Kill, Baby...Kill!

Hey folks. Sorry for the delay from the Z Nation Season 3 review. I was working on the next Rotten Reelz Reviews Video Review script and my dad has undergone a bypass surgery. He is off his ventilation tubes and breathing normally. So yeah we can unclench for a few now.

Today's movie revolves around a coroner, his assistant, some supernatural shenanigans, a village gripped in fear and a local witch doing good deeds? Brought to you by the Godfather of Giallo: Mario Bava. This is Kill, Baby...Kill!

Meh, look at this ignorant rabble.

Yup, we should have known this would have alternative English titles to the likes of: Don't Walk in the Park, Operation Fear, Curse of the Dead and Curse of the Living Dead.   

In the year of our lord 1907, Dr. Paul Eswai (Giacomo Rossi Stuart of Zorro and the Three Musketeers, Sodom and Gomorrah, The Last Man on Earth, War Between the Planets,The Crimes of the Black Cat, The Lonely Woman and Zorro) has been called to the Carpathian village of Karmingam to do an autopsy on a young woman.  The girl, Irena Hollander died under mysterious circumstances... in a horror movie.  How bizarre.  Yeah she fell from a high window and impaled on a iron fence post is a tad odd.

His assistant Monica (Erika Blanc of Espionage in Lisbon, Kill,Baby...Kill!, A Man for Emmanuelle, Eye of the Cat, The Mistress Is Served,Sacred Heart and A Second Childhood) must vouch for his work as a witness as Eswai finds a silver coin in Irena's heart. Well how did that get there? Maybe she swallowed it. With the local villagers being devout believers of magical happenings and superstitions, they tell Eswai that the town is haunted by ghost of a young girl who curses those who visits. 

 Naturally, a man of science can't take this seriously. Poppycock! Balderdash I say! Hrrumph! Meanwhile, I am thinking you need an unlicensed nuclear accelerator on your back, a young priest and an old priest at the ready.

I took acid and now I can flyyyyy!!!

Esawi is set to meet Inspector Kruger (Revolt of the Praetorians, Django Kill...If You Live,Shoot!, Fury of Achilles, Hell Commandos, When Heroes Die and My Dear Killer), the man that requested this autopsy in the first place. He is to arrange said meeting at the villa of Baroness Graps (Giovanna Galletti of I fratelli Karamazov, I miserabli, Eneide, Last Tango in Paris, The Girl in Room 2A and Woman of Wonders) when the Baroness tells the good doctor there is no Inspector Kruger... DUN DUN DUN DUN!!!!

The innkeeper's daughter Nadienne (Micaela Esdra of Highest Pressure, Made in Italy, Il muro, Nero Wolfe, I Nicotera, Philo Vance and La villa) claims to be visited by the ghost girl next to be cursed so the local witch Ruth (yes Ruth) performs a ritual to lift the curse. Leaving his cellphone in another century (don't you hate it when you do that?) Eswai confabs with the burgomeister Karl (Piero Lulli of Love Story, Knights of the Desert, Rapture, The Huns, The Two Gladiators, Django Kill and My Name is Nobody) about this Santa Claus fellow. No wait. Kris Kringle. No, wait...right, the ghost girl. Got baffled for a moment.

Selling...girl scout...cookiessss... buy 10 of them....

Karl is claiming the child is actually the ghost Melissa Graps, the dead daughter of the Baroness who is responsible for both Irene and the Inspector Kruger's disappearance.  Eswai heads to the cemetery where two gravediggers are hastily burying a coffin with Kruger in it.  Guess the Baroness don't pay no OT.

Will Esawi figure out how to combat the spooky child? Can anything be done to put her spirit to rest?

Shot in 12 days in the region of Cargata, this small commune has been an artist retreat since the 1930s giving it an amazing look for Americans to find out that ancient towns and villages do exist in the world and not just in cinema.

Domestically it grossed 201 million lire which tallies to about...oh.   117 thousand 5 hundred 20.

