that, Gustavo and Sebastiano sort of resemble each other and they spend half the movie in stage costumes and makeup, making things even more confusing. I had to draw a diagram to keep everything straight.
There seems to be a half-hearted "relflection" motif, where characters – especially Marialé – are shown in mirrors or reflected in windows. I was expecting it to foreshadow a split-personality twist, but that never came to pass

What the Hell am I Watching?

So much to cover here...

Let's start with the part where a harmless garter snake – no more than half an inch around – crawls over Mercedes' foot. When she screams, Paolo immediately pulls out a gun and shoots it off her. Paolo is a). more than a little over-reactive and b.) an amazing marksman.

Let's talk about the scene where Semy feels up and gropes an empty suit of armor.

The women in this movie really get brutalized. Before getting murdered, they're constantly slapped around and Mercedes gets raped in one disturbing scene.

Speaking of getting slapped, my brain broke at the sight of Gustavo wearing a ballerina's dress in a slap fight with a naked Semy. The fight is broken up by Joe, who beats Gustavo with a whip. For real. What the hell am I watching?

Throughout the movie, I kept asking myself: Do these people even like each other? Why are they here? Why are they in these toxic relationships?

Fashion Moment

True to the title, Marialé does wear a white dress. In fact it's the same white dress her mother was murdered in. You can clearly see the two bullet holes on her chest. Foreshadowing!

Things get out of hand at the costume dinner.

And the aftermath of the feast looks like a Renaissance Dutch still life.

Date for a Murder

"...but I can assure you I'm no Sherlock Holmes."

Vince Dreyser (George Ardisson) is an American security expert working for rich clients in Italy. When he runs into his college buddyWalter (Hans von Borsody), they make a plan to meet up again a few weeks later in Rome, but Walter never shows up. Concerned for his friend, Vince starts investigating and discovers a web of murder and corporate espionage. To complicate matters, Vince has also agreed to be bodyguard to a freewheeling young mod named Fidelia (Halina Zalewska). While keeping Fidelia out of trouble, Vince tracks down the clues and dodges bullets alongside disapproving, by-the-book Commissioner Giunta (Günther Stoll). Is Walter dead? What was he mixed up in? And why do all the people with the answers Vince needs keep getting murdered?

Date for a Murder is a pretty good pre-Argento Giallo, with some good action sequences, tight suspense, and a focus set firmly on the mystery, rather than on blood or sex. The story culminates in an epic chase scene through a hospital, which turns into a car chase through Rome's suburbs and finishes with a suspenseful standoff at a meat packing facility.

There seems to be a "reflection" motif, as characters are frequently seen in mirrors. They're even more commonly obscured on screen, filmed behind reflections in glass, blinds, flowers, and screens.
Early in the investigation, two mobsters try to dispatch Vince Norman Bates-style by knocking him out, putting him in a car and staging an accident. But rather than sinking it in a lake, they set it on fire and roll it down a cliff.
Vince gets his own "House" moment – after reaching a dead end and giving up on the case, he sees something unrelated which triggers an epiphany, allowing him to solve the case.
The original title, Omicidio Per Appuntamento might be better translated as Murder by Appointment. The working title of the film was Si Muore Una Sola Volta, or You Only Die Once– no doubt a wink at a similar James Bond title and a reference to Vince's role as, essentially, a freelance secret agent.

What the Hell am I Watching?

As I mentioned, this move is straightforward, bloodless and nudity-free. The only wacky, off-the-wall moments come from Fidelia's complicated and outrageous fashion sense, as illustrated by some of her many wigs. Here are just a few:

This is the "Mia Wallace."

This is her Phyllis Diller look at the local disco.

I call this look "Leia on Hoth."

And finally, there's the "hairy basketball hoops," a.k.a. "Minnie Mouse on acid."

Fashion Moment

Let's take a moment to recognize cinematographer Franco Delli Colli. His compositions are artful and his warm lighting gives the movie a real human touch. But he's not afraid to mix it up with some shaky verité handheld work in order to give the disco a raucous vibe and imbue the rooftop chase with a giddy sense of vertigo. Here are just a few examples of his interesting lens work:

Notice the low angle and the harp in this last shot - no doubt an homage to Mario Bava's classic Blood & Black Lace.

What the Peeper Saw

"He has his problems..."

After a whirlwind romance and a marriage to Paul (Hardy Krüger), Englishwoman Elise (Britt Ekland) arrives in Spain to discover that her new stepson, Marcus (Mark Lester) is home early from boarding school. Elise soon learns that Marcus is very smart, but also very cold and calculating. After snooping around, she finds that Marcus was expelled from school for his voyeuristic compulsions and lewd behavior. But did he also have something to do with the death of Paul's first wife, Sara (Colette Giacobine), who died under mysterious circumstances? Elise's search for the truth puts her deeper and deeper in danger, while distancing her from her new husband. Did Marcus kill his mother? Does Marcus want Elise dead? Or does he want something else from her?

Gross.

Gross gross gross gross gross.

I know that some giallo movies tend to push the boundaries of good taste, but this one takes it in a weird direction. There are, of course, "sexy" gialli, but this is the first I've seen that involves an adult and a twelve year old. Apart from the ick factor, the first two thirds of the movie are really dull and then things pick up at the end with some strange turns, a dream sequence montage and a gleeful twist ending. Light on blood but heavy on exposition, bewbs and inappropriate boundary issues.

You'll recognize the most famous actor in the cast, Mark Lester, from his title role in Carol Reed's Academy Award-winning musical Oliver.
You might know Swedish actress Britt Eckland as a Bond girl or from The Wicker Man, Get Carter, or from dozens of guest appearances on all the classic '70's TV shows.
The music in this movie was done by the great Stelvio Cipriani
Co-director Andrea Bianchi is renowned for his sexually-charged gialli like Strip Nude for Your Killer.
There's definitely a water motif in the movie- Sara is killed in her bath tub, a dog drowns in a pool, and several grownup scenes take place in bathrooms and swimming pools.
Both of the fake murders occur during the aforementioned dream montage.

What the Hell am I Watching?

Paul and Elise go to a party, where a woman of African heritage has been forcibly pinned to a table while guests cover her with fresh fruit, shoving it into her face as she struggles to free herself.

In the most messed-up scene in the movie, Elise slowly strips in front of Marcus, getting him to answer questions about his mother's death. He answers a question for each article of clothing, until she's completely naked in front of the boy.

Fashion Moment

There's not a lot to talk about, fashion-wise. Paul looks good in a suit and Elise tends to prefer solid-colored, monochromatic outfits.

She does glam it up a little with this Pucci-inspired print and elaborate matching necklace in the party scene.

The Murder Clinic

I never look at houses. Only the people living in them.

