Bring Out the Perverts: The Girl Who Knew Too Much (1963)

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The general consensus is that Mario Bava’s 1963 film The Girl Who Knew Too Much (also known as The Evil Eye) was the very first Giallo. This is strange because it doesn’t actually seem like a Giallo at all.

It was filmed in black and white and Gialli is known for its bold use of color. The killer is neither black-masked nor black-gloved. There is little to no gore and the killer’s motivations don’t stem from some psycho-sexual need. The camera does linger on the main actress’s bikini-clad body in one scene. In another, she’s wearing a short nighty and the photograph of an old man (played by Bava himself) ogles her. But it has none of the sleaze later Gilli would contain.

It is a murder mystery and Bava does deploy some imaginative camera setups and interesting visuals, but it seems more like an inventive thriller than anything you’d dub a Giallo.

Truth be told I don’t know where that idea that it is the first Giallo comes from. Wikipedia says it’s true so maybe it is, but most of the other online articles I’ve read both note that it is the first Giallo and then in the same breath note that it doesn’t really feel like one. So who knows.

To make all this even more strange is the fact that Bava directed Blood and Black Lace just one year later and it has all the hallmarks of a Giallo.

Whether or not The Girl Who Knew Too Much deserves that Giallo recognition or not it is a fine film and deserves to be seen.

Letícia Román stars as Nora, an American tourist visiting her aunt in Rome. The aunt is very sick and dies that first night. When Nora leaves to find help she is immediately attacked by a robber. When she awakes she sees a woman run out of a house with a knife sticking out of her back. A man approaches the corpse and grabs the knife. She then faints. When she wakes up the street is clean and no one will believe her story.

Later she’ll read some old newspaper clippings about a woman who was murdered in the exact spot ten years prior. And then there were other murders, meaning a serial killer might be on the loose.

She’s aided by Dr. Marcello Bassi (John Saxon) who both believes her story and rather fancies her. They will investigate. I suppose that is another way in which this film meets the Giallo standard – non-police investigating the crime.

They’ll run into lots of interesting people and there will be a few more corpses. It is all pretty standard murder mystery stuff. But Bava infuses it with some remarkable images. It doesn’t hurt that it is set in Rome and Bava apparently had free reign of many of its incredible landmarks. Norah winds up staying in a house located right on the Spanish Steps and the film makes great use of that location.

I don’t know that I would really consider it a Giallo but it is an interesting starting point for the genre, call it proto-Giallo. Or don’t, but I recommend it anyway because it is well worth watching whatever genre you want to put it in.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: All the Colors of the Dark (1972)

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A while back I started a little feature I called Bring Out the Perverts: Giallo on the Criterion Channel. That streaming service featured 13 Italian genre films and that seemed like a fun thing to review. I like the idea of having a pre-selected set of films to watch and review. I thought I’d do a bunch of them.

When I say “a while back” I mean I started this feature last September. Four months have gone by and I still haven’t finished watching 13 films. I did well through October, but the Noirvember happened and I completely forgot about this idea.

This is the second to last one and hopefully, I’ll finish it out soon after that. I still like the idea, and I’ve got some things brewing in a similar vein for this coming year. So consider this a Friday Night Horror Movie and a Bring Out the Perverts.

All the Colors of the Dark is a mixture of classic Giallo with some early 1970s psychedelia with a touch of satanism thrown in for good measure.

Edwige Fenech stars as Jane Harrison a woman whose recent car accident caused her to miscarry and lose her baby. This has sent her spiraling into mental breakdown. She begins losing her grip on reality, unable to tell her dream world full of nightmarish images and a man with a knife out to kill her, and real life.

She’s seeing a psychiatrist, but her boyfriend Richard (George Hilton) is against it. But he’s mostly annoyed that every time they start to have sex she starts envisioning that dude with the knife and has a panic attack. We’ll skip the analysis about knives and sex, stabbings, and penetration for now.

She meets a friend who suggests attending a Black Mass. There she is, well I don’t want to say raped because that feels slightly too strong a word so let’s just say strongly persuaded to drink the blood of a sacrificed dog and then engage in a lot of sex. Afterward, she’s totally into sexing up her boyfriend again. I wouldn’t touch that analysis with a ten-foot pole.

That dude with the knife keeps showing up in odd places stalking her. Sometimes she envisions him attacking her but every time that seems to just be a hallucination. At another Black Mass, she might have been forced to kill her friend who introduced her to it. Or maybe that was just a dream too. The lines between reality and hallucination become quite blurred.

It all wraps up a little too neatly for my tastes with all the solutions coming fast and clean.