Moving on, it would then be three years before Mario Bava would do another horror film which was Hatchet for the Honeymoon or The Red Sign of Madness, the 1970 giallo film.

An spectral crawly film that gets under your skin and innverves you. I enjoyed it. That being said, English dub actor/writer Renato Izzo makes Eswai sound pompous to John Agar levels.   Arrogant and condescending.  That means he speaks down to you as if you were an errant, lost child. 

Calm yourself, woman. Be cold and detached, like me.

 

Fun with Bava: Shock

Welcome back for more Fun with Bava. Today I thought we would focus on the last feature Bava worked on in 1977. The ending of disco, cocaine and freaky deaky sex acts to later be replaced with the 80s. Chilling thought.  Now I bring up this film because we once again run into an also know as scenario.   Because we the subculture, crass Americans couldn't possibly distinguish different directors this film today was released in the US under the title Beyond the Door II.  IT HAS NOTHING to do with the original Ovidio G Assonitis' Beyond the Door.  If anything Beyond the Door is Italian Rosemary's Baby.  This is Shock a.k.a. Beyond the Door II, Suspense and The Demon is Nuts.

Ugh. He just kneed me in the boob.

Personally I love the last title because I am curious to wonder what would drive a demon crackers. Too much Barney? Sat through Dora the Explorer one too many times?

Dora Baldini (Daria Nicolodi of Deep Red, Tenebre, Phenomena, Delirium, Opera, Sinbad of the Seven Seas, Paganini Horror, School of Fear, The Devil's Daughter and Notes of Love) has returned. Returned to the house of her first marriage to live after an extended stay in an asylum for seven years. She moves back into this home that brought her horrors along with her son Marco (David Colin Jr of Beyond the Door and Beyond the Door II). OoOoO Pseudo Sequel!!!  The kid from the first one is in it...in spite of playing a completely different character.   With her new husband Bruno (John Steiner of Beyond the Door II, A Man Called Blade, Question of Love, Caligula, The Last Hunter, Tenebre, Yor, the Hunter from the Future, The Ark of the Sun God and Cut and Run) or is that Biondo from Salon Kitty? Oh crap it is. Lady don't trust an ageless Nazi with you and your son!

gorgogliare is Italian for gurgle.

Any rate Dora was released from the wacko basket given her incarceration was based around the mysterious death of her first husband. Bruno is an airline pilot and is gone most days of the week leaving Dora with Marco (POLO!) all alone. Thanks to extensive electroshock treatments (They still did that in the seventies?) she believes her son is channeling her dead husband to torture and torment even beyond the grave.

Dora starts to recall the events that lead up to late husband's death and what the memories of this house brings. She needs to flee and would take Marco but she now fears him. The walls of sanity are crashing down Dora as she looks about her in a feeble attempt to hold on to her mind and her son.

Will Dora succumb to madness?? Will Bruno inherit the house?? Can Marco lose both parents??

First off loving the handheld camera work. Some of these angles looks like tracking shoots panning for full 360 degrees, dolly track, other looks like the poor cameraman would have been hanging over a railing to capture certain shots. All in all a gorgeous shoot.   As far as the storyline, you can see the influence this film had on things like Stir of Echoes or What Lies Beneath. A notion of past horrors manifested in spirit and guilt.

You see dear, normally my British accent is allowed but not this film.

Looking at the earliest reviews of this movie, most of the critics give it a pass or call it mildly notable that Bava did this film. From trick cinematography, talented actors, moody lighting and an excellent musical score, this macabre film has creepy down pat. I was amused to hear Edward Mannix yet again for dubbing but sadly he was only voicing one of the movers at the very beginning of the film. Such a waste! 

Should have used lanolin on those dry monster hands.

Fun with Bava: Blood Brides

Welcome to the week. At the suggestion of my Rotten Ramblin' On co-host Shawn I tackle some more Mario Bava for your reading pleasure and my viewing enjoyment. A brilliant idea so I decided to dive right in on that today. With a series of unexplained murders of young brides-to-be, these grizzly deeds go unchecked. This is Blood Brides a.k.a. Hatchet for the Honeymoon, Honeymoon, Red Wedding Night and An Axe for the Honeymoon.