It's 1870 and at a remote English estate converted into a psychiatric asylum, a beautiful young patient has been murdered by a mysterious figure in a black hooded cloak. That same night, Giseéle (Françoise Prévost) is lost in the woods and stumbles upon the clinic's doctor, Robert Vance, burying the body. The next morning, Dr. Vance discovers Giséle and takes her in as a guest, where she meets the doctor's wife, Lizabeth (Mary Young), Nurse Mary (Barbara Wilson) and several patients at the hospital. Did Dr. Vance really kill the young woman? Or did one of the inmates finally snap? What are those strange footsteps coming from the forbidden third floor? And who will be the next to die?

The Murder Clinic (not to be confused with Slaughter Hotel, which has virtually the same plot) is an early giallo that relies on the trappings of gothic horror to create its mood: a dark castle, torch-weilding villagers and a quite-possibly-mad scientist. But The Murder Clinic also clearly owes a lot to the gialli of Mario Bava, whose trademark colored lighting is appropriated along with certain plot elements from Blood and Black Lace. There are also elements that presage an important later work but I'll go into detail below.

Elio Scardamaglia was mainly a producer of Italian exploitation films. This is the only movie he ever directed.
Barbara Wilson seems like a natural on-screen, but this is her only film credit.
You may remember Massimo Reghi (who plays psychotic patient Fred) as Marco in Blood and Black Lace.
The Murder Clinic is an early script by superstar screenwriter Ernesto Gastaldi.
A shallow grave in the woods does not count as a scene in a cemetery, for the purposes of the checklist above.

What the Hell am I Watching?

When Dr. Vance finds Giséle in the woods, he gives her a quick medical exam. And by "gives her a medical exam" I mean "gropes her bewbs."

There's a flashback late in the movie scored to a knockoff of the main theme from Gone With the Wind. I'm sure it's just different enough to avoid litigation.

Fashion Moment

Scardamaglia attempts a color motif in The Murder Clinic, just like Bava did in Blood and Black Lace. In this case, the color red links back to the first murder. At the beginning of the film, the killer runs through the castle and seemingly into the Vance's suite, where Robert is wearing this red smoking jacket.

The next morning, the victim has mysteriously vanished and Nurse Mary finds her red book slashed across the cover.

Wearing a fancy red dress, Giséle stumbles across Dr. Vance burying the body and when he finds her, Dr. Vance is wearing a red cape.

Later, when Giséle tries to blackmail Dr. Vance, he is wearing the same red smoking jacket.

On a different note, it may sound strange but The Murder Clinic may have been an influence on one of the greatest giallo films of all time - Dario Argento's Susperia. The first murder in both films features a young woman escaping a looming manor house and running from a killer through the woods at night. There's a scene in The Murder Clinic where Giséle slowly explores the house, gets chased by the killer, locks herself in a room, watches in terror as the door handle rattles, and is attacked - rather like Sara's memorable scene in Susperia. Both movies feature a mysterious woman hidden at the top of the house, who holds the answers to all the weird goings-on. And there's this scene, where a servant chases the killer through a shadowy labyrinth of hanging laundry...

... which is reminiscent of this memorably creepy scene from Susperia:

So was Dario Argento inspired by elements of The Murder Clinic? I'll leave it up to you to decide.

New York Ripper

Don't accept rides from anyone with two fingers missing on his right hand, okay?

A serial killer is on the loose in New York City and Lt. Frank Williams (Jack Hedley) is on the case. The victims are all beautiful young women, but that seems to be the only factor they have in common. As the bodies pile up in the morgue, the killer grows bolder, calling Lt. Williams before each murder and taunting him with a squeaky Donald Duck voice and quacking noises. Could the deranged killer be Mickey Scellenda (Howard Ross), a brooding eight-fingered man? Could it be jealous husband Dr. Lodge (Cosimo Cinieri)? With the help of psychology professor Dr. Paul Davis (Paolo Malco), Lt. Williams must find the answers before the duck-voiced killer strikes again!

New York Ripper isn't Lucio Fulci's best movie (that would be supernatural thriller L'Aldila), it's not his best giallo (that would be Perversion Story) and it's not the most fun to watch (that would be Murder Rock), but it's the Fulci-est Fulci movie ever, featuring all his signature moves: beautiful women in mortal jeopardy, lots of blood, close-up gore, zoom-ins on peoples' eyes, the killer's POV, Donald Duck, creepy and inappropriate sexual encounters, eyeball injuries, a gritty setting, helpless police, and a plot that hinges on a childhood trauma. This movie was made at a time when traditional gialli were being eclipsed in popularity by slasher films and Fulci gives his audience what they want, with slow-motion, blood-soaked shots of razors cutting off a woman's nipple and slicing through her eyeball. The plot may not make sense, but gore fans will cheer.

The movie starts with a standard Law & Order opening. A man is going about his day, walking his dog along the river when he stumbles across the first body.
Fulci makes a cameo as Lt. Williams' police chief.
There's a scene of a cool radio DJ warning people about the killer on the loose between songs and asking him to "leave those ladies alone." The way it's shot and acted, it seems to be an obvious homage to the DJ in The Warriors.
Fulci also seems to be paying homage to Bava and Argento when he lights the third murder scene in saturated greens and reds.
Killer's POV is a pretty standard giallo move, but I can't recall seeing Police POV before New York Ripper.
You may remember Andrea Occhipinti from his starring role in the great Blade in the Dark.

What the Hell am I Watching?

In a weird subplot, Jane Lodge(Alexandra Delli Colli)keeps getting herself into more and more dangerous sexual situations, recording them on a mini tape player, and giving them to her husband to listen to. She doesn't seem to enjoy doing it, and it's implied that she's making the tapes to aid her husband's sexual disfunction. In the weirdest and most disturbing scene, she flirts with and is assaulted by two guys in a pool hall.

Fashion Moment

There's not a great shot of it, but I love Fay's (Almanta Suska) white cashmere scarf and the way it's elegantly draped over her shoulder in the subway scene. Great hair, too.

Libido

"Not like my father! My god! Not like my father!"

As a child, Christian (Giancarlo Gianni) witnessed his father kill a blonde woman before hurling himself off a cliff. Now, many years later, Christian has returned to the house for the first time, accompanied by his wife, Helene (Dominique Boschero), the caretaker Paul (Luciano Pigozzi) and Paul's ditzy blonde wife, Brigitte (Mara Meryl). Christian's guests are all on edge, unsure weather his return will stir up dark, traumatic memories and slowly but surely, Christian seems to lose his grasp on reality. He sees ghostly figures in the dark, chases phantom footsteps and swears that his dead father is in the house. Is the manor haunted by Christian's father? Or is Christian being gaslighted in an effort to steal his inheritance? If so, who is mastermind behind such a devious plan?

