(1972)
Dir - Roberto Bianchi Montero
Overall: MEH
Leaning more on the police procedural side of the giallo spectrum, Roberto Bianchi Montero's So Sweet, So Dead, (Rivelazioni di un maniaco sessuale al capo della squadra mobile, The Slasher is the Sex Maniac, Penetration), is one of several Italian films that Farley Granger appeared in after moving to Rome for a number of years. It also features Nieves Navarro, (Susan Scott), in a smaller part, doing what she usually does in such movies, namely getting naked and getting murdered. The killer here is picking off promiscuous women who are all cheating on their prominent husbands, leaving photographs behind of their adultery to spice up the crime scene. Granger is the frustrated police detective who is not only several steps behind the black hat/black trench-coat/black pantyhose-masked murderer, but also has to deal with the press taking regular pot-shots at his department. Nothing unique to such movies and Montero's direction is largely lifeless, utilizing the usual slasher tricks of cutting out the soundtrack to readily announce the next kill scene. Luigi Angelo's script is laughably infantile as well, featuring such things as a woman who witnesses the killer, the killer noticing he is being witnessed, and then said woman not even contemplating telling anyone in law enforcement as well as nonchalantly refusing her boyfriend's escort to her apartment later.
(1975)
Dir - Luigi Bazzoni
Overall: MEH
The final full-length from filmmaker Luigi Bazzoni, Footprints on the Moon, (Le orme, Primal Impulse), adapts co-screenwriter Mario Fenelli's novel Las Huellas into a strange, psychological thriller of a disturbed woman dealing with traumatic bouts of amnesia and delusion. Shot in both Turkey and Rome, cinematographer Vittorio Storaro captures the remote scenery of an off-season, island beach resort in a gorgeous manner, similar to Eduard van der Enden's photography on Harry Kümel's Daughters of Darkness from four years prior. The isolated setting comes off as its own foreboding presence in this respect, as Florinda Bolkan seems perpetually frustrated there with her identity in question the entire time. The plot line is vague and repetitive, yet this may be intentional as to mirror Bolkan's confused ordeal. Both black and white as well as sepia-toned images of Klaus Kinski and suffocating astronauts regularly haunt her, so it can all mean some diabolical, experimental conspiracy or just the unhinged state of our protagonist. The presentation is too aloof to fully captivate and the deliberate pacing gets the best of the movie, but it is a visual triumph at least that may wield more intellectually stimulating rewards upon further viewings.
(1977)
Dir - Maurizio Pradeaux
Overall: GOOD
By 1977, giallos were overdue for parody and though efforts in the past afforded plenty of silly plot points and exaggerated performances, Death Steps in the Dark, (Passi di morte perduti nel buio, Death Steps Lost in the Dark), leans into the comedy as much as it does black-gloved killers slicing victim's throats up. The penultimate film and only the second giallo to be directed by Maurizio Pradeaux, it concerns Leonard Mann's reporter who gets mixed up with a murder on a train; a murder that gets uncovered by ridiculous ruses being played by the police as well as the surviving passengers who stage a "catch the killer" scheme that could only be conceived of by Italian screenwriters in the 1970s. While the movie meanders during its second act by following around the less-than-gripping personal lives of secondary characters, the tonal balance of sleaze, bright-red-bloodshed, and intentionally silly pitter-patter between everyone on screen is sufficiently handled by Pradeaux. Vera Kruska is delightful as Mann's Swedish, airhead model girlfriend, as is Robert Webber who prefers complaining about having indigestion during a crime scene investigation and arresting a casual coke dealer instead of the person who he has a warrant out for when given the chance. Low on suspense maybe, but it is also light on its feet with tongue-in-cheek performances, some brutal slayings, and a refreshingly humorous take on well-worn tropes.
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