Italian Clint Eastwood??

Manager of bridal dress factory John Harrington (Stephen Forsyth of Love and Marriage, In a Colt's Shadow, Fury in Marrakesh, Death at Owell Rock, Acid Delirium of the Senses, Black Jesus, and Blood Brides) seems to suffer from narrative's disease. Thankfully no echo reverb like Chuck Norris in The Octagon. John also seems to have an Oedipus complex. While he is cool and collective on the surface, he has inner demons needing to be kept at bay with his older wife Mildred (Laura Betti of Teorema, The Canterbury Tales, 1900, Art of Love, To Catch a Cop, Mamma Ebe, All the Fault of Paradise, Sweets from a Stranger, Widow's Walk, The Blue Rose, Courage Mountain, Suffocating Heat and The Rebel) while he comes to grips with his obvious dementia. John keeps flashing back to some event in the past, something his own subconscious is attempting to forever conceal from him.

That being said he and the wife usually start the day with a screaming match at the breakfast table of John belting out about a divorce and Mildred will have none of it. John storms out of the house and to his office where he meets Helen Wood (Dagmar Lassander of Forbidden Photos of a Lady Above Suspicion, The Black Corsair, Seagulls Fly Low, Sugar, Honey and Pepper, The Black Cat, The House by the Cemetery, Devil Fish, The Pleasure, The Family and Tommaso), a full-figured gal applying for modeling for the bridal gowns after the previous model..."disappeared".

Why, this model is dead on her feet. MUAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

With this new model put into employment, one of the lovelier models, Alice Norton (Femi Benussi of The Hawks and the Sparrows, Blood Brides, So Sweet, So Dead, The Countess Died of Laughter, When Love Is Lust, Special Killers, Tales of Erotica, Blood Money and The Private Lesson) seems to want to leave the salon due to getting married, so John offers her a choice of any of the dresses in storage. Foolishly trusting her boss who has embraced his inner goofballs he proceeds to hack her to death with a meat cleaver and dispose of her body with the furnace of his greenhouse.

Hmm, why does the cameraman have no pants?

The next day Inspector Russell (Jesus Puente of Teatro de siempre, Aventuras y desventuras de Mateo, Primera hora, Obsesion, El teatro, Novela, Blood Brides, Shouts of Anxiety and You're te One) comes snooping around Harrington at the request of Alice's fiancee giving Harrington pause as Russell points out that six models have disappeared from his bridal salon but no real evidence can bring Harrington in. Meaning John will have to kill with a tad bit more discretion. Meanwhile John is becoming smitten by Helen with plans of spending the rest of his days with her as soon as he gets rid of the nuisance that is his wife Mildred.

Will Mildred get more than split ends?? Will Helen ever figure out John belongs in the wacko basket??

Okay a few things of note now. Stephen Forsyth does an amazing balance of creepy and broken so well I wondered if they were just drugging his drinks on set or if the guy is a manic depressive. It was actually spellbinding watching him work. Patented Bava close up on hands and eyes while eerie as crap music ranging from a harpsichord to small orchestral plays gently in the background.

The story takes its time, builds suspense and gives gore fans some love as well. With lens shots through glass cut doorknobs, vases and mirror work, it gives the effect that the walls of reality are crashing down on John and he doesn't know what to do. Inspector Russell has been dubbed with the glory of authority of Edward Mannix. Man that guy got a lot of work. Sorry fellas but no large quantities of nudity. If you really need that in your giallo movie, toss me a message and I will point you in the direction for it to be found. This my friends is a psychological thriller.

Canoodling on a train can lead to DEATH!!!