Libido (not to be confused with the crime thriller In the Folds of the Flesh, which is sometimes also known as Libido) is a very early giallo and one of the first written by Ernesto Gastaldi, the man whose credits read as a list of the greatest gialli ever made and who created the template for the slasher film with Torso. Libido starts as a Psycho-style psychological thriller, introduces elements of gothic horror (thunderstorms, an old castle, muddy footprints, etc.) and finishes with a string of devious cons, double-crosses and mis-directs, ramping up the action all the way to the end. Gastaldi was clearly a fan of Mario Bava but also learned a lot from the French classic Diabolique.

You may know Giancarlo Gianni from his roles in Casino Royale and A Quantum of Solace. Dominique Boschero would appear in several other gialli, such as Who Saw Her Die? And giallo superstar Luciano Pigozzi - the "Italian Peter Lorre" - was featured in the classics Blood and Black Lace and Naked You Die.
This was the first directorial effort for both Gastaldi and co-director Vittorio Salerno.
Please note that the 2nd death listed above - Christian's father - is one that's talked about but not shown.
The movie opens with a Freud quote defining the concept of "libido" in clinical terms, but that provocative title doesn't really suit this mostly buttoned-up production.

What the Hell am I Watching?

Libido may not be very well-known, but it turns out to be a highly influential giallo movie. If you're already a giallo fan, you will be shocked by the opening scene: Christian, as a young boy, is dressed in a short-pants suit with knee socks playing with a mechanical toy that plays a creepy sing-songy tune. He hears a scream and witnesses a murder, scarring him emotionally for the rest of his life.

Sound familiar? There's no way that Dario Argento didn't have this scene in mind ten years later when he wrote the beginning of Deep Red.

Also, the rest of the movie involves a psychologically unbalanced man named Christian who holes up in a cliffside mansion with a blonde woman, an older caretaker and the caretaker's bubbleheaded younger wife. I'd say that's also a pretty good description of the middle third of Spasmo.

Fashion Moment

Brigitte is young, adventurous, and clueless about social cues, so her fashion sense tends to be a little daring. In one memorable scene, the camera leers as she dances the hula, wearing only black underwear and a feather boa.

Later, Helene's eyes nearly pop out of her head when Brigitte reveals this tiny pusstcat bikini.

But she does glam it up later with this elegant evening look.

As a side note, here's the musical toy that sets Christian off. He says it's Jiminy Cricket, but there's no way that's not Mr. Peanut.

Well, it's finally happened. After nearly two years of recapping the bloody thrills of the giallo genre, I've finally run out of movies.

98 posts – I would have loved to write just two more to make it an even hundred or, even better, six more to end the project on Halloween Eve, exactly two years from when we started the journey, but the movies have been harder and harder to find and my sources have run dry. Not that there aren't a lot more out there - I count over 40 titles that I'd love to review, but can't find in their entirety either dubbed or subtitled in English (my Italian is okay, but it would take four hours of pausing and rewinding to fully comprehend a 90-minute movie).

If I do come across one of the missing titles, I'll be sure to add a new entry, but this marks the end of the regular Thursday posts. Here's a chronological wishlist of obscure gialli:

The Hyena of London (1964)
The Third Eye (1966)
~~A for Assassin (1966~~)
The Killer Without a Face (1967)
Double Face (a.k.a. Liz & Helen) (1969)
Your Sweet Body to Murder (1970)
Kill the Fatted Calf and Roast it (1970)
Marta (1971)
The Glass Ceiling (1971)
Murder by Design (1971)
Tropic of Cancer (1972)
The Two Faces of Fear (1972)
~~The Weapon, the Hour, the Motive (1973)~~
The Bloodstained Lawn (1973)
Love and Death on the Edge of a Razor (1973)
No One Heard the Scream ( 1973)
~~Clap... You're Dead (1974)~~
Five Women for the Killer (1974)
All the Screams of Silence (1974)
The Fish with the Gold Eyes (1974)
The Killer Reserved Nine Seats (1974)
~~The Hot Lips of the Killer (a.k.a. The Killer Wore Gloves) (1974)~~
~~The Killer with a Thousand Eyes (1974)~~
The Killer is One of Thirteen (1974)
~~Vice Wears Black Hose (a.k.a. Reflections in Black) (1975~~)
~~Plot of Fear (1976)~~
~~Crazy Desires of a Murderer (1977)~~
The Monster (1977)
The Perfect Crime (1978)
Carnal Crime (1982)
~~Murder Near Perfect (1983)~~
Formula for a Murder (1985)
The House of Good Returns (1986)
The Killer has Returned (1986)
The Monster of Florence (1986)
~~Obsession: A Taste for Fear (1988)~~
Murder in Blue Light (1991)
Crime of Passion (1994)
The House where Corinne Lived (1996)
~~Fatal Frames (1996)~~
Eyes of Crystal (2004)

I haven't seen any of these yet, so it's possible that some of them aren't gialli at all, but rather Krimi or other crime dramas. If you know where I can find any of them, please let me know!

One of the great things about having a blog on Blogger is that they provide the writer with a variety of statistics, so he or she can follow trends. For example, here's a run-down of the top SEO keyword phrases entered into search engines that led people to this blog (as of this posting):

It makes sense that the name of the blog would come up first, but I'm surprised to see that as many of six people looking up Luc Merenda and ending up here. Or, even stranger, maybe one person searched his name six times. If it was Luc Merenda searching his own name, let me please say hello. Big fan.

Next, let's take a snapshot of you, the audience:

The blog is written in English so it's hardly surprising that the US, UK, Canada and Australia are in the top ten countries that visited the site. But I'm thrilled to see so much interest in giallo movies coming from elsewhere including Turkey, Iraq, Madagascar and Ecuador, who fell below the top ten. I'm a little sad that Italy didn't rank higher.

Finally, by way of a hit count, here's a list of the most popular posts:

Absolutely fascinating. For a while You'll Die at Midnight was the most-viewed post (likely boosted by my incisive breakdown of Lamberto Bava's color motif) but in recent months, So Sweet... So Perverse pulled a commanding lead. Going in, I thought for sure that one of the classics like Deep Red, Blood and Black Lace, or The Black Belly of the Tarantula would be the most popular but a relatively obscure and bloodless Carroll Baker thriller is the most-read-about movie on this site.

Again, the blog isn't over - just the regular Thursday schedule. If you have access to one of the movies on my wishlist, dubbed or subtitled in English, please let me know in the comments. Until then, thanks for reading!

Obsession: a Taste for Fear

"Are knives standard in the bondage game?"

