Ok, quick fix on this movie… Well it’s set in the seventies and about a typical stiff upper lipped British bloke, Gilderoy [Toby Jones], who travels to Italy to work with the sound design on director Santini’s [Antonio Mancino] new historically correct inquisition film The Equestrian Vortex – that’s exploitation horror to you and me and Gilderoy.
Somewhere between the letters from mom, and being nauseated by the on-screen, off-screen atrocities Toby seemingly falls for Silvia [Fatma Mohamed] - whom producer Francesco Coraggio [Cosimo Fusco] warns Gilderoy has “poison in her tits”. The emotional detour leads him to becoming lost in his own imagination where the line between film and fiction is erased…
Let’s be honest, Berberian Sound Studio is a tricky movie to grasp in one sitting, and there’s really no right or wrong analysis of this film, as everyone is going to read it their own way. This is one of those films that will split audiences in two halves. The ones who are angered because flips in and out of diegetic and non-diegetic audio, has a really trippy narrative and does all that it possibly can to mess with the audiences head, and the ones that simply take it for what it is – a curious thriller flipping in and out of diegetic and non-diegetic audio, has a really trippy narrative and does all that it can to mess with the audiences head.
Oh! And Suzy Kendall get’s a credit as special guest screamer!
Let me put it this way, Berberian Sound Studio is fucking brilliant and mandatory viewing for fans of Eurohorror and Giallo. No it’s not a horror film, it’s more of a mental mind trip in with elements of Brian DePalma’sBlow Up, Coppola’sThe Conversation, Dario Argento’sSuspiria and Michael Armstrong’sMark of the Devil… and it’s also a movie about what you didn’t see. NO, this isn’t a Giallo homage, NO, this isn’t a Eurohorror homage, this is something quite different and indeed.
To sum it up, Berberian Sound Studio is like being really drunk and trapped in that scene of the sound engineers in Luigi Cozzi’s“Dario Argento – Master of Horror” creating sound effects and magic that we all associate with classic Italian genre fare. That’s where this movie takes place and if you do like those kind of movies, you will get a kick out of this mind expanding piece of cinema.
Here’s that scene from Luigi Cozzi’s Dario Argento: Master of Horror which partially captures the essence of Berbian Sound Studio!
And here's the UK trailer:
Soon to be released by NjutaFilms on DVD and also screening at the MONSTERS OF FILM festival 26-29 September.
The Giallo! One must love the Giallo. There’s possibly no
other sub niche that can vary so much under one collective banner as the
Giallo. You can find artistic interpretation like AMER, the glamorous homage
approach like FrançoisGaillard'sBlackaria, or the classic tight, tense, thriller as Federico Zampaglione’sTulpa!
Tone and atmosphere is everything in Giallo. Establish that
tone, and reel the audience in. Keep them captivated and asking questions. Tulpa
opens with a fantastic initial attack that hammers the referents to classic
Giallo in as if Zampaglione was crossing off the Giallo 101 checklist.
A mysterious encounter leads to a BDSM game where pleasures
peak. The man wanders over to a desk and snorts a line of coke; whist the woman
still enjoys her state of submission. She catches something out of the corner
of her eye as a leather trench coated, black gloved and fedora wearing shadow
steps into the room. Gagged and bound she panics as she tries to break free,
but this doesn’t catch the attention of the man, who continues to get high on
his cocaine. Seconds later profound violence fills the screen; blood, knives,
death and mutilated genitals are left resting in front the still bound woman
face as she tries to release her muffled screams.
Yes, after this amazing, rough and visually stunning, opening
there’s no doubt about it; Federico Zampaglione has created a Giallo that
vibrantly resonates with all the right tones, colours and holds a solid atmosphere. Early on
Zampaglione has in interviews said that he wanted to make a film that was
actual Giallo, and true to his word he’s done exactly that. From a story
co-written with legendary Dardano Sacchetti - writer of many fine Gialli and Italian horror classics - and a screenplay penned with his
co-writer on Shadow, Giacomo Gensini, Tulpa is everything that we loved about
old school Giallo.