Edward Mannix Week: A Bay of Blood

Welcome back readers if I have any left after the cannibal/zombie showdown film of Zombie Holocaust. Trust me, I suffer its scars more than you. Unless you went out and saw it. WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT??!!!! Anywho, hows about a scary Italian horror movie? Okay stop running, it is not Bruno Mattei. I'm talking the master of the Giallo movies, the cream of the crop of scare, the building blocks that made Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci want to be directors. The one and only Mario Bava (Hercules in the Haunted World, Black Sunday, Evil Eye, Blood and Black Lace, Kill Baby, Kill, Danger: Diabolik, Blood Brides, Baron Blood, The House of Exorcism and Beyond the Door II). This is A Bay of Blood a.k.a. Twitch of the Death Nerve, The Last House on the Left Part II, The Antecendent, Bay of Blood, Bloodbath, Blood Bath, Ecology of a Crime, Chain Reaction and Bloodbath Bay of Death.

Robert Evans Italiano!

This film is better known by Twitch of the Death Nerve in the states but that's a bunch of savages that know no better. Pity them. No offense fellow Americans but A Bay of Blood just sounds soooOoO much better a title. Twitch of the Death Nerve sounds like an organ harvesting film.

Our macabre tale opens with some 360 pans and a view of the lake house. Photo phobics, it wasn't bad tracking like an Uwe Boll flick. You will be alright. A spinster wealthy wife (Isa Miranda of Everybody's Woman, The Secret of Helene Marimon, Abandoned, A kiss for a Killer, When Stangers Meet, Compact and The Avengers TV series) has met her end of days violently. The reason? Well it was either too many bedpan changing or the sick amount of money she was worth.

Hangin' out. Hangin' out with my homies..Gonna have ourselves a party.

Won't lie to you, her "suicide" is creepy from the gag for air, to her body swaying limply from hanging. With a suicide note planted by her dearly grieving husband, a mysterious switchblade is jabbed into is back by person unknown. Hmm guess this is a lot of dough offhand.

Soon family members, daughter Renata (Claudine Auger of Thunderball, Yoyo, Black Belly of the Tarantula, The Devil's Lieutenant, Secret Places, The Repenter and Love of a Woman) and her husband Albert (Luigi Pistilli of For a Few Dollars More, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, The Great Silence, Illustrious Corpses, Antonio Gramsci: The Days of Prison and Luigi Ganna detective) start poking around the lakehouse trying to make heads or tails of Renata's late mother's suicide and where has her father gone off too. A real estate agent Frank (Chris Avram of Time to Live, The Rage Within, Sentence of God, So Sweet, So Dead, Cuore, Enter the Devil, Voodoo Sexy and Emanuelle in Bangkok) is hoping to charm and swarm his way into Renata's heart for the signature on the house for some cool breezy cash for land development. He can't miss, right?

And I am told I never put up nudity. Pshaw!

Two couples zip off around the lake in what looks like Jon Pertwee's Bessie to frolic and be teens/twenty somethings...only they seemed to have disappeared...one by one.

With a bit of sleuthing, Renata seems to feel as though there may be more people involved for the land and money of her mother's. She even starts questioning whether Albert didn't have a hand in it. With this amount of dough on the table, everyone and anyone is a suspect.

Will these murders be solved? Are there still more to come? Who is to blame?

Worry not readers as Edward Mannix graces us with his insidious voice as Albert's English dubbing. Thought I forgot, didn't you? WELL ANSWER ME!!!

A quick bit of trivia, this film has had an impact on Friday the 13^th Part 1 and 2 as two of the murders in it are lifted and almost shot for shot exact as homage. Hell even the locations where the murders take place are so similar it is eerie as hell.

The shooting locations had no woods to speak of, so Bava waved several different tree branches in front of the cameras to give the illusion of a run or romp through the woods. According to Laura Betti, it looked so silly to view this, the cast and crew had a hard time not laughing at the simple yet brilliant solution to a lack of woods in the area. Yeah a dude waving sticks at the camera would have made me chuckle too. Hell the tracking shots are so steady and smooth, you would swear they are dolly tracked but no. Turns out Bava with years experience in cinematography shot these amazing images with...get this. A frigging kid's wagon. Yeah the little red wagon saved the day. The camera was mounted on a pole, surrounded by sandbags to reduce any wiggle and just rolled along. Awesome right?