Diane (Virginia Hay) is a high-powered high-tech bisexual photographer who gets what she wants in the bedroom as well as in the studio. But when her model and lover, Tegan (Tegan Morrison) turns up dead, she has to stay a step ahead of Lieutenant Arnold (Dario Parisini) to protect her ex-husband, Georges (Gérard Darmon), who is the main suspect. Soon, other people close to Diane are killed in the same way - bound in ropes and then stabbed, like a kinky encounter gone wrong. Can Diane find the real killer before Lieutenant Arnold closes in on Georges? And who will be the next to die in this wicked game of cat and mouse?

Obsession: a Taste for Fear definitely falls under the category of "sexy" giallo, with more gratuitous nudity and steamy scenes that any two other gialli combined. This movie is writer/director Piccio Raffianini's only credit - he never made another film before or since - but he seems to know his stuff, turning in a script with all the rhythms of a classic giallo and camera work throughout that pays homage to Dario Argento's Susperia, flooding each frame with deeply saturated color.

You may know Australian actress Virginia Hay from her role in The Road Warrior, as a Bond girl in The Living Daylights, or as sexy blue alien Pa'u Zotoh Zhaan on TV's Farscape.
The original Italian title, Pathos: Segreta Inquietudine translates roughly as Passion: Secret Anxiety. It's also sometimes called Pathos: Un Sapore di Paura, which literally translates as A Taste for Fear.
The score by Gabrielle Ducros is a glorious late-80's fever dream of 808 beats, synthesized new-age panflutes and Lethal Weapon-style sax solos.
There's a sly little homage to Michaelangelo Antonioni's1966 film Blow-Up, which was a touchstone for Argento's early films. Just like David Hemming's character in the mod classic, Diane gets frustrated during a photo shoot and tells her models to close their eyes and hold their poses, as she walks out of the building with no plans to return.

What the Hell am I Watching?

Near the very beginning of the movie, Georges takes Diane to a nightclub right out of a Stefon sketch from Saturday Night Live. This club has everything: little people ballroom dancers, a female bodybuilder, mirrors covered with cocaine, and a live band that plays New Jack Swing covers of George Gershwin songs.

Twice during the movie, scene transitions are made with a star-wipe, the cheapest and stupidest looking edit ever devised and one that has no place in a professionally-made film.

During the investigation, Lt. Arnold gets out of his car and is nearly run over by a speeding van. He draws his gun and fires what appears to be a laser blast. Where did that come from? Police have laser guns now? Are we in the future?

The movie never makes it clear what kind of photographer Diane is, exactly. She's not a fashion photographer, because her models almost never wear clothes. I suppose what she does could be considered high-end artistic erotica, but for what market? Calendars? Framed art prints?

Fashion Moment

When the characters do eventually get dressed, it's not often in something notable - or visible with all the high-contrast lighting effects. But there seems to be a motif throughout the movie of crazy fashion eyewear. Here's Tegan, sporting some retro checkered shades.

Kim wears these strange sunglasses with matte lenses

Diane keeps it classic with black Ray Bans

And here's Georges in his Dwayne Wayne flip-ups (which he wears like an eye patch at one point).

Let's also have a look at the beautiful cinematography. It's a lot darker than Argento's use of color, but has the same disorienting, ultra-saturated effect.

Crazy Desires of a Murderer

"Truth is certainly better than deception."

After a trip abroad, Ileana (Isabelle Marchall) returns home to Italy with her friends to the family castle and her ailing father, the Baron di Chablais (Roberto Zattini). During a fun evening of dancing and charades, it becomes clear that Ileana's friends share a complex history of relationships, debts and varying levels of mistrust. But when party girl Elsa (Patrizia Gori) turns up dead with her eyeballs gouged out, everyone is a suspect and it's up to the Inspector (Corado Gaipa) to sort the truth from the lies. Could the killer be Pier-Luigi, who is being hounded by the mafia or Berta, the sour-faced maid? Or perhaps it's Ileana's secret half brother Leandro, driven insane by a childhood trauma, who hides in the castle's catacombs embalming animals? The inspector must use all of his wits to find the killer!

Much like A White Dress for Marialé, Maniac Mansion, Five Dolls for an August Moon and Nine Guests for a Crime, Crazy Desires of a Murderer finds its roots in old-fashioned locked room Gothic murder mysteries. This one takes a few breaks for grownup scenes - it comes to us from the writer of the Emanuelle series of erotica movies, after all - and features a Colombo-like detective whose trademark is a cane and limp. The film is well-paced and repeatedly throws suspicion from one character to another, so just when you think you have the killer's identity figured out, you may start to doubt yourself.

The fourth murder listed above is actually a flashback that occurs before the main action of the movie starts.
Leandro's room in the catacombs is filled with taxidermied animals, but the only animal death I listed above is the rabbit he was shown taking apart near the beginning of the movie.
The title does make sense, but it's really generic. Just about any giallo movie could have been called Crazy Desires of a Murderer. But the original Italian title is one of the worst in the genre, as it gives away way too much of the plot.
There's a big emphasis on eyes in this movie. Lots of dramatic close-ups of eyes, shots of peeping toms spying and, of course, the killer gouges out eyeballs. I'd like to think it's all in homage to Lucio Fulci, who has a similar obsession with eyes in his movies.

What the Hell am I Watching?

At the beginning of the movie, Pier-Luigi is kidnapped, driven to a remote barn and then politely asks the mafia enforcers to give him two more days to come up with the money he owes. And after all that trouble, they let him go. I imagine it must have been an awkward drive back to his car in the city.

There's a scene where the house guests play sexy charades. Basically, they just undress and grope each other while the other guests shout movie titles, until they stumble across the one that's correct. It's a weird scene.

Fashion Moment

For a bunch of rich kids, this group has terrible fashion sense. Bobby wears this tight yellow turtleneck throughout the film, making me suspicious of him the whole time. Pier-Luigi sports this loud and distracting purple plaid jacket and an Eric Estrada hairdo. And you can't see it in this shot, but the Inspector's tie is always about four inches too short, accentuating his paunch.

The Killer Wore Gloves

"Did Michael speak to you? He's in danger - why don't you believe me?"

London artist Peggy (Gillian Hills) is worried about her boyfriend Michael - he's a reporter who has been covering the Vietnam war and has been out of contact for four months. In Michael's absence, Peggy rents the upstairs loft of her apartment to a friend of a friend named John Kirk Lawford. When she receives a mysterious phone call from Michael telling her to meet him at an abandoned airplane hanger, Peggy is nearly murdered by a gloved assassin and when she returns home, she finds that her new tenant is dead, having fallen from her upper-floor balcony. Things get even stranger when another man appears at Peggy's door, claiming to be the real John Kirk Lawford. Who wants Peggy dead? Where is Michael? Which is the real John Kirk Lawford? And why is there a suitcase full of money stashed in Peggy's hamper?