Following the initial attack, a brief moment of time is
spent establishing the lead character Lisa Boeri [Claudia Gerini]. This is done
swiftly and effectively as we see her in her workspace. She’s rapidly
established as a strong and powerful businesswoman, with a key position in the
company, fluent in several languages and also someone who even the boss
[Michele Placido] holds a secret desire for. We also get to see a third persona
of Lisa when we are introduced to her friend, bookshop owner and love sick Giovanna
[Michela Cerson], possibly Lisa’s only real friend and the person who she can
really be herself with.
Each well written leading character needs dimension to make
them interesting to the audience, and Lisa’s “dark secret” is that she spends
her nights at an erotic “members only” nightclub. Here she takes a drug laced
cocktail, supplied by the mysterious Kieran [Nuot Arquint – who also played
Mortis in Zampaglione's previous film, Shadow], slips out of her clothes and starts the nights carnal encounters
with fellow club members.
So starts the intrigue. Being a Giallo, we as an audience
are on our feet; paying attention to detail and already placing together the
pieces that will make this film click. The initial murder is connected to the
club members, the woman Lisa was intimate with at the club becomes the
murderers next victim – in a fantastic merry go round, victims face versus
barbed wire session – and we realize that the killer is stalking club members… now
we start to lay the puzzle of who the killer is, what is the motif and what’s
the connection.
Zampaglione plays it by the book; lush settings filled with
vibrant lighting, solid camera work and a genre typical soundtrack all written
and performed by Zampaglione and Andrea Moscianese as The Alvarius. The
soundtrack is contemporary, but at the same time it breaths classic Cipriani,
Morricone and Goblin scores, and more than one theme that sticks in my head
after the movie is over. I can’t wait for it to be released so that I can
listen to it again.
It’s obvious that Zampaglione knows his Giallo traits, and he
uses them perfectly. He keeps the killer mysterious and sadistic – which makes
for some outstandingly murder set pieces – in the safety of the off screen
space until the very last moment. He also tosses in a few red herrings and a
few loose ends – which I’d claim are vital Gialli traits as the entire genre is
about deceiving and keeping the audience guessing. Then there are the
obligatory murders. Oh yes, there are a great variety of murders in Tulpa. Even
if you aren’t a fan of the Giallo as a genre, Tulpa has some great special
effects that will satisfy your blood lust. Really, there are some really
spectacular moments in this film that are top notch. Finally the ultimate trait
– the amateur sleuth! Lisa becomes the amateur sleuth as she comes to the same insight
that we as an audience do – that someone is murdering the clientele and that
only she can solve this mystery. Yes, there is logic and a stern motivation to why
she get’s drawn in, which I’m keeping hidden from you as not to spoil the
intrigue, and her rush of insight moment is fantastic.
I’ve seen many a neo-Gialli try so hard to be Giallo, and
perhaps some of them try to hard and become pretentious and illogical, which
makes them fall flat on their faces. Tulpa avoids all those pitfalls, as it
stays real, and instead of being a pastiche or homage, it is a pure and simple
Giallo, so when the big reveal is made, there’s a logic to the killer’s raison
d’etre. Another great detail was the use of cell phones to spy and share
information between characters. We all know the classic “camera” POV of early
Giallo, Zampaglione brings it up to date and uses it in a smart way in these
days of fast access and constant online living.
On a final note, I find that one of the key ingredients of
Italian genre fare – or at least one of the features I find ever so enchanting
– is the way the films are dubbed. Yes, I love that somewhat out of sync not
quite right match of mouth and dialogue. Now let it be made clear that I work
with TV productions and have been responsible for several hours of TV during my
years in that profession. I’d never for a second accept out of sync sound and
image there, but I actually feel that it’s important part of Italian cinema,
and if you know your cinema history, you’d know that the main part of Italian
cinema was post-synched. Fellini, Pasolini, Visconti, Argento, Fulci, Bava, all
of them worked this way, and this makes it kind of sad that some people can’t
appreciate this as a key ingredient to what makes Italian genre cinema such a
passionate obsession.