Fenech is quite good. She’s the Scream Queen of Gialli and while I’m a fan, I’d never call it a fantastic actress. But she does well as this damaged woman in distress.

Director Sergio Martino leans heavily into the psychedelia of the era. He does that thing that was common at this time where the images turn into a kaleidoscope. He uses a lot of quick cuts, and he’ll repeat images over and over. I find it all very dated and rather annoying.

When he’s not giving you a visual trip he does create some rather striking images.

I’ve never been a fan of this type of psychedelic cinema and I find it especially obnoxious in horror. Looking at my Letterboxd friend list most of them seem to really like this one. So your mileage may vary.

Bring Out the Perverts: Strip Nude For Your Killer (1975)

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Horror films have always been at least a little transgressive and salacious. They are trying to evoke strong emotions after all. Starting in the 1960s and moving strongly in the 1970s and 1980s they began to rely heavily on sex and violence. Horror tends to be watched by younger people and younger people buy tickets when that’s what you’re selling.

Giallo always trodded on those tropes. This makes sense since Giallo is at heart a genre about violence against women. The best films in the genre examine those tropes, they ponder the male gaze (while often at the same time offering up examples of it) and probe the links between sex and violence. The worst ones simply give the audience plenty of naked flesh and blood-letting without much thought behind it beyond making a few dollars.

Strip Nude For Your Killer is one of the sleaziest horror films I’ve ever seen. Hardly a scene goes by without someone (usually any number of beautiful women) taking off their clothes. Actually, it is always the women. This is a film that has no problem showing full-frontal nudity from a woman but always pans up just as the men are taking off their pants.

It begins with a woman lying naked on her back, her feet in stirrups. She’s getting a back-alley abortion. The doctor’s head is strategically placed so that we can see pubic hair, but not her actual genitals. That’s about as sophisticated as the film gets.

I won’t get too far into the plot, as you can read more about that in my review of the Blu-ray over at Cinema Sentries. There isn’t much plot to be found if I’m being honest. It is basically someone killing a bunch of people connected to a modeling agency.

The kills aren’t particularly interesting, and the filmmaking is rather plain. There is a groovy soundtrack and the killer does wear a pretty rad-looking leather biker suit (someday I’m gonna make a list of all the films that have a killer wearing a similar suit – there are a lot of them, and they always seem to keep their helmets on!)

It also stars Edwige Fenech and I’ll never complain about that. However, she’s not given much to do (other than strip off her clothes at every opportunity) even as she is the main character and the one who is investigating the murders.

It isn’t a terrible film, it just isn’t particularly exciting which is quite a thing to say considering how much nudity and murder it has in it.

Bring Out the Perverts: What Have They Done To Your Daughters? (1974)

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Italian Cinema was dominated by two genres in the 1970s – the Poliziotteschi and the Giallo. The Poliziotteschi was a particular type of crime drama that is noted for its gritty, down-and-dirty take on police work featuring loads of violence and action sequences, highlighted by corruption at the highest levels. Gialli were murder mysteries featuring graphic violence, hyper-stylization, overt sexuality, and wild soundtracks.

What Have They Done To Your Daughters? is an interesting blending of both genres. Plotwise it is very Poliziotteschi as it follows the police as they try to catch a killer and are then pulled into a child prostitution ring with ties to the upper echelon of the city’s political sphere. Stylistically it is mostly gritty like a Poliziotteschi, and it features a couple of terrific chase sequences, but it also has a few stylish Giallo-esque moments.

There is also a black-gloved, motorcycle helmet-wearing, hatched-yielding psycho going around hacking people to death, and a few moments of sleaze where the camera lingers on naked female bodies (one of which is supposed to be a 15-year-old girl – the actress is of age – which makes it particularly gross).

I cover the basic details of the plot in my old review of the Arrow Video Blu-ray release (which you can read at Cinema Sentries) so I’ll skip them in this write-up.

I mostly really dug the film this go-around. I think I enjoyed the Poliziotteschi elements more than the Giallo. The story is good, the investigative elements are interesting, and the action sequences are top-notch. It is not unusual for this type of crime drama to dive into underage sex rings, but it still grosses me out, especially now that I have a young daughter. And this film gets a bit skeevy in that area.

I did dig the hatched-wielding killer, but like, why is he running around in a motorcycle helmet (other than the film keeping us from seeing his face I mean)? It is especially weird since the cops figure out who he is fairly early in the film (it is the guys who hired him that remain a mystery).

Overall, a very enjoyable cinematic experience.

Bring Out the Perverts: Torso (1973)

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I’m not sure how the Criterion Channel decided to organize their list of Giallos. It certainly isn’t chronological, and I can’t see any sort of thematic relevance. But we have definitely entered into the sleazy section of the list. By their very nature – black-gloved, knife-wielding maniac stalks and murders beautiful, young women – all Gialli are at least somewhat sleazy. But some definitely lean into that aspect of the genre.