The Killer Wore Gloves is trashy fun in the classic style of Death Walks at Midnight and The Case of the Bloody Iris, featuring a mix of sex, blood, suspense and a variety of creative kills. The plot, with its double-identity hook, is really ingenious and is based on the novel Juan a las Ocho, Pablo a las Diaz by Luisa Maria de Linare, unfolding at a quick pace with plenty of suspects and victims on hand to keep things interesting.

The original Spanish title of this movie is La Muerte Llama a las Diez, or The Killer Calls at Ten (though he never does). In Italy it's called Le Calde Labbra del Carnefice, which translates as The Hot Lips of the Executioner.
If Gillian Hills looks familiar, you may recognize her from A Clockwork Orange, Michaelangelo Antonioni's Blow-Up, or as Glenda Kelly on TV's Dallas.
Bruno Corrazari is no stranger to gialli, having appeared in Blade of the Ripper, Seven Bloodstained Orchids and Puzzle.
You'll notice that I did not check "Gay character" in the checkboxes above. Yes, Peggy's upstairs neighbor, Mr. Lewis (Carlos Otero), is a hypersensitive single musician who dotes on his cat, swans around his apartment and wears tight sparkly shirts, but did you see the way he leers at Peggy? Please feel free to disagree.
All the men in Peggy's life are real scumbags. Her client, Ronald (Stelio Candelli) openly offers her money for sex, the first John Lawford and Mr. Lewis leer at her, and it turns out that Michael isn't the catch he appears to be.

What the Hell am I Watching?

The one animal killed is the rabbit that the landlord caught and skinned. Where, one might ask, does someone catch a rabbit in the heart of Europe's largest city?

I suppose the craziest thing about this movie is that at every single opportunity, Peggy refuses to tell anyone what's going on in her life and seek help, and it's never clear why. She's lured to the hangar and shot at and never tells anyone about it. The police ask about the dead man who fell from her balcony and she denies meeting him. She starts into a police station but chickens out on the front steps. Why? What's keeping her from getting the authorities involved?

Fashion Moment

When we first meet Peggy, she's running around town this two-piece leather maxi dress. Even with the decorative venting, it must be incredibly hot to wear.

Later, she shows up in this hilarious Sonny Bono-style jacket with fluffy wool vest and gauntlets.

Here's Peggy's apartment in all its eclectic glory. It's a fun mix of modern and vintage pieces and I like the colors. I think that giant egg cup is some sort of table lamp.

Finally, this is what passes as appropriate office attire in 1974:

Murder Near Perfect

"Mystére, remember - play it cool."

The day after a German man named Reinhardt (Peter Berling) snaps photos of a political assassination at the Piazza di Spagna, he hires two prostitutes - bubbly blonde Pamela (Janet Agren) and French vamp Mystére (Carole Bouquet) - for some late-night entertainment. Pamela steals Reinhardt's gold cigarette lighter and drops it into Mystére's handbag, not knowing that it contains the incriminating negatives of the killing. But she soon discovers that a dapper stranger in white spats, armed with a bladed cane is willing to kill to get it back. With people dying around her, Mystére reluctantly turns to American police Inspector Colt (Phil Coccioletti) for help. Can she trust this detective who seems immune to her charms? Can they figure out what the killer wants and outsmart their assailants? And who is the man in the white spats?

Murder Near Perfect (which is equally well-known as Mystére and is sometimes known as Dagger Eyes) is a fascinating later giallo that incorporates elements of an espionage thriller. Carole Bouquet is no stranger to this world, having appeared in For Your Eyes Only just a few years before. Despite some logic problems and plot holes, this movie has a fast, exciting pace, good moments of suspense and some well-played mis-directs. I was shocked when the killer was revealed halfway through the film, but then pleasantly surprised to find that there was another mastermind behind the assassination plot.

This is a movie about a prostitute but features absolutely no nudity.
In a nod do Dario Argento's Deep Red and The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, Mystére keeps flashing back to the last time she saw Pamela, sure that she was forgetting an important clue.
Setting the beginning of the movie at the Spanish Steps might be a reference to the first giallo, Mario Bava's The Girl Who Knew Too Much.
The assassination in the prologue plays out exactly like the JFK assassination, with a motorcade, an open car, a crowd on the street, shots ringing out - back and to the left! - and a shadowy figure in a high window as the security agents scramble into action.
It should be noted that in real life cars aren't allowed at the Spanish steps.
There's a montage of Mystére putting on her makeup before going to work, like she's putting on armor to protect herself from the world. It's reminiscent of a similar scene with Jennifer Connelly in Requiem for a Dream.
The title Murder Near Perfect bears no relation to the movie, but both of the alternate titles are far more apt.

What the Hell Am I Watching?

Mystére is a high-end prostitute who charges thousands of dollars per night, drives a sleek sports car and has a killer wardrobe. So why does shework the corner like a common hooker?

For her first job of the night, an old man pays Mystére $1000 to undress, touch his wife's shoulder for five seconds and then leave. It is an incomprehensible scene.

When the killer breaks into her apartment, Mystére defends herself with a bullwhip which, luckily, she had lying around.

Fashion Moment

For the first half of the movie, Mystére wears black and white exclusively, with an occasional pop of red. With her long dark hair and porcelain complexion, she's giving off serious Morticia Addams realness. Check out these webbed sleeves.

The black and white color scheme reflects her simple worldview - she lives a straightforward life where everyone is upfront about what they want and what they're willing to give in exchange. But when things get a little complicated, we see some shades of gray enter her wardrobe.

When she finds herself for the first time in real danger, she is seen in this bold yellow dress. Outwardly, she may appear confident, but she's really hiding her anxiety. Remember that in Italy yellow (or, in Italian, "giallo") is the color of fear.

At the airport, Mystére thinks she's found love and is ready to settle down. We see her in this retro conservative red polka dot dress with a plunging neckline, like a slutty Donna Reed. As in America, red is the color of love.

But when she realizes that she's been double-crossed, Mystére gets her game face on and goes after what she's owed in this jewel-toned green gown. Green - the color of envy and the color of money.

Fatal Frames

"Christ, that woman gave me the creeps. This is a weird situation."

American film director Alex Ritt (Rick Gianasi) is mourning the death of his girlfriend, who was the third of five victims of the "Video Killer" - a serial murderer who hacked his victims with a machete, videotaped the bodies and sent the tapes to the police. Eager for a change of scenery, Alex accepts a job from his friend Daniel (Leo Daniel) to make a music video in Rome for pop singer Stefania Stella (Stefania Stella). But old memories resurface when the women around him are brutally murdered one by one as he helplessly watches and eerie videos of the crime scenes are delivered to the police. In his anxious state, Alex is hallucinating visions and voices of the victims... or is he seeing ghosts? Did the killer follow Alex to Rome or is a copycat murdering these women? Can he and his friends get the answers they need at a seance? And can Alex convince American investigator Professor Robinson (Donald Pleasence) that he's not the killer?