Federico Zampaglione’sTulpa is the slickest and grittiest
Giallo since the eighties! I enjoyed this energetic return to the greatest
genre in the world so much, that I watched it again, straight away. Tulpa is required
viewing for Giallo fans! It get’s right to the point, nails it perfectly and
violently rams a razor sharp dagger down the throat of all competition! A
showcase of what made that Giallo so great, and unquestionably the best neo-Giallo
of the last thirty years!
Tulpa hits Italian cinemas on June the 20th, and is set for
a Swedish DVD release later this year.
Dick Randall, happy go lucky archetype of an American film
producer/ writer/actor, with a burning passion for low budget trash and sleaze
fare. Amongst his mighty catalogue of productions prowls some of the grittiest
dazzling and favoured exploitations flicks co-produced between the USA and
Italy, Spain, France, Philippines, Taiwan, South-Korea, Thailand and on and on
and on. I’ll say stuff like Guido Zurli’s Lo stranglatore di Vienna (The Mad
Butcher) 1971, Fernando Merighi’sCasa d’appuntamento (The French Sex Murders) 1972, Mario Bava’sQuante volte… quella note (Four Times that Night)1972,
Eddie Nicart’sFor Y’ur Height Only 1981 and Juan Piquer Simón’s Mil gritos
tiene la noche (Pieces) 1982 and you’ll probably find at least one title you
like, and then you have a perfect image of what Randall got up to in his thirty
years as producer of cheap and cheerful trash cinema.
If you’ve been keeping up with Mondo Macabro’s catalogue
these last couple of years, you will definitely have seen the names of several
Dick Randall produced movies, amongst them the more recently released gialloesque
sleaze thriller, The Girl in Room 2A.
A pretty grim initial attack – during the opening credits,
talk about being effective - eagerly sets the tone, as a young woman is
kidnapped by masked strangers, drugged, striped naked, strung up to the beams
of a roof, tortured and then tossed off the side of a cliff to her death…
There’s no doubt about it, from here on this movie is probably going to be on
the rough side.
In stark contrast to the violent opening, we’re introduced
to our protagonist Margaret Bradley [Daniela Giordano] as she’s released from
prison peacefuly chatting to the wardens. She goes straight to her halfwayhouse
under the supervision of Mrs Grant [Giovanna Galletti], claims to have been incarcerated
innocently, and that it all had been a mistake, which obviously makes her
backstory suddenly become intriguing. To thicken up the plot, there’s a lurky
geezer following her around, and installed in her temporary residence, she
notices a big blob of red – supposedly blood – that won’t wash out from the
floor of her room. Definitely lifting a trick of two from the Italian Giallo
genre, shutters slam, the landlady acts suspicious, footsteps stalk outside her
door at night, a character has a mannequin fetish, and a red gowned, red masked
figure haunts her dreams… but is it a dream?
By chance the landlady’s son Frank [Angelo Infanti], is in
cohorts with the sinister Mr Dreese [Raf Vallone] who takes an eager eye to
Margaret. There’s a little hook that keeps Margret from leaving the cooky
landlady and her snooping son, Margaret can’t leave before she’s paid the first
rent. So she need’s dosh too become free… With a small loan of twenty bucks
from her parole officer and friend Alicia Sundberg [Eurohorror icon Rosalba
Neri], Margaret starts to plan her move to freedom and escape from the
suspicions apartment of Mrs Grant.
Along the way, we learn just how vile Dreese and the man in
red can be, as they turns on a former business partner, torturing him and driving
him off a cliff in a burning car. The plot thickens when Jack Whitman [John Scanlon] turns up,
telling Margaret the story of his sister’s suicide. Edie Whitman was also the
previous tenant of Mrs Grant, and also a former resident of room 2A.
