Ladykillers (1988)

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Originally airing on ABC on November 9, 1988, Ladykillers inverts the expectation of giallo — you’d expect that this would take place in an exotic dancing club with women on stage, not men — and has not only men be the object of the camera’s gaze but a female detective in the lead.

Ladykillers is the kind of bar where women get dressed up to watch men get undressed to the hottest music of 1988, which means cover versions of “Glamour Boys” by Living Colour, “Pump Up the Volume” by MARRS, “Beds Are Burning” by Midnight Oil, “I Didn’t Mean to Turn You On” by Robert Palmer — well, originally Cherrelle  and Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis wrote it — as well as “Stay With Me Tonight” by Jeffrey Osbourne and “Nasty” by Janey Jackson and I hope Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis got paid for all their music in this. The film has an incredible moment right at the beginning where someone in a Tina Turner glitter wig and a frock emerges from the crowd and unleashes a box cutter like they’re in A Blade In the Dark and slices a nude man to pieces and he dies in front of the women who were once yelling for him to take it all off.

Keep in mind that this is an American made-for-TV movie and not an Italian giallo!

Despite the murders in her club, owner Morgana (Leslie Anne Down) won’t close the place with all the business. I mean, what women are coming out to…oh yeah, true crime. It all makes sense. The police are on the case with partners — and former lovers — Samantha Flannery (Marilu Henner) and Cavanaugh (Thomas Calabro) not just looking for the suspects but Cavanaugh going undercover with a g string. Plus you get Susan Blakely as an advertising executive and Keith David as a cop. What else do you need?

Director Robert Michael Lewis also made A Stranger Waits, Computercide, S.H.E: Security Hazards Expert and Pray for the Wildcats. It was written by Gregory S. Dinallo, who wrote another TV movie that’s almost a giallo, Calendar Girl Murders.

The Los Angeles Times said that it was “inept” and “an excuse for a male flesh parade.” The New York Times claimed that it was “leering” and “prurient.” I enjoyed it. You knew that, right?

You can watch this on YouTube.

Last Caress (2010)

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François Gaillard and Christophe Robin referred to this movie as “glam gore.” Perhaps you’ve seen some of their other giallo-influenced movies like Blackaria and All Murder, All Guts, All Fun. As you can also tell by the titles of these three movies, they like Danzig a lot.

A woman gets the feeling that she will be killed and faints at an art show before her assistant drives her home just in time for a woman in black with an axe lives up to her nightmare and kills her. There’s also a priceless painting of a witch who was burned at the stake hidden on the estate and another killer with a spiked gloved from Blood and Black Lace or Death Walks at Midnight murders the first killer just in time for five friends to pay a visit. While the killer hides, they wait for the host — who is now dead — to come back. They decide to have a seance, which awakens an ancient evil and we’re off to a movie that is pretty much every late 60s to early 80s Italian horror and giallo movie all thrown together as well as the rose thorn beating scene from School of the Holy Beast just in case there wasn’t enough.

This is more a remix of the filmmakers showing you every horror movie they love, along with lots of nudity and practical FX. There are a lot of people hating on this online and saying that it’s mindless, but, well, of course it is. It’s like someone passing you a mixtape of some bands they like and some of their music on the other side, so when you hear their garage band, you know where they got the riffs and inspiration, but you have to admit that you appreciate how hard they go. I mean, it ends with a witch setting a priest on fire after an hour plus of bloody murders set to synth and if you don’t enjoy that, what hope can there be?

Sensazioni d’amore (1990)

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Director and writer Ninì Grassia made around thirty movies, including Legittima Vendetta, Omicidio al Telefono, Innamorata and Gatta Ala Pari with Bruno Mattei. He also made a few movies with adult actress  Ileana “Ramba” Carusio (Gatta alla pari, Un grande amore) and the movies First Action Hero, Italian Gigolo and Provocazione fatale.

