Amuck! (1972)
Amuck! is a great title, but this is a movie that has a ton of great other titles –Alla ricerca del piacere (In Pursuit of Pleasure), Maniac Mansion, Leather and Whips and Hot Bed of Sex were also used and the working titles were Replica de un delitto (Repetition of a Crime) and Il passo dell’assassino (Footsteps of the Killer). No matter what name you […]
Your Vice Is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key (1972)
Has a movie ever had a better title? Nope. Sergio Martino’s fourth entry into the giallo genre, following The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh, The Case of the Scorpion’s Tail and the previously reviewed All the Colors of the Dark, it refers to the note that the killer leaves to Edwige Fenech’s character in Mrs. Wardh. And the title […]
All the Colors of the Dark (1972)
The first five and a half minutes of 1972’s All the Colors of the Dark (also known as Day of the Maniac and They’re Coming to Get You!) subvert what I call Giallo’s “graphic beauty” in intriguing ways. An outdoor scene of a stream slowly darkens, replaced by an old crone with blackened teeth, dressed as a child and a […]
The Case of the Bloody Iris (1972)
1970’s The Bird with the Crystal Plumage became a worldwide hit, bringing giallo to the world. But by 1972, in its native Italy, the films had already become self-aware parodies of the genre. Witness 1972’s The Case of the Bloody Iris (originally titled Why Are There Strange Drops of Blood on Jennifer’s Body?), directed by Giuliano Carnimeo (Exterminators of the […]
DANGEROUS WOMEN: Don’t Torture a Duckling (1972)
Known in Italy as Non si sevizia un paperino (Don’t Torture Paperino, because Paperino is what they call Donald Duck) and La Longue Nuit de L’Exorcisme (The Long Night of Exorcism) in France, this was what Fulci considered his best work. It’s a giallo, which if you don’t know, is an Italian movie tradition — kind of like a detective story, […]
DANGEROUS WOMEN: The Red Queen Kills Seven Times (1972)
Emilio P. Miraglia followed up The Night Evelyn Came Out of Her Grave with this giallo freakout — starring the magnificent Barbara Bouchet (Don’t Torture a Duckling) — that combines gothic horror with the high fashion we’ve come to expect from early 70’s Italian horror. A curse haunts the Wildenbrück family once every 100 years — two sisters […]
WEEK OF MADE FOR TV MOVIES: Gargoyles (1972)
When I was a kid, I remember asking my dad what movies he thought were scary. He answered Night of the Living Dead and Gargoyles, so I was always nervous to watch this movie. It just looked strange, and in the late 1970s, it wasn’t like I could find it on demand. But the unique storytelling of […]
WEEK OF MADE FOR TV MOVIES: The Night Stalker (1972)
At one point, network TV was the only home entertainment option. And for so many genre fans, they were rewarded with some truly amazing offerings. Sure, there are plenty of fangless horror telepics, but there are also so many more incredibly frightening and well made ones, too. We say all the time — they don’t […]
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