Jack ignites his own little subplot, which goes via Edie’s
boyfriend Charlie [Brad Harris], and his wife Claire [Dada Gallotti], who
clarify both Margaret and the audience’s suspicion that Mrs Grant’s hostel is
being used as a menagerie of victims for the Red masked man’s sadistic
pleasure. When Charlie tells Jack Edie ended up at Mrs Grant’s after a short
spin in prison, it becomes clear that Margaret better stay on her toes. Which
doesn’t stop her or the supposed mourning Jack from dropping out of heir
clothes and getting it off, whilst Frank peeps on them from the other side of
the curtains…
The threat against Margaret is pretty solid now, and gearing
up for the last act, the red hooded figure and his thugs make their grand
entrance.Chained up and locked in a
small cell in a dank chateau Margaret finally learns what the strange cult is
all about, and how they are the only ones who can help her, and the other” Bad
girls” repent their sins. It’s a small part, but Karin Schubert is featured as
Maria, yet another young woman to move into the Grant hostel, and as we have
already learned, bad girls must be punished. Subplots and main narrative all
come together in a final climactic encounter where answers are given and the
identity of the masked red figure is revealed.
The Girl in Room 2A never really manages to get up there
with the great Gialli, although it certainly does tap into genre traits and
relies heavily on something of an investigation plot. There could have been more
moments where nudity and violence come together, and the greater part of the
hooded man’s sadistic torture is told through flashbacks. It is a great moment
of depravity, and a quick internet search makes me wonder if there was an even
rougher cut of the film, as some seventies bush found on the net, isn’t
featured in the film. It could also be the classic publicity shot stunt, so
let’s not pay too much attention to that. I’d easily have seen more of it, but
despite being an important part of establishing the threat of the climax, it’s
pretty sparse. The opening premise certainly doesn’t come through even though
the final scenes have a great evil cult, complete with bourgeoisie audience in
attendance moment. If one this is underused, it’s the mystery of Mrs Grant and
the ominous cult!
Perhaps it is part of lesser Gialli traits, the sudden
stopping in it’s tracks and tossing a mediocre ending at the audience, as a lot
of them suffer from somewhat unsatisfying final solutions. The climax to The
Girl in Room 2A isn’t’ altogether satisfying and comes off as something of a
quick fix. I’m guessing that the lack of eroticism and sexploitative content –
which certainly was an area that Rose had tampered deep into back in the states
during the Sixties with scripts for several roughies and his direction of the
one with the best name ever The Smut Peddler 1965 -may be sign that Rose was trying to move into a new area, more
serious film turf and perhaps starting to sever his ties with the old smut
peddling sexploitation world. Whatever the case, his plans seemed to have
failed, and he unfortunately never made another film after The Girl in Room 2A.
The majority of the score is brilliantly haunting ambient
jazzy stuff by Berto Pisano - mostly known for his scores to Andrea Bianchi’s
Nude per l’assasino (Strip Nude for Your Killer) 1975, Le notti del terrore (Burial Ground: The Nights of Terror) 1981, and Mario Landi’sGiallo a Venezia
1979. But at the same time it takes on some preposterous proportions during the
last act and does more damage than help build towards the climax. I don’t know
what the through was at the time, but it almost becomes farcical with a cheesy
adventure matinee quality. Needless to say it sounds pretty daft in the context
of saving young naked women from a red masked person thrashing at them with a
cat o’nine tails.
Re-built using part of English and Italian prints to bring
the most complete version of The Girl in Room 2A, Mondo Macabro present the
film in the finest shape it’s ever been available in to date, uncut, uncensored
and unbound! It may not be the top of the crop, but it sure is an delightful
little piece that easily makes for some easy watching and the Red hooded sadist
is one of those characters you really cant get enough of and cherish every
moment of that scarlet insanity.