Torso is not the sleaziest Giallo I’ve ever seen (that award goes to Strip Nude For Your Killer which is on the list and will be reviewed soon) but it certainly has plenty of gratuitous sex, nudity, and violence.

In the Italian city of Perugia, someone is strangling and then mutilating women from the local university. Terrified, four students take off for the weekend to an isolated villa that sits on top of a tall cliff overlooking a small village. Naturally, the killer follows them there and now they have nowhere to run.

But first, the two lesbians have to do a little sexing, and everybody must lounge around in skimpy lingerie. The violence ratchets up until our Final Girl is stuck inside the villa watching the killer literally make torsos out of his victims.

But Sergio Martino is too good a director to let this slip completely into sleaze. The mystery is well done (even if I did guess who the killer was early on). There are lots of red herrings and the kills are gruesome, but interesting and effective.

It is definitely not the first film I’d recommend to people looking to dive into the genre, but it is definitely not one I’d say you should avoid.

Bring Out the Perverts: Who Saw Her Die? (1972)

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I’ve seen all but one of the Giallos on the Criterion Channel. That is to say almost all of the films that will make up this series. I own quite a few of them on Blu-ray and reviewed most of them for Cinema Sentries. I’ve enjoyed rewatching these films thus far and writing new reviews. It is fun to read the old reviews and think about how my opinions have changed.

The thing with Who Saw Her Die? is that my opinion has stayed pretty much the same. Reading over my review from 2019 I find myself nodding along, pretty much completely agreeing with my thoughts from back then.

So what do I have to say about it now? Not much, really.

Like a lot of Italian films from this period, the actors all spoke whatever language came naturally while they were on the stage and then their voices were dubbed in post-production. They created two soundtracks for the film – one in English, one in Italian. In the English dub star George Lazenby used his own voice. In the Italian version, some Italian actor spoke his lines.

The Arrow Video Blu-ray has both soundtracks. I previously watched the English track. Criterion only has the Italian one. Lazenby once played James Bond. It was weird watching him act but hearing someone else’s voice come out of his mouth.

That really affected my view of his performance. In my review, I praised his acting, this time around I was less impressed.

The plot is pretty standard-issue Giallo. The visuals aren’t all that stylish, and the kills are pretty tame. But it does look lovely. It uses the Venice setting wonderfully and has that warm feel that only an excellent film and a good cinematographer can provide.

I’m making it sound worse than it is. It’s really fine. The mystery is interesting, and it has a good collection of weird characters. There are perhaps a few too many of them, and the plot gets a little too complicated, but it is still enjoyable to watch.

And that Ennio Morricone score is wild.

Bring Out the Perverts: In The Folds of the Flesh (1970)

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This is the only film in the collection which I had not previously watched. It also happens to be the worst of the bunch, and I’d hardly call it a Giallo at all.

I’ve talked before about how most Gialli don’t make all that much logical sense. They often have plot inconsistencies and characters will behave in a nonsensical manner. But In the Folds of the Flesh is on a whole new level of nonsense. Honestly, I’m not sure I could describe everything that goes on in this film, or how any of it fits into the plot.

But I’ll try.

A convict escapes from a mental hospital. He comes across a woman who has just killed her husband and is burying him in her yard. But before he can do anything he is captured by the police. Many years later a long-lost cousin shows up to the house and is promptly murdered. Then an old friend comes to the house and he gets his head sliced off. Then the convict finds his way back to the house, tries to blackmail the family, and finds himself in an acid bath.

I think there is a police investigation and there are definitely flashbacks to a Nazi concentration camp, and probably a bunch of other stuff too. I really can’t remember. It all happens so haphazardly it was difficult to keep up. Or to care.

It is shot with psychedelic glee. There are a lot of flash zooms and kaleidoscope-y split screens. The kills (which feature quite a few decapitations) are pretty fun. And goofy.

It is overwrought and trashy. And a little bit of fun. But not enough to make me recommend it.

Bring Out the Perverts: Tenebrae (1982)

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While Mario Bava may have invented the Giallo, it was Dario Argento who popularized it in 1970 with The Bird With the Crystal Plumage. Without that film, we wouldn’t be talking about Giallo at all. Then in 1975, he perfected the genre with Deep Red.

While the genre was a very popular one, it had its critics. Many criticized its overt sexualization of violence and its graphic violence towards women. In 1982, just over a decade after making The Bird With the Crystal Plumage and thus creating the Giallo craze, Argento made Tenebrae, a film that can be viewed as the director’s direct response to the criticism of his films. While the genre would continue to be popular throughout the 1980s and Argento would make several more, Tenebrae can also be looked at as a final statement about the genre from the director.