Elena Aloisi (Marisa Mell) has lost her husband and would like her son Renato (David D’Ingeo) to remain alive as well, as he’s suffering from a heart condition. She also wants him to marry Giulia (Barbara Blasko) and give her a grandchild, even if that might kill him. Or maybe not, because while he avoids sex with Giulia, he’s sleeping with Claretta (Federica Farnese) while his wife and Dr. Gianmarco Serra (Gianni Macchia) are also twirling the Dum-Dum while the medical professional should be concentrating on keeping her husband alive.

Renato’s heart gets better, so the wedding plans get more intense, all while the maid Lizzi (Emanuela Castiglionesi) catches him in bed with his other lover and ends up becoming his third conquest to stay silent. Somehow in all this, Elena dies and the wedding plans slow, all while Giulia’s brother Ernesto (Marcello Montana) forces himself on Claretta — he already did the same with another maid by the name of Elvira (Alessandra Antonelli) — which causes Renato to smash his brains out and then make love to Giulia while stabbing her with scissors. He runs to a farmhouse where he and Claretta are married and as they consummate their marriage just as he has a heart attack and perishes. She gets all of the family money and the baby that Elena wanted so badly.

As you can tell, this is just as much as erotic thriller — actually a softcore movie — as it is a giallo. The whole point of it seems to be the numerous encounters between the different characters and less the murders, but I mean, there’s a scene where our protagonist — I guess? — stabs his fiancee with both a flesh and metal knife, as they say.

Have I seen too many gialli? Probably.

Delitto Passionale (1994)

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Milena (Anna Maria Petrova) has been shot to death after a night in a hotel with her politician lover. Her husband Peter Doncev (Fabio Testi), who is sleeping with someone else — spoiler its his ex and the director of the show that he was in, Julia Yancheva (Florinda Bolkan) — which leads the police into an investigation. Meanwhile, his sister-in-law Tonia (Serena Grandi, The Adventures of Hercules, Graffiante desiderio) comes to help him with his paraplegic daughter Ania (Anya Pencheva). Inspector Ivan Zanova (Paul Martignetti) takes the case, which somehow ends up — more spoilers — with Ania being the killer, as well as offing her dad, and then thinking that a puppet is now her dad. She’s confined to a mental hospital and we walk away.

This was directed by Flavio Mogherini, who also made a much better giallo, The Pyjama Girl Case, and was the art director of Danger: Diabolik. It was shot by Luigi Kuveiller (Deep Red, The New York Ripper), so with those names, I expected so much. But ah, the 90s, when gialli became erotic thrillers and movies were getting made in Bulgaria instead of the Eternal City of Rome. Written by Daniele Stroppa (Delirium, Blue Angel Cafe), this has the elements of what a giallo should be but just goes through the motions. That said, Grandi is gorgeous and could have been a giallo queen two decades before.

Caramelle da uno sconosciuto (1987)

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Sweets from a Stranger has the elements of a giallo — a masked and black-gloved killer is slicing sex workers with a razor and then killing them with a bolt gun — but it’s just about how the women decide to stop taking it and empower themselves, which may not have been what audiences were looking for.

It was directed and written by Franco Ferrini (Phenomena, Nothing Underneath, Dark Glasses), who worked on the script with Andrea Giuseppini and got the idea while writing Red Rings of Fear. It’s the only movie that he ever directed.

Stella (Mara Venier) and Nadine (Athina Cenci) are a high end call girl and an older experienced prostitute who learn of the death of Bruna, a mutual friend. They organize their fellow sex workers Lena (Barbara De Rossi, Vampire In Venice) and Angela (Marina Suma) with the goal of finding out who the killer is and stopping him while the police are fumbling in the dark.

Ferrini has spent a lot of time working with Argento — as has editor Franco Fraticelli — so the film looks good. The first kill is totally Bava with a woman being killed while surrounded by sculptures of angels. In fact, it’s nearly one of the scenes from Blood and Black Lace. Thanks for noticing, Giallo Files. Steal from the best, right?