Remember AMER? Remember the fucking awesome Justice tracks
Phantom (1+2) built around that GoblinTenebre sample? Remember all those
splendid Gialli you spent hours watching until they all melted into one? Well
here’s a twosome of movies that combine everything that you liked about all the
above and deliver two fabulous concoctions that really should be in the
collection of anyone who claims to like European cult cinema.
First out, is Last Caress, which sees an eclectic bunch of
kids, arrive at a mansion to spend the weekend with Catherine’s [Julie Baron]
cousin, but she’s nowhere to be found – we the audience already know her fate,
as that’s what the initial attack and ordinary world all establish. We know
it’s Giallo territory, we know it’s going to be violent murder, and the bomb
under the table has been set. So the eclectic gang, consisting of Catherine,
her painfully skinny artist friend, a guy dressed as a reservoir dog, and guy
who looks like one of Steve Martin and Dan Aykroyd’s "two wild and crazy guys",
Oh and then there’s Sélène [Joanna Imbert] the sexy mute!
With nothing better to do on a dark night in a large mansion
they’ve never been in before, they have a little séance, which drifts
deliriously through some very Lucio Fulci imagery into some prime nunsploitation…
You see, this is a smorgasbord of delirious tributes to the world of low budget
exploitation films.
The set up at the start of the film makes for the main
narrative. The killer is in the mansion, hiding in the shadows, searching for
the “lost painting” that we’ve already seen him murder for, will he find it,
what’s so important about it and how will Catherine and her mates survive the
weekend are the subplots that push the film forth.
François Gaillard and Christophe Robin bring out all the
tools from the shed out for this one, Black leather, spiked gloves that tear through
skin, wires garrotting throats, young flesh hanging on meat hooks, cat and
mouse games…carnage and torment in the most stylish way.
It’s Lucio Fulci meets Juan López Moctezuma, Dario Argento
meets John Carpenter, Tobe Hooper meets Luciano Ercoli, Norifumi Suzuki meet’s Bruno
Mattei… and then there’s the Demon that turns up at the end…oh my… I need to
sit down; my head is about to explode.
Then on to Blackaria, which literally flies of the screen,
screaming David Cronenberg, David DePalma and Emilio Miraglia hurling us into nightmares,
wet lesbian dreams and razorblade wielding psychos.
The narrative of Blackaria is basically Angela [Clara
Vallet] who suffers from erotic nightmares where she encounters a strange woman and
her quest through the movie is to solve the puzzle of her identity, come to an
insight what she saw when she found the neighbour murdered, and squeeze in as
many Dressed to Kill homages as possible.It’s dreamy, its erotic, its violent… and drenched in blood soaked
special effects that will make you squirm.
Of the two, I’d easy say that Blackaria is the better
because of it’s Gialli / DePalma visuals, yes Last Caress uses Giallo traits
and symbols to, but it’s in Blackaria it comes to a fantastic multiorgasm,
where narrative stricture is disrupted time and time again as Angela moves in
and out of her dream state – not to unlike A Lizard In A Woman’s Skin…
You get the picture; François Gaillard and Christophe Robin have
assembled a rosary of murder set pieces, cinematic homages and iconic moments
in their very own magic brew. And why not, it’s like listening to a hip-hop
album for the first time and going “ah, there’s that”, “Oh cool, they took that
too” “Hey, I love that beat” and so on, but with visuals. Damn, if I still
drank, these movies would be my new drinking game… each time you can identify a
referent, take a swig.
Someone said online that I’d lap this up like a crack addicted
prostitute and it’s true, I did lap it up like a crack addicted prostitute all
three hours of it, Last Caress, Blackaria the two shorts Die, Die my Darling (See
Semi-naked Nazi chick in knife fight!) and Under the Blade (a Giallo
concentrate) and as I wrote this text and made screengrabs I listened to the
Double Dragon soundtrack which is on the second disc… it’s definitely the
Ultimate Edition. I really loved the hell out of this; this is exactly what an homage-movie
should be like. It works on it’s own two legs, but at the same time is an
ultimate remix for the initiated.