Because of its intensity, unearthly vibes, good story presentation and decent casting a lot of folks consider this a precursor to the slasher genre and I am inclined to agree. I mean Black Christmas, The Town that Dreaded Sundown and even Halloween have to tip their hats to their grandfather of macabre. Still love Last House on the Left Part II title considering Craven released the original a year after this flick but who needs nutty things like timelines and consistency?

Hold me closer, Tito Fuentes...

Giallo Journeys: The Evil Eye

Welcome boys and girls, one and all to Day 2 of Giallo Journeys. It seems only fitting and fair we watch one of the Godfather of Giallo films brought to us by director/screenwriter/SFX artist and cinematographer of the golden age of Italian horror himself, Mario Bava (Black Sunday, Hercules in the Haunted World, Erik the Conqueror, Blood and Black Lace, Kill Baby, Kill, A Gunman called Nebraska, Bay of Blood and Baron Blood).  Today's feature film almost feels like Bava's nod to Hitchcock's The Lady Vanishes as a young girl rambles to Rome and witness a murder that the police do not believe since they cannot find a body.  Reputed as the first Giallo film in existence, this is The Girl Who Knew Too Much a.k.a Incubus a.k.a. The Evil Eye a.k.a. Obsession diabolique a.k.a. Evil Eye.

You shouldn't do "THAT" in Rome!

Boy it has been a while since we had a good collection of alternative titles, right?

Our story centers around a young girl Nora (Leticia Roman of Pirates of Tortuga, Evil Eye, The Reunion, A Sentimental Attempt, The Gentlemen, The Man from U.N.C.L.E. And To Die in Paris), who flew in to Rome to visit her dying aunt one last time and maybe get some shopping in as well. Okay, I added that last part. Nora's auntie is being cared for by a Dr. Bassi (John Saxon of Gunsmoke, Enter the Dragon, Black Christmas, Mitchell, The Bees, Beyond Evil, Cannibal Apocalypse, Fantasy Island, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Dynasty, Hands of Steel, A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, Death House and Falcon Crest) at the first night of Nora's visit her aunt dies in the night and Nora goes to the hospital to tell Dr. Bassi...alone...in the night of a foreign country. Predictably she is mugged and knocked out in the Piazza di Spagna.

AHHH!!!! NUNS!!!! REPENT!!! REPENT!!!!

She wakes in time to see the body of a dead woman slumped on the ground by her and a bearded chap pulling a knife out of her back. Nora flees to the hospital and makes her report to the cops. They do a cursory look about that area but find no body, ergo the girl is imagining things, is a ditz or whatever stereotype you love about a female in distress. Later after ample ridicule, Nora is visiting in the cemetery with her aunt's friend Laura (Valentina Cortese of The Barefoot Contessa Oh, Grandmother's Dead, Give Her the Moon, The Assassination of Trotsky, Day for Night, Ring of Darkness and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen) who lives in the Piazza and tells Nora she can house sit for her as Laura has vacation time coming.  Ace journalist Landini (Dante DiPaolo of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, The Evil Eye, Blood and Black Lace, Sweet Charity and Unscripted) seems to be trailing Nora as he is suspect of Nora and the linking to these murders.

Hello.  I'm John Saxon, I'll be your eye candy.

No sooner does house-sitter get comfy, she gets snoopy. Checking the closet and drawers to come across clippings of an Alphabet Killer doing in folk by surname. A, B and C already done in but as she reads further these articles are almost ten years old. A phone call pulls her away from the clippings with a voice saying "D is for Death." Sue Grafton breathes a sigh of relief but Nora is terrified and attempts to get Dr. Bassi on her side to figure out if the murder of the other day is linked to these existing murders. A sadistic game of cat and mouse begins putting Nora right slap bang in the middle of it all.

Who can Nora turn to??? Is she or her new Doctor friend next??

What is so astounding about this is the lighting, tone and music carefully and painstakingly used. It has almost the comedic romp you would get from It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World one minute and next a chord and dimmed lighting to offer dread and impending danger. The hustle and bustle of Rome is fascinating to watch and the rush for cabs is quite funny. This also marks the first horror film John Saxon is ever in as well as the last black and white film Mario Bava does.

Most of Leticia Roman's line are narrative as she just flirts and smiles warmly at the camera but a lot of her dialogue is thought provoking as she truly is the lead in this film. John Saxon comes off charming and mischievous as well. This mixture of romance, comedy, drama and horror provides a wonderful contrast of a movie. 

Dead on my feet.  Sorry.

 

Obscure Italian Horror: Blood and Black Lace

Welcome back to RottenReelzReviews!!! How's about some more Horror movies??!!! Yeah I am still on the Obscure Italian Horror Movie kick. This time around we are moving over to an old school director Mario Bava (Hercules in the Haunted World, Black Sunday, Evil Eye, A Bay of Blood and Baron Blood). This Godfather of Gore brings oddities of Horror, some disturbing giallos and many a demonic story arc. This is Blood and Black Lace.

Darkman??!!

A lovely young model Isabella (Francesca Ungaro of Forbidden Temptations and Blood and Black Lace) is brutally dispatched by some lunatic in a white cotton mask. Left at the grounds of the boarding house ran by Max Marian (Cameron Mitchell of How the West Was Won, Texas Detour, Fantasy Island, The Guns and the Fury, Kill Squad, Dixie Ray Hollywood Star, The Tomb, Space Mutiny and Demon Cop) and his lover, the widow Countess Cristina Como (Eva Bartok of Victoria and Her Hussar, Orient Express, Break in the Circle. The Gamma People, Naked in the Night, Operation Amsterdam, SOS Pacific and Beyond the Curtain).

The good Inspector Silvester (Thomas Reiner of Der Floh im Ohr, Die Rechnung- eiskalt serviert, The Three Fantastic Supermen, Das Kriminalmuseum, Die Spinnstube and The Black Forest Clinic) assigned to the case finds this all to be too convenient. Max insists he has no idea why such a thing would happen but he will offer whatever aid he can to the inspector. The fashion house they both run seems to have a seedy underbelly of corruption, blackmail, drug related charges and other various sins to it but the inspector cannot put both the Countess and Max directly to it when it is revealed that Isabella may have had a diary keeping track of all such vices and the people linked to it. 

Darling, our relationship is less likely to survive than a Hammer film for critique.

Another model Nicole (Ariana Gorini of Unexpected, Blood and Black Lace and the Revenge of Ivanhoe) finds the diary and promptly wants to take it to the police but another girl Peggy lifts the diary from Nicole's purse and has it for herself. No sooner does Nicole make off to an antique store to visit her wayward man that she is attacked by the same killer with a cestus (armored spiked gauntlet commonly used for gladiatorial games) crushing her face and killing her instantly. Tossing her purse and patting her down he finds no diary and super runs away.. Will the inspector figure out who is behind these murders and/or who is next?

Interesting thing about our movie is this is one of the earliest and most influential of all Giallo films and more or less set the tone for some of the early 80's slasher films in style and overall body count. Each of the murder scenes are unique involving unusual choices for dispatching death to these attractive women. The lighting giving off blues, greens, purples and reds seems to signify the moods of terror and helplessness. It is clearly were Scorsese and Dario Argento developed their need for that artistic flair in film.

The macabre atmosphere is well paced, doesn't develop the models more than two dimensional but give some genuine scares and unpredictable murders. The twists and turns of this 1964 psychological thriller really offered a lot more terror and gore than the 60's crowd really saw stateside. So if you like seeing pretty petty girls gacked, a web of lies and deceit unravel and some decent gore effects then you are in luck. I was very impressed with this rare gem of giallo.

Rorschach falls to petty thievery because...he doesn't have Bruce Wayne money.