Fatal Frames (which is sometimes audaciously called Susperia 2000) is a messy, poorly-rendered homage to Dario Argento. Story elements of The Bird With the Crystal Plumage and Deep Red are crammed together and shot in a weak imitation of Susperia's color-soaked cinematography. It takes more than a couple of lens filters and a handful of gels to get Argento's look right. You can't fault director/composer Al Festa for his ambition and his choice of inspiration, but the final product is a poorly shot, badly written, terribly-acted muddy-sounding mess.

Fatal Frames is Donald Pleasence's last screen credit.
Besides Donald Pleasence, you many recognize familiar faces in the smaller roles - Alida Valli (Susperia), Angus Scrimm (Phantasm), Ugo Pagliai (The Red Queen Kills Seven Times) and Geoffrey Copleston (Perversion Story) all make appearances.
The movie does make a decent travelogue of Rome, taking us to popular tourist sites like the Colosseum and the Trevi Fountain. I only wish the movie would ditch the characters and explore the ruins of the Forum instead.
At the end of the movie is the security guard in the building's foyer dead or was he knocked unconscious? Based on the movie's disappointing resolution, I'm pretty sure he was just knocked out, so I didn't include him in the body count above.

What the Hell am I Watching?

In his final scene of the movie (and his final scene ever on film), Donald Pleasence phones the police from the airport, telling them that he has to leave town because an old case has re-opened. He then walks into the distance to the theme from John Carpenter's Halloween. This is the best moment in the entire movie.

The seance scene is crazy. Alex, Daniel and Stefania go to an opulent palazo lit only by candles (for some reason) where a fancy formal party is taking place. The whole situation gives off a weird Eyes Wide Shut vibe. They meet a blind psychic Countess (Alida Valli) before winding through a maze of rooms to consult with the medium.

Let's talk about that cemetery scene. In a story thread that leads absolutely nowhere, Alex searches out the grave of a mysterious artist and meets a scowling priest (Angus Scrimm), who starts shouting and ranting... and then disappears without warning. That whole segment is bonkers.

Fashion Moment

Fatal Frames was released in 1996 but the look is pure 1988. Long ponytails, luxurious shoulder-length hairdos, loose-fitting, unbuttoned blouses billowing in the breeze, tight light-washed jeans... and that's just the guys.

Everyone looks like Fabio. Or the saxophone player in The Lost Boys. Also, here's a shot of Stefania's costume for her music video.

Guys, can you get out of the way? You're ruining my view of the Colosseum.

The Killer with a Thousand Eyes

"I've never dropped a case yet and I won't stop now."

When English Interpol agent Alistair McAndrew is murdered by a kabuki-masked assassin, his colleague, Michael Laurence (Anthony Steffen) is sent to Lisbon to identify and retrieve the body. But while in Portugal, Michael gets pulled into Alistair's case and, with help from an international team of agents, starts his own undercover investigation into the city's drug smuggling operations. As he gets closer to his friend's killer, informants and fellow agents are getting taken out by the mysterious gloved killer. Could it be the work of crime boss Costa (Eduardo Fajardo) or is someone else pulling the strings? Michael must hurry to find out before more people are murdered!

The Killer with a Thousand Eyes (not to be confused with The Man with Icy Eyes) is one of those fun gialli-poliziotteschi hybrids, combining the mysterious black-gloved killer and mystery aspects of a giallo with all the action and idiomatic themes of an Italian police procedural. And boy is this one action-packed. There's intrigue, explosions, six kung-fu fight scenes, a shootout in a dark warehouse and a couple of car chases - the last of which ends with the bad guys driving over the side of a giant suspension bridge. And it all winds up with a satisfying twist ending.

1974 was director Juan Bosch's giallo year. He's best known for his Westerns, but he released this movie and The Killer Wore Gloves within a few months of each other.
Marcello Giombini's score mixes a 1970's crime movie aesthetic with a strange electronic bebop style of synthesized bleeps.
This movie has a really high body count, but in includes six anonymous thugs, who are gunned down in the warehouse shootout in the course of four minutes.

What the Hell am I Watching?

When French agent DuVallier (Raf Baldassarre) lets Michael crash at his apartment, he makes a point of showing off an exercise device he keeps in the kitchen. I thought for sure that this would pay off later on - maybe Michael could choke an intruder with it - but it never does.

Crime boss Costa's girlfriend, Sarah is a real psycho, as evidenced by her boisterous bloodlust during a cockfight at a dinner party.

Crime movie cliché #104: the detective and the crime boss square off over a quiet but intense game of chess. Because the chess game is a metaphor for their contentious relationship.

DuVallier's murder scene takes place in the woods and as the tension builds, the birds get louder and louder - but instead of sampling actual bird sounds, they used electronic chirps and whistles, building to a weird robotic cacophony.

Fashion Moment

When we first see Michael, he's getting his hands dirty, busting up a small-time London drug ring in this cool black jacket and turtleneck.

In Lisbon he gets decked out in his Carnaby Street finest. Love this chic jacket-waistcoat-ascott combo.

But for the rest of this investigation, he wears these less flashy outfits: sport coat, chinos, and a wide tie, all in solid colors. He does have a magnificent gold belt buckle, though.

But the real fashion iconoclast of the movie turns out to be Michael's commanding officer, Albert (Antonio Pico) who climbs out of a pool in one scene wearing a tiny white banana hammock.

Reflections in Black

"If we don't find the third girl in that photo fast,

we're going to have another corpse on our hands."

When Emma Giorgi is attacked in her home late one night by a razor-wielding woman wearing black stockings, Inspector Laurina (John Richardson) and his partner Sergeant Panto (director Tano Cimarosa) are on the case. Before long, a second murder occurs and the victim is one of Emma's close friends. Why is the killer targeting this group and who will be next? The answers will lead the Inspector from Leondra (Dagmar Lassander), the wife of a powerful politician, to a drug smuggling hairstylist to lesbian photographer Contessa Orselmo (Magda Konopka). What secrets do the victims share and who will be the next to die?

Reflections in Black (also commonly called Vice Wear Black Hose) is a classic mid-70's giallo complete with a gloved killer, gratuitous nudity, lesbian love scenes, and a groovy soundtrack featuring a harpsichord, thumping electric bass and jazz drumming. The plot comes into focus late in the game and an overlong but necessary summary of the storyline by one of the survivors may fill in the details, but it drags the ending down. Other than that, the cast of giallo all-stars shines and benefits from expert editing by Romeo Ciatti.