A superb release, some great movies and a well spent three
hours, if nothing else a visual party-tape for horror fans, and make sure to
stay through the end credits of Blackaria(and Last Caress) for the “Thank You” list, it
will all make perfect sense then. All the directors works referred are listed
and Anita Strindberg; The Uncrowned Swedish Queen of Italian Cinema.
These trailers may be censored, but the NjutaFillms discs are uncut!
I won’t start this with a rant on how Lucio Fulci made so
much more than the classic video nasty’s he’s infamous for.I’m quite convinced that anyone who really
bears a passion for the works of the late master of genre, will already have
ventured back past those seminal works and discovered the real masterpieces of suspense
and thrill, hidden away in his back catalogue. If you haven’t seen the movie,
I’d recommend that you first check it out before we get into this, as certain spoilers
are featured in this text. If you know the movie, then buckle up and let’s go.
In a small rural village, someone is murdering young
pre-adolescent boys. The Carabinieri are stood almost helpless as they have a
hand full of suspects ranging from the village idiot, to the witch who roams
the landside, to the shaman who taught her his magic. A curious journalist
arrives in the village and together with a somewhat strange choice of companion,
starts to poke around the case, coming to a shocking conclusion about the killer’s
identity.
I often talk about setting tone as early as possible… Well
try this on for size: a woman [Florinda Bolkan] claws at the dirt under a
motorway overlay. Her thin soiled and bloodied fingers produce the skeleton of
an infant from a shallow grave in the dirt. A young boy (Tonino) shoot’s a
stone from his slingshot that upon impact crushes the small lizard he was aiming
at whist he sits keeping lookout for a specific car to swoosh by. Editor
Ornella Micheli (Fulci’s frequent editor before Vincenzo Tomassi made his
entrance) rapidly establishes the small village with a series of fast edits to
the diegetic sound of church bells ringing. We enter a church in mass, were two
young boys(Bruno and Michele) sneak out
to share a gauloise under the same overlay we saw earlier. Tonino comes running
towards them whilst screaming, “They’re here, they’re here” and the trio run
off to a shack, where some blokes greet the two prostitutes who have exited
their car. The women have“tits like
water melons” in the excited boys’ opinions – but the village idiot Giuseppe
wrecks their intended session of sordid voyeurism. Instead they turn their
attention on him and start verbally bullying him, as he too was planning to
watch the two men shag the prostitutes. As they boys taunt Giuseppe, he screams
that he will get they, he will get them…
Potent stuff, and definitely an impressive couple of minutes
which accompanied by Riz Ortolani’s short but harsh stinger cues, establishes a
lot of stuff, which will come to play within the movies narrative later on. But
be alert, those moments establish more than you could ever have guessed. The
location is set, a small rural village, where the church is the centre of the
town. The crazy woman – Florinda Bolkan’s is presented, and we understand that
there’s a dark secret in her past. We learn that the kids are adolescent young
men with a budding curiosity of the opposite sex. But they are still kids and
can easily turn from their sexual curiosity to a taunting mob, which evokes
fear in those they decide to single out. In the subtext we can assume that sex
is something sacred and kept within the confinement of the family unit. This
can be presumed as the village is most likely a stern follower of catholic values,
and the men take their “imported” prostitutes to a shack outside of the village
vicinity. But it’s not all presumptions, this is all true, and will give you a
rush of insight upon the conclusion of the film.
If you know your Fulci, then you know that he enjoyed giving
the church a kick in the ass on any given moment. My theory is that it's due to the tragic events in his personal life. I can’t really see a creative person
being a devout follower of religion, when that religion takes away loved ones.
Somewhere that bitterness has to vent, and I’m saying that the way Fulci aimed
critique towards the clergy was one of them.