While The Bird With the Crystal Plumage opens with the killer typing something on a typewriter – he is the creator of the art, Tenebrae opens with the killer reading an already-published novel – he is an audience to the art. That novel, also titled Tenebrae, was written by our protagonist Peter Neal (Anthony Franciosa) and it could rightly be considered a Giallo. It is about a killer who attacks women he considers to be perversions to society.

The real killer acts like a copycat to the killer inside the book (inside this film). We see him murder a woman who offers herself up sexually in order to get out of a shoplifting charge, and then later a lesbian couple with an open relationship. Like Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver, the killer believes he has been sent to rid the streets of so-called scum.

Peter Neal is in Rome for a book tour celebrating Tenebrae. His agent Bullmer (John Saxon) keeps booking him interviews in which Peter is constantly being asked about what effects the violence in his book may create in society. That’s Argento getting meta, as he was often asked similar questions about his movies.

When one of the murder victims has pages of his book inserted into her mouth the police begin asking Peter questions. Later the killer will slide quotes from Tenebrae under his door. Peter and his assistant Anne (Daria Nicolodi) start their own investigation.

The film is filled with scenes exactly what you’ve come to expect from an Argento-directed Giallo. There are sly camera angles, extreme close-ups, surprising jump-scares, blood-soaked violence, and a righteous score from Goblin (well, three of the members at least).

While the film does present lots of questions about violence and art – does it create violence in society or is it simply a depiction of the existing violence in society? Argento doesn’t give us any concrete answers. His on-screen surrogate, Peter Neal bats the questions away with pat answers, but the movie seems to indulge the idea both ways. Perhaps his films are a reflection of the real-life violence Argento was surrounded by, or perhaps his films influenced others to violence in society. Maybe a little bit of both occurred. It is clear Argento loved depicting violence in his films. I suspect he was never ever to truly untangle the reasons why. I love his films and abhor real-life violence so I have no pat answers either.

What we are left with is a pretty darn good little film filled with stylish violence and an interesting mystery. That is more than enough for me.

Bring Out the Perverts: Don’t Torture a Duckling (1972)

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Lucio Fulci is sometimes called the Godfather of Gore. As one might assume from that name his films were often filled with gratuitous violence and loads of blood and guts. Honestly, his films are sometimes not much more than blood and guts. Some of his films feel like he thought up some crazy violent scenes that would be cool to film and then tried to piece a story around it. Even at his best, his stories aren’t all that well done.

He wasn’t a particularly good stylist either. His films rarely look great. There is often a kind of DIY approach to the way he shoots his films.

I’m making it sound like I don’t like his film, but mostly I do. I think The Beyond (1981) is quite good and Zombi 2 (1979) is fantastic. But I wouldn’t say that Fulci is a great filmmaker. There is a bluntness to his films that reaches right into your guts and pulls them straight out. That violence and gore created some truly memorable effects work and he could certainly create a scene that will stick in your memory banks.

But yeah, he’s not really known for his thought-provoking scripts.

Don’t Torture A Duckling then is a bit of an oddity in Fulci’s filmography. The gore is toned down a great deal, and there is a concentration on telling a real story. One with a social conscience even.

The story revolves around the murder of three young boys in a small Italian village. It shocks the citizens and creates a sort of moral panic. They must find the killer, even if it’s a scapegoat. The community must go back to normal.

The first pick on a simple-minded man, then when it’s clear he could not be the culprit they go after a wandering witch. Then they decide it could be Patrizia (Barbara Bouchet) a rich, classy woman from the city spending some time in the country. She talks funny and dresses in tight shirts and short skirts. Surely she has loose morals and could be a killer. Rumors and superstition lead the investigation, at least where the townsfolk are concerned. The police are relatively competent but it hardly matters.

This is a Lucio Fulci message picture. Rural Italy is run on superstition and religion, science and procedure take second place. Not even the Catholic Church is given a break.

I appreciate that he’s trying to do something more than his usual shocking violence and gore. I also appreciate that he spends more time than usual creating beautiful images. Most of the film was shot on location and there are some truly beautiful landscapes that he lovingly captures. But if I’m being honest it isn’t all that interesting to me.

I’m not entirely sure why this qualifies as a Giallo. Outside of it being a murder mystery, it has very few of the hallmarks of the genre. But whatever, it is worth watching just to enjoy Fulci paying attention to the story for once.

I previously reviewed Arrow Video’s Blu-ray release of Don’t Torture a Duckling for