Director Tano Cimarosa cast himself as Sergeant Panto, the short, wisecracking sidekick to the noble Police Inspector. Could "Sergeant Panto" be a reference to Sancho Panza from Cervantes'Don Quixote?
This movie features a classic "lovers alone in the woods stalked by the killer" scenario, which first appeared in 1973's Torso and was inspired by the true events of the Zodiac Killer case.

What the Hell am I Watching?

After being questioned by police about Emma's death, Leondra goes to her room. Her maid soon follows and, in an effort to console her, silently starts to undress. Leondra is too upset for grownup time and tells the maid to leave. It's a revealing scene, to be sure, but it's staged in a very strange way.

Leondra then flashes back to a poolside makeout scene with Emma and, rather than using the traditional hazy focus, the flashback looks like it was shot through a glass of milk.

When I started this blog, I decided not to have a checkbox for "horribly misogynistic" because that's sort of a given in the giallo genre. But it's never been so overtly stated as when Sergio (Marco Busciala) tells Anna (Ursula Davis) "Try to keep your impulses to the bedroom and supermarket."

Fashion Moment

Fast-talking drug dealer Sandro (Ninetto Davoli) illustrates everything that was wrong with 1970's fashion:

A tight muscle shirt under a glaringly loud cropped shirt with nine-inch cuffs and a collar fashioned from a couple of airplane wings. Add tight polyester high-wasted bell-bottoms and a Juan Epstein hairdo and you've got yourself a look.

Later, he tops it with a full-on Disco Stu rhinestone denim jacket that reads "OHIO BASE 47."

A... for Assassin

You got what you deserved, John Prescott

When millionaire John Prescott is found stabbed to death in his palatial manor, he leaves behind an unusual audio-taped will. Because he hated and distrusted his greedy heirs, John stipulated that only three would share his fortune and only after living together in his home for a month - sure that they would kill each other off in pursuit of his money. And sure enough, as police Inspector Matt (Gilberto Mazzi) looks into John's murder, he finds that with the heirs eager to frame each other, details of their alibis don't line up. Is Adriana (Aïché Nana) really the ditzy bubblehead she seems to be? Is Angela (Mary Arden) really innocent? And was Giacomo (Sergio Ciana, credited as Alan Steel) really a loyal employee? The Inspector will need to sort out the lies and find John's killer before everyone ends up dead!

A... for Assassin is another snappy early script by Ernesto Gastaldi that relies on gothic atmosphere and leans heavily on the classic Agatha Christie template. It also sets the stage for later locked-room gialli like The Weekend Murders, Nine Guests for a Crime and, most notably, Twitch of the Death Nerve. The setting is appropriately creepy, the cast is effective, and there are even a few good fight scenes, including a suspenseful rooftop chase during a thunderstorm.

You may recognize bodybuilder Sergio Ciani, a.k.a. Alan Steel, who took a break from playing Hercules and Samson in a popular string of sword-and-sandal adventure films to make this giallo.
The gothic trappings continue into the score, as an arrangement of Bach's famous Toccata in D Minor is used as the main titles music.
Cinematographer Aldo Tonti had a spectacular resume, having worked with Fellini and, a few years later, John Houston.

What the Hell am I Watching?

Giacomo takes a bullet to the corroded artery before finishing his fight with Armando,walking downstairs and confronting and attacking Angela before passing out.

Fashion Moment

There's not a lot going on, fashion-wise in this movie, but Angela does stand out in this mod color-blocked dress.

And it's interesting to see how they dressed Sergio Ciani, who spent his career up to this point shirtless, bearded and coated in baby oil.

I'd say they made him look pretty good.

The Weapon, the Hour & the Motive

I may die, but you'll pay.

Father Giorgio (Maurizio Bonuglia) is a well-loved priest in his parish, a father figure to orphan Ferruccio (Arturo Trina), and a hero to young Sister Tarquinia (Claudia Gravy). But he also has a sinful side - after breaking off his secret affair with beautiful married teacher Orchidea (Beddy Moratti), he starts up a relationship with hot-blooded Giulia (Eva Czemerys). When Father Georgio is found dead in the chapel, it's up to Commissioner Boito (Renzo Montagnani) to solve the case. Was the priest murdered out of jealousy or revenge or because he knew too much? Everyone seems to have a motive, but it's only a matter of time before the killer strikes again!

The Weapon, the Hour & the Motive is a pretty decent giallo, brought to us by producer and writer Francesco Mazzei in his only directorial effort. The body count is low, but Mazzei seems more interested in shocking his audience's religious sensibilities than filling the screen with gore - mildly blasphemous imagery and story points take precedence over the kill scenes. The script does have its ups and downs and some pretty glaring plot holes, but just when you think the conclusion is an anticlimactic let-down, the story keeps going and proves to be as sly and clever as you'd hoped.

Giulia's tarot readings count as a paranormal story element for the purposes of the checklist above.
The translation I saw changed a few names - Giulia is called "Julia" and Commissioner Boito is called "Voight."
A few story elements are borrowed from Argento. The scene where Boito silently explores an abandoned building is very Argento-esque and I believe that the police reviewing film footage of the victim's funeral to search for suspects comes from Cat O'Nine Tails.
There's also a clever camera move that appears twice in the movie. The characters are sitting around a round table with the camera in the center, pivoting between them from person to person as the dialogue plays out. It's the same effect that would frequently be used decades later on TV's "That 70's Show."
A good alternate title for this movie would have been The Dead Hour.

What the Hell am I Watching?

The blasphemous imagery includes a sexually active priest, a mysteriously falling crucifix, Ferroccio defacing a religious painting and spying on the nuns, use of tarot cards, and a scene of nuns naked in the shower.

There's also that weird scene where all the nuns in the convent get topless (except for their cowls) and self-flagellate while crying out Latin prayers until they're all bloody and sore. It's a classic scene of "nunsploitation," full of sex and violence, crossed with religious fervor.

Father Giorgio also whips himself for penance, but then only a few scenes later his scars have miraculously healed. Then, when he's found dead, they're noticeable again.

I find it weird that the priests and nuns are totally cool with Giulia's tarot readings at the church. I thought they'd see that as a form of witchcraft.

Why does Ferroccio need injections throughout the movie? Does he have some sort of medical condition? It's never adequately explained.

Midway through the film, Boito takes Orchidea to... what? A friend's house? A rented villa? A restaurant with no other patrons? Anyway, they sit down to eat, talk a bit and, without warning, she suddenly leaves the table. A woman walks by the doorway. Boito has a weird exchange with the hostess about her son. Then he gets up to look for Orchidea, who sees him, but continues on to the next room. He eventually finds her naked in a bed where they have some grownup times. It is a weird, directionless head-scratcher of a sequence.

Near the end of the movie we see Father Giorgio's late-night murder in flashback, but when the killer runs out the chapel's front doors, it's broad daylight.