There’s a delightful irony that motivates the murders and
definitely a provocative one in more than one way. The village priest, Don Avalone
[Marc Porel], is the murderer of the piece, and it’s not only a stern poke at
the church, but it also presents a delightful dilemma as one can in some
strange way empathize with what Don Avalone is trying to do. In his complex
state, his philosophy is to kill the yearning young lads as to protect them
from committing sin, hence allowing them to enter heaven instead of the burning
pits of hell. I’m a sucker for the moral twists of doing bad, for doing good,
and Fulci nails this one on the head. Then he makes the priest – or the clergy
in the larger picture – pay a most terrible and harrowing death as he has his
face torn to pieces against the rock walls, before breaking every body in his
bone when he smashes into the hard rock below. If there was one thing Fulci
could do, it was provoke.
But perhaps the most provocative moment of the movie is
found early on when Barbara Bouchet’s character Patrizia, who oddly enough
rents a penthouse flat above the Spriano family, reveals herself as a paedophile!
Now this isn’t a Feliniesque moment like the opening one, where the lads merely
want to catch a glimpse of the prostitutes “tits like melons”. This is a raw,
confrontational, full on flirtation where the fully naked Patrizia invites
Michele to go to bed with her. If not for being saved by his mother who calls
him back to the first floor. Patrizia, talk about a complex character, and it’s
later revealed that she not only has an appetite for young boys, but she’s a
recouping Junkie too… Not that this was
the first time Fulci, used paedophilia to provoke, it plays a vital part in the
narrative of Beatrice Cenci 1969 too, where both Tomas Milian and Georges
Wilson are part of the cast. Fulci, no stranger to getting in trouble with the
law – i.e. the puppet dog incident following Una Lucertola con la pelle di donna (Lizard in a Woman’s Skin) 1971 – once again
ended up facing another trial when the scene where the naked Bouchet takes to
seducing Michele caused a stir. Always the one with an ace up his sleeve, Fulci
presented the "little person" Don Semeraro (who almost thirty years later stared in Joe
D’Amato’s The Hobgoblin) who had been the stand in for the child actor, and the
case was dismissed.
So how does this come together with the opening montage?
Well basically Florinda Bolkan’s Macaria character is insane the whole time.
Yes, she performs her voodoo-like ritual with the three dolls in the images of
the three taunting kids – I told you they where trouble, and they disturbed the
grave of her child, hence forcing her to move the dead baby from it’s resting
place and have her perform her mumbo jumbo voodoo vengeance. But that’s merely
a red herring to toss you off track, just as the trail of village idiot Giuseppe
[Vito Passeri] is too. Barbara Bouchet is a red herring too, despite her wonderfully
complex character. The church and the whole Catholic Church bit is all about
Don Alberto’s modus operandi. Yes, there is a veil of Catholic values draped
over the town, and to save the children from corruption – which we see they are
on the way to being with the smoking and desire to peek at prostitutes, and
possibly masturbate at the same time – Don Alberto saves their souls by
murdering them. Then in the last moments of the movie, good Old Catholic guilt
comes over him and he takes his own life… ironically as suicide damns the
deceased to an eternity in purgatory.
There’s an interesting use of the off-screen space in
Don't Torture a Duckling. At first several characters are isolated out there, the killer, and at
least two pairs of hands tampering with the voodoo dolls. The off-screen space
had been a safe haven for murderers to lurk around in since Powell’sPeeping
Tom and Hitchcock’sPsycho, both 1960, and a genre-defining trait when it came
to the Giallo. What Fulci does is use it wisely; he keeps the characters in the
off-screen space until he needs to reimburse them into the narrative. Such as
when we need to introduce a second red herring, and Bolkan’s character finally
comes into frame after tampering with the voodoo dolls off screen since the
opening.
It’s said that Don’t Torture a Duckling was Lucio Fulci’s
personal favorite amongst his films, well looking at the movie from a retrospective angle, it all rings true, in
some way’s the movie is more a piece of Neorealism, with a smidgeon of thriller traits added. It’s definitely the Fulci movie that lies closest to Neorealism, and it is a fair interpretation,
which possibly could explain why he was so fond of this little obscure gem. Considering that Neorealism is the big Italian contribution to film history, one can understand his fondness for the film. With
the knowledge that Don’t Torture a Duckling was Lucio’s favourite film, this
could explain the reason why he later used several key moments –and beats -
from this movie in his later more typical horror films.