Yet it’s also a serious movie that doesn’t exploit the woman and shows the reasons why someone would sell their body, as well as the abuse and trauma that often comes with this profession. It’s an intriguing way to use the giallo form to tell a story about real life. Of course, the first two girls are simply to get you in, using the exploitative nature of the giallo trappings to whet your appetite for more mayhem and then making you consider the actual people who are often only presents as victims.

You can watch this on YouTube.

MVD 4K UHD RELEASE: Cutting Class (1989)

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Rospo Pallenberg, the director of this film, is probably better known for the movies that he collaborated on with John Boorman, like Exorcist II: The Heretic, Excalibur and The Emerald Forest. This is the one and only movie he ever directed and sadly, it’s mostly known for being one of Brad Pitt’s first roles.

Brian Woods (Donovan Leitch, son of Donovan, the man who sang about smoking bananas in “Mellow Yellow”) has just been released from a mental hospital after his father was killed suspiciously. He quickly falls in love with Paula (who can blame him, she’s played by Jill Schoelen from Popcorn), but she’s already dating the big jock in town, Dwight (Pitt, who met Schoelen on set and got engaged to her at the end of filming). For some reason, the school’s principal Mr. Dante (Roddy McDowell!) is also in love with her. Once we get that all settled, a bunch of murders start happening and any of Paula’s suitors could be the killer.

I mean, how can you not love a movie where Paula’s district attorney dad (Martin Mull!) gets shot by arrows and spends the entire movie stumbling around and trying to get rescued?

The kills in this movie are ridiculous: one teacher is killed on a Xerox machine and every kid gets a copy of it. Another is having way too good of a time on a trampoline before a flag gets put under it.

It all ends with Dwight’s head in a vice and Brian making him choose between the two men. Paula screams, “Stop fucking with my emotions!” and literally sends a claw hammer into his brains and slicing him in half with a circular saw.

Seriously, this movie is just weird. It has no set tone and usually, that’d make me hate things, but it works here. Also, if you like Wall of Voodoo, they and lead singer Andy Prieboy are all over the soundtrack.

You can get this on blu ray or 4K UHD from MVD. Each includes the 2018 4K restoration from the 35mm original camera negative, as well as interviews with Jill Schoelen and Donovan Leitch, an R-rated cut and a trailer. There’s also a DVD without these extras.

La porta sul buio: La bambola (1973)

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The third episode of Doorway to Darkness was directed by Mario Foglietti (who wrote the original story for Four Flies On Grey Velvet) and Luigi Cozzi and was written by Foglietti and Marcella Elsberger.

Argento informs us, in his introduction, that someone has escaped from a sanitarium, saying “…a sick mind wandering a small town, apparently normal, in matter of fact incandescent… Its aim: to kill.” That sick mind may be Robert Hoffman, who has checked into a hotel with an attache case before wandering the streets. One redhead is already killed when he meets Daniela Moreschi (Mara Venier) and follows her back home.

This feels like ten minutes of story shoved into an hour and sadly doesn’t work. But hey — Erika Blanc is in it and if the worst thing you do is watch a giallo with her in it, your day isn’t all that bad. Foglietti gets the look of Argento but doesn’t have the same ability to make art out of a flawed script.

You can watch this on YouTube.

La porta sul buio: Testimone oculare (1973)

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Directed by Roberto Pariante (who was the assistant director for Argento on The Bird With the Crystal Plumage, The Cat o’Nine Tails and Four Flies On Grey Velvet) and Dario Argento, who wrote the script with Luigi Cozzi, Testimone oculare is my favor episode of Doorway to Darkness. It’s so simple and yet succeeds as an example of giallo.