Fashion Moment

There's a lot of yellow in this movie, but it doesn't exactly to add up to a motif or point to the killer the way it would in a Lamberto Bava movie. Giulia appears in this great yellow top with a plunging neckline, mandarin collar and black and gold embroidery. She looks like a sexy Starfleet officer.

Commissioner Boito shows up in a yellow jacket...

... on a yellow motorcycle...

...which he takes to the abandoned restaurant, which has this bold yellow sign.

Orchidea is the only other person in the movie who wears yellow.

But let me throw this out there. Orchidea wears this red shirt under a black and white striped jacket early in the movie...

...which seems to parallel and link her to Giulia's blood-soaked appearance later on.

Clap, You're Dead

Let's see if you have the guts to lie to us again.

On the set of his new movie, capricious film director Benner (Antonio Pierfederici) has thrown out the script and is coming up with new ideas on the fly - an approach that confounds his cast and enrages his writer, Ross (Carlo Enrici). But production nearly comes to a halt when one of the actresses ends up dead during a take and the only clue is the killer's shadow caught on film. Soon, the shadowy figure in yellow gloves strikes again and Inspector Menzel (George Ardisson) must figure out a way to trap the killer. Could it be Richard (Ivano Staccioli), the creepster who keeps hanging around the set? Is introverted actress Lucia (Annabella Incontrera) as innocent as she seems? And can anyone get Brenner to see past his own ego and take these murders seriously?

Clap, You're Dead (not to be confused with Fatal Frames) isn't a great giallo or even a particularly good giallo. But setting the film on a movie set is a novel and meta conceit that covers some of the flaws and provides an excuse for crazy costumes, nudity and a bizarre finale with dozens of potential suspects running around a theater wearing identical black unitards and masks. But for all that wackiness, the story is sadly predictable - things wrap up pretty much the way you thought they would from the beginning, though no adequate motive is ever given for the murders.

The title refers to the slate board or "clapper" used on film sets at the beginning of each take to identify the scene and take number and to help sync the sound to the picture during the editing process.
One of the scenes of the movie-within-a-movie is a funeral, but because it's just a film set, it doesn't count as an actual cemetery, for the purposes of the checklist, above.
The killer first appears as a shadow on film and, subsequently, the movie has fun playing with shadows and silhouettes, using them as mis-directs, and to imply an eavesdropping presence.
The main theme music seems to be a mellow, lite-rock knockoff of "Can't Take My Eyes Off You" by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons.
I'd like to think that the character of Benner is a combination of Fellini's solipsistic bombast and Alejandro Jodorowski's surrealist sensibility.

What the Hell am I Watching?

During a party scene, Fanny (Belinda Bron) shows up in a barely-there harem costume and goes into a wild dance. There are many unnecessary extreme close-ups of her pelvis.

Later, a large chunk of the movie is devoted to a city-wide manhunt when Richard goes on the lam. This sequence takes forever and instead of creating tension and suspense, it's just tedious and repetitive.

I mentioned the wacky finale in the theater with dozens of masked suspects running around, but it bears repeating. It's ostensibly staged as the finale of the movie-within-a-movie, but there are no cameras rolling - just choreographed prancing that breaks out into a fight scene and a hostage situation.

Here's a little sub-mystery embedded in the movie. Police Inspector Bert Malden and Benner's production assistant Andalou have this strange coded conversation during the party scene:

     Bert: Listen, have we met before?
     Andalou: I don't think so. Oh, yes - at the interrogation.
     Bert: No, no. Another occasion.

Later, Benner accuses Andalou of sexually assaulting the victims but then quickly realizes that he couldn't have because of reasons. So are we to deduce that Bert and Andalou are gay and that they previously met at a bar? If so, poor Bert got shut down hard.

SPOILER ALERT

At the end of the movie, Richard says that he went on the run when he stumbled upon the real killer strangling Fanny in her shower. But he never explains why he snuck into her room to catch her in the shower in the first place.

Fashion Moment

Benner immediately shows himself to be a free-thinking artist living on the fringe with this ensemble including a tablecloth plaid tam, a wooly vest and love beads.

Later, he shows up on set in this blue embroidered dashiki. And he's not giving up that tam anytime soon. If this movie were made today, Jason Mantzoukas would be cast in this role.

Finally, here's a look at Fanny's "slave Leia" cosplay.

Barry Gibb approves.

Death Haunts Mónica

If only I could solve everything with pills.

Madrid businessman Frederico (Jean Sorel) leads a messy life. His real estate firm is sinking, his business partners are plotting against him, his wife Mónica (Nadiuska) just found out about his affair, and Diego (Damián Velasco) - an associate from Frederico's former life as a smuggler and kidnapper - is extorting him. One night while Frederico is away, a masked intruder breaks into Monica's home. But after she shoots him, the intruder springs up, knocks her out, and stages Diego's lifeless body in her home so when Mónica awakes, it looks like Diego was the attacker. When Frederico returns home, he and Mónica dispose of Diego's body but soon, tormenting phone calls begin and more people turn up dead. Who is trying to frame Mónica for murder and drive her mad? And who will be the next to die?

While Death Haunts Mónica meets all of my criteria to be called a giallo, it's really more of a fast-paced soap opera that's 65% exposition and 35% actual plot. The first hour of this 125-minute film plays out like a season of "Falcon Crest" with secret affairs, high-stakes business deals and double-crossings. Death doesn't haunt anyone until the pivotal scene where Mónica shoots the masked intruder. After that, it's all giallo, reminiscent of Lucio Fulci's con-game plots with notes of Diabolique and Gaslight. The movie features high energy and a fast pace throughout and ends with a twist ending on top of a twist ending, which makes up somewhat for its bloodless first two-thirds.

The Italian title, Il Buio Intorno a Monica, translates as Darkness Surrounds Monica.
To whomever wrote out the subtitles for this movie: "noone" is not a word.

What the Hell am I Watching?

Early in the movie, Diego shows up to Frederico's office to extort money and menacingly admires a photo of Mónica on his desk. In the photo, Mónica is wearing the same outfit she was wearing that very morning while confronting Frederico's mistress at the photographer's studio. They clearly used a production still from an earlier day's shoot.

Adding to the blatantly gratuitous nudity (this may be the most well-bathed female cast in any giallo ever), Mónica's friend Elena (Yolanda Rios) goes to a nightclub that features a lesbian sex show for no reason at all.

Fashion Moment

Early in the movie, Mónica gears up for a confrontation with her husband's lover by squaring her shoulders, cocking her hat and glamming it up Joan Crawford style.

She has fire in her eyes and a polished, expensive look that means business. But later on, when her ends have been frayed and her nerves are shot, she looks more like this:

She's looking to an oversized, dowdy brown sweater for comfort and her rumpled, askew collar is the fashion equivalent of a resigned sigh. Pull it together, girl.