Chains whipped against a tender frame of human flesh,
creating deep gory gashes, which you all know and love from the “You ungodly
warlock” opening of …E tu vivrai nel
terrore! L’alidià (The Beyond) 1981, when a band of villager’s once again take vigilante
justice into their own hands. A face being smashing against side of mountain as
character plumages to death and presents insightful inner dialogue at the same
time, much like the opening visions that torment Jennifer O’Neil in The
Psychic. Amusingly enough the film also features a first poke at Disney and
primarily Donald Duck. A Donald Duck doll is decapitated and it’s torso dragged
around. Originally Fulci wanted the movie to be titled Don’t torture Donald
Duck, but when Disney protested, the title was changed. Exactly ten years later
the killer of Lo squartore di New York (The New York Ripper)1982 would
disguise his voice and talk like Donald Duck, and Fulci finally got his poke at
the cooperate suits of Disney Co.
Don’t Torture a Duckling really is an “all comes together”
flick in so many ways. Fulci has an amazing cast, several of which he’d worked
previously or would work with again; Florinda Bolkan, Tomas Milian, Marc Porel
and Georges Wilson. Not forgetting one-offers like Irene Papas, despite holding a rather small part, and Barbara Bouchet, who delivers a great performance here. Keeping
that tight Fulci grip on those he enjoyed working with, the maestro delivers a
movie with a water tight script, penned by Fulci, Gianfranco Clerici and
Roberto Gianviti (who wrote a stunning twelve screenplays together with Fulci
through the years), editing is superb and definitely amongst the best of the
eighteen flicks Ornella Micheli cut for Lucio, and without saying, Sergio
D’Offizi. Damn, the more I see of this man’s work the more it becomes a mystery
to me why he never landed an international career like, say Vittorio Storaro.
At least give the man an honorary award because, some stuff like Don’t Torture
a Duckling and not forgetting the innovative “found footage” approach of
Deodato’sCannibal Holocaust 1980, is all D’Ofizzi. Someone give credit where
it’s due!
Riz Ortolani’s score, which is pretty tender at times, has a
short moment that fan’s of the Cannibal Holocaust soundtrack will recognize. Not
that it’s a complete tune or anything like that, but there’s a small build
which Ortolani later used on Cannibal Holocaust and if you know that soundtrack
you will find it. Following the violent beating of Florinda Bolkan one can
hear the song Quei giorni insieme a te, performed by the domestically renown
Ornella Vanoni. It’s a delicate piece written by Ortolani and Jaja Fiastri
which definitely set’s a sentimental mood for Bolkan’s dying moment… but just wait
for a moment, things are about to get kinda strange here. I’m more curious
about the funky shit-kicker Crazy, here performed by Wess and the Airedales,
the same funky ass shakers that played on stage in Umberto Lenzi’sOrgasmo 1969
and Paranoia 1970. The same version of Crazy (originally written by Armando
Trovalioli), which is heard on the soundtrack to Dino Risi’sVero Nudo 1969…
Now take a guess who wrote the screenplay to Vero Nudo? Jaja Fiastri, the same
who wrote Quei giorni insieme a te with Riz Ortolani. Just another reason why I
love Italian genre, it’s all interwoven and connected to and fro for all
eternity through captivating intertext.
Unlike other releases, Shameless have given the movie a
release with the original Italian soundtrack, and an optional English Dub. Now
I do find that these movies are more fun with the English dub, but I also
prefer to be able to watch them with the original language option. Thanks to Shameless,
that’s now an alternative. If you watch one version of Lucio Fulci’s somewhat
overlooked masterpiece Don’t Torture a Duckling, then make sure it’s the Shameless FilmsVersion.
Berberian Sound Studio