Roberta Leoni (Marilù Tolo, Las trompetas del apocalipsis) is driving on a dark and rainy night when she sees a woman dive in front of her. She doesn’t hit her, but does find her dead body. She’s been shot in the back. That’s when she sees the glint of a gun and runs through the storm to a diner where she breaks down. The police, led by Inspector Rocchi (Glauco Onorato), take her back to the crime scene but there’s no body and no blood.

Everyone treats Roberta like a hysterical woman, including her husband Guido (Riccardo Salvino), even after someone breaks into their house while they’re out for their anniversary and the next day when someone tries to shove his wife into traffic. Then the phone calls start and never seem to stop.

One night, while all alone, the killer calls and says that they will finally kill Roberta. Guido comes home just in time and says that instead of leaving — the killer cut the phone line — they are going to wait for them and he will shoot whoever is after her. As you can imagine, this isn’t the way things end up happening.

Sometimes, a simply told mystery is exactly what you need. That’s what this episode gave me. Supposedly Argento disliked the work that Pariante did and went back and filmed a lot of this himself — the tracking of the killer by footsteps is definitely him — and then not putting his name on it.

You can watch this on YouTube.

La porta sul buio: Il tram (1973)

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For the second episode of Doorway to Darkness, Dario Argento himself would direct and write. Il Tram (The Train) under the name Sirio Bernadotte (thanks to the incredible Italo Cinema).

A young woman is murdered on a train in the seconds that the lights go out and before they return. The murder baffles everyone except for Commisario Giordani (Enzo Cerusico) who seeks to solve it. He thinks that it has to be ticket taker Roberto Magli (Pierluigi Aprà), except that he’s never satisfied. It seems too simple. That’s when he brings his girlfriend Giulia (Paola Tedesco) to ride the train and try to lure out the true murderer.

A very Hitchcock-influenced story, this moment was originally going to be part of The Bird With the Crystal Plumage but it took away from the story. Argento would return to the dark mystery of a train and how frightening it can be in probably the best sequence of his post-Opera films in Sleepless. This may not have the insane energy and madness of his usual style, but the story is well-told and I loved how the hero must overcome his own shortcomings — he’s too cocky, which may be because of his youth — if he wants to save his lover and solve the mystery.

There’s also a striking scene where the killer chases Giulia through the train and into a station and down an immense hallway, all POV, all with her staring back at us. It’s incredible.

You can watch this on YouTube.

La porta sul buio: Il vicino di casa (1973)

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In 1973, Dario Argento was invited to RAI television and delivered Door Into Darkness, a show that he would host and even guide some of the episodes. Argento says, at the start of one of the episodes (translated into English) “As for Door Into Darkness, which is the title of the series, you will wonder what it means. Well, it means many things: opening a door to the unknown, to what we don’t know and which therefore disturbs us, scares us. But for me it also means other things. It can happen, and it has happened once, even just once in a person’s life, to close a door behind them and find themselves in a dark room… looking for the light switch and not finding it… trying to open the door and not being able to Do. And having to stay there, in the dark… alone… forever. Well, some of the protagonists of our stories have closed this fatal door behind them.”

The first episode, Il vicino de casa (The Neighbor) was the second directing job for Luigi Cozzi, who had debuted with Il tunnel sotto il mondo (The Tunnel Under the World). It’s the tale of a young couple by the names of Luca (Aldo Reggiani) and Stefania (Laura Belli). They arrive at their new home late at night with their infant child and barely meet anyone, other than knowing they have a neighbor (Mimmo Palmara) but otherwise, they live in a very isolated neighborhood.

On one of the first evenings they are there, as they watch Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, they start to see a stain in the corner of the ceiling that starts to leak from upstairs. What is it? And should they tell the neighbor they have never met? When they go up there, no one is home. However, they soon find the dead body of their neighbor’s wife just in time for him to come back and tie them up.

This story was also written by Cozzi and it has plenty of tension, such as the couple hiding in the dark and then realizing that the husband has dropped his lighter in the killer’s room. It also has a dark non-ending that doesn’t give you much hope, as well as an Argento cameo as a hitchhiker.