Can't Say She Didn't See It Coming

Is there still any question that the best of the Italian horror filmmakers is Lucio Fulci? I know there are plenty of cinema fans who will die for Dario Argento or try to slap my face with a Sergio Martino for making such a statement, but come on! Whether he's making gooey gore, tasty trash, or actual objectively good thrillers, Fulci is, at least to me, never not interesting.

Quick Plot: As a child, young Virginia was walking through Florence with her classmates as she watched her mother fall to her death over a watery cliff. That's rough enough stuff for a kid, but all the more disturbing when we realize her mother was tumbling into bloody mannequin form at that exact time...but in England. 

Some years later, Virginia has grown into a chic decorator living in Italy. She's newly married to an older businessman named Francesco. While they're clearly in love, Virginia is also withholding, sharing some of her new psychic visions with her pal Luca instead.

Trouble strikes when Virginia visits her husband's country estate with the intention of going full HGTV but instead, discovers a young woman's rotting body hidden in the walls (and yes, I have long craved for that content on HGTV). When the victim is revealed to be an ex-girlfriend, Francesco is quickly arrested as the prime suspect. Virginia is determined to clear his name and solve the mystery of her premonitions.

Giallo is far from my favorite horror subgenre...unless it's directed by Lucio Fulci. In the case of Don't Torture a Duckling, Fulci uses the central crime to explore something very specific (Catholic guilt). With The Psychic, Fulci has two aces up his sleeve: a well-written time-looping narrative (with the assistance of co-screenwriters Roberto Gianviti and Dardano Sacchetti) and the gobsmacking glamour of Jennifer O'Neill. 

My notes say "Julie Christie chic", which should tell you what you need to know. This is the kind of woman who hammers her way through a dusty corpse-filled hole and has me the viewer wondering where she got her boots. There's a reason O'Neill had so much success as a model: the camera loves her and she knows exactly how to love it back. As Virginia, O'Neill is believable as a smart, determined woman gifted or cursed with clairvoyance, and it makes a big difference in fully investing the audience in her journey.

It helps that she's working with more solid material than is often found in this particular corner of the genre. Giallo is a tricky beast because it often sacrifices substance for style, or ultimately relies on a shocking twist that just leaves me feeling annoyed. In the case of The Psychic, the looping stuck in time structure takes it to a different level. It's almost more classic gothic, and I found it riveting. 

High Points

There are a lot of intelligent filmmaking choices at work in making The Psychic so effective, and one of the most important is the haunting score by Fabio Frizzi. It's both of its time and timeless in the best possible way.

Low Points

In all honesty, I did not fully understand EVERY detail of what actually went down in The Psychic, but I feel like that's more my fault than Fulci's. I'm not always that smart.

Lessons Learned

Visions are not legal alibis

Nothing says "trustworthy" like boasting 56 lovers and not having murdered a single one

Hell hath no fury like the hourly chime of an annoying watch

Rent/Bury/Buy

I had heard positive sentiments about The Psychic, but I was genuinely surprised by just how good it was, and how fresh the storytelling felt. Give it a go! I watched via Kanopy, though I believe it's also floating around a few other streaming locations. 

Do You Want to Buy a Duck?

Few would ever classify Lucio Fulci as a master of cinema, but the man had a certain appetite for excess that makes a lot of his work hold up as damn enjoyable entertainment today. I've never been the biggest fan of gialli, but Fulci's Don't Torture a Duckling almost justifies all of the issues I usually find with the genre. 

It's somewhat odd that it's taken me this long to tackle his other best-known giallo, especially considering its deep Manhattan roots. But to dive into an Italian slasher of the '80s generally means gearing up for watching mysteriously gloved hands murder abused women, something that requires a certain, you know, MOOD from its watcher. 

Look: it's been a rough few years, and some of the meaner horror I used to love has lost a bit of its appeal on any given day. That being said, the aspect I love most about Don't Torture a Duckling is that its reveal (which I won't spoil here) was very much ABOUT violence toward women. Fulci seemed to understand that there was a way to use this kind of violence not just for thrills, but to also throw out some ideas. 

With that in mind, let's get quacking, New York style.

Quick Plot: We open with your basic Law & Order pre-credits sequence, as a man plays fetch with his enthusiastic golden retriever only for her to ditch the stick for a decaying lady's hand hidden amongst some shrubbery on the city shore. Our lead detective Fred is on the case, slowed down a bit by heavy drinking and general scuzzy apathy. When another victim is found brutally slaughtered on the Staten Island Ferry, it becomes clear that a serial killer is on the loose.

A New York Ripper, you might even say...

We follow a few more potential victims through the city streets: Jane, the sophisticated wife of an impotent but sexually adventurous man, who encourages her to have random sexual encounters and bring back the details. There's the ill-fated star of an onstage sex show Jane watches, Kitty, Fred's regular sex worker, and last, a college student named Fay who narrowly escapes a subway assault and might be the key to solving the crime. 

The murderer continues to taunt the police, making ominous phone calls in a duck voice as his nude bodies pile up. Fred, a fairly terrible cop, inches toward answers which naturally arrive in a flashback-heavy manic conclusion.

It should come as no surprise that The New York Ripper was dubbed a video nasty: we're not 10 minutes in when we have a closeup of a female nipple being carved up. Those with an aversion to visceral violence against women will probably want to skip past this title on Shudder.

And yet, I say, as I think of how The New York Ripper compares to, say, the better-made, but (to me) less female-friendly Tenebre: there is some kind of method to the madness. While the reveal (which I won't spoil) doesn't quite click everything into place at the same level as Don't Torture a Duckling, it does hold the rest of the story up in a way that just doesn't always happen in giallo. 

All that plus an echoing saxophone-infused score, super aggressive camera zooms, and surprise doll room. 

I think I liked this movie.

High Points

I don't know that Fulci ever intended to be a sex-positive presence in genre cinema, but like Don't Torture a Duckling, The New York Ripper ends up revealing certain aspects of our attitudes towards female sexuality

Low Points
The New York Ripper is a movie floating in a sea of sleaze, and yet, AND YET, it DARES to give us TWO scenes of a crusty coroner sweating over a brutally maimed body while NOT eating a gooey sandwich. A roll of Lifesavers? Mr. Fulci, I have EXPECTATIONS

Lessons Learned
A nosy landlady is a lazy detective's best friend

Yes, watching women's body parts sliced up by a dirty knife can be upsetting, but nothing, NOTHING is more disturbing or nightmare-inducing than seeing a stranger stick his dive bar-floor toes into a woman's vagina 

If you want your coffee made, get a wife, not a prostitute 

Rent/Bury/Buy

The New York Ripper is far from the apex of this era of genre cinema, but it's a fairly fascinating artifact that probably ages differently every decade. At this particular moment in time, I could find a lot to appreciate (I'd say "enjoy," but considering this movie involves a dirty bar toe bang, I'm not sure what that would say about me). It's on Shudder, and worth your eyes so long as you're aware of what you're dipping your gross toes into.  

Loony Bin? More Like a BOOBY Bin

My Netflix DVD queue has become something of a weekly grab bag. With over 300 films on the list and full access to both Instant Watch and Amazon Prime, I tend to just shuffle the rarer, harder to find or "Very Long Wait" titles to the top and let myself be surprised by what arrives in the mail. More often than not, I have no memory of adding something to that queue, possibly because in my 34 years, I've slaughtered quite a few brain cells watching, well, the kind of movies like Slaughter Hotel.

Is that such a bad thing?

Quick Plot: Welcome to Europe's sexiest mental asylum, aka a "rest home" for attractive women with lots of money, some mental issues, and very little clothes. Among the scantily clad patients are:

- a shy young woman trying to get better and counting on the help of a sexy new nurse

- a nymphomaniac who seduces the resort's gardener as a way to help her deal with being madly in love with her brother

- an unhappy wife whose brutish husband stops the car just long enough for her to exit before speeding away without a word

- a married business owner whose relationship is in question due to her newfound, totally professional, totally understandable love of her psychiatrist, played by Klaus Kinski

Yes, you are correct in immediately saying, "You know your mental hospital isn't quite the best if the doctor in charge is played by Klaus Kinski." The fact that the entire place is decorated with medieval torture devices is an additional clincher, one made even better by the presence of John Karlsen.

I know, most of you are swooning with glee, providing you paused long enough to read this in between chapters of your John Karlsen erotic fan fiction. For the few out there who don't recognize, the name or soul-piercing eyes, John Karlsen played Blossum in 1966's The Christmas That Almost Wasn't, easily one of the weirdest/greatest holiday specials to ever include a plot about Santa Claus not paying his rent and singing a not creepy at all song called "What Are Children Like When They're Wide Awake?" More fittingly, Karlsen played the English king in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure. Yes, the same man who ordered that titular pair to be put in the IRON MAIDEN.

Guys. This movie has an iron maiden. And John Karlsen opens it. 

I can't adequately express how happy this makes me.

Anyway, patients and nurses are brutally slaughtered (mostly in their naked sleep) by a cloaked figure. We have boobs (many), we have blood (a fair amount), and indeed, we do have black gloves touching both. Slaughter Hotel (or any of its other more fitting titles) is indeed a giallo. A very messy, occasionally quite labia-filled one. 

Thankfully, the film and its director, genre regular Fernando Di Leo, are well aware of its shortcomings. It never feels like Slaughter Hotel is trying to do anything but shove attractive women and grisly murders in your face. You don't realize there's a mystery about the killer's identity until the final act brings in a not-so-genius plan to unmask the murderer, and even then, the reveal is less rewarding than the continued chaos and violence that comes after it. Bava, this ain't. Fun trash, it certainly is.

High Points
Between aforementioned iron maidens, ancient swords, arrows, and a handy mace, Slaughter Hotel's murders are quite a varied batch

Low Points
Oh come on. The movie is terrible. What more do you need to know?

Lessons Learned
In the 1970s, it was totally acceptable for a nurse to seduce a mental patient providing foreplay involved a two-hour bath and extended dance party

One can still shed tears after being shot in the head

When trying to trap a violent serial killer in a hospital filled with dozens of civilians, consider blocking all exits or at least hiring faster police officers so that you don't end up with another half dozen murder victims thirty seconds AFTER you've caught the serial killer

Rent/Bury/Buy
Listed as Slaughter Hotel on RareFlixx DVDs, this was a "Very Long Wait" on Netflix's DVD portal. Was it worth it? Not particularly, but if you're a giallo completist or just really like female breasts, this is certainly one to find. I found myself chuckling through most of it, so it's certainly entertaining in one way or another. 

Putty Up

Let's get this out of the way: I like--not love--Dario Argento.

I understand and appreciate his contribution to genre cinema. Suspiria is something of a masterpiece. His support and connections helped make Dawn of the Dead be all that it could be. I’ll admit that I’ve yet to see some of his more respected early efforts (Deep Red, The Bird With the Crystal Plumage, Four Flies On Grey Velvet among them) but regarding his middle-career streak (Tenebre/Phenomena/Opera), I come up in a rather scandalous category of meh.

Maybe I should just wait to reserve any complete judgment until I see his long-awaited Dracula 3D. Word on the street is it’s a hit!

Quick Plot: A young model named Celine is abducted by a yellow tinted mad man with a thing for disfiguring and killing beautiful women. Luckily for his latest soon-to-be victim, Celine's sassy flight attendant sister Linda will stop at nothing to save her. For Linda, that mostly means tracking down Adrien Brody's tortured Inspector Avolfi to crack the case before it's too late.

Giallo is, I guess, a giallo, save for the fact that doesn't really tease you with a mystery to the killer's identity. 

Well, maybe it does?

See, for some sort of creative/silly/yet sort of entertaining reason, Brody does double duty as the earnest hero and mumbling murderer. Now anyone who's ever caught a glimpse of Adrien Brody only to feel as though his one-of-a-kind schnozz has poked them in the eye might be wondering 'How can you possibly disguise a man with a face as singular as Adrien Brody?'

Well...

I'll spoil a question that you might otherwise be distracted asking for Giallo's 90 minute runtime: no,  Putty Brody is not the secret long-lost twin of Non-Putty Brody. Nor is Putty Brody supposed to be Non-Putty Brody in a putty disguise. Nope. He's just playing two parts a la Paul Dano in There Will Be Blood or Frank Morgan in The Wizard of Oz. 

Except with about 85% more putty.

You’re probably now thinking “how can you possibly get back to a semi-serious discussion of this movie when all I can think about no wis putty?” I feel your pain. And answer simply with this:

You can't.

High Points

Dummy violence! It's a giallo and it has dummy violence! THAT'S A GOOD THING!

Low Points

So. That was an note of ambiguous hope to end on eh?

Lessons Learned

Italian policemen were never taught how to take a pulse

The more puttied your face is, the further back your memory goes. This calculation does indeed lead to the conclusion that if your face is made entirely of putty, you can remember your life in your heroin addicted mother's womb

When considering what to be when you grow up, remember a hidden bonus of the occupation 'fashion model': you'll probably be skinny enough to squeeze through a chained door when trying to escape a mad putty-faced serial killer

Perhaps it explains my clumsiness as something blood-related: Italians are not very good at walking, at least if it involves passing another person without crashing into them

Randomly Aggressive Product Placement

Because watching a movie about a man who slaughters pretty young women ALWAYS puts me in the right mood for snappy Diablo Cody dialog

Rent/Bury/Buy

Look, I'm not calling Giallo a good movie. But unlike a lot of other gialli, it didn’t bore me. Many diehard Argento fans will call it a true shame, but as someone who’s never been overly impressed by the filmmaker’s output, I don’t see it as being THAT bad. It’s more that he never quite improved from where his run ended in the mid-80s. Fog up Giallo to make it look like it was made in 1987 and try to tell me it’s that much worse than Opera. 

Or just don’t watch it and save yourself an argument. The choice is ultimately yours.

Kissy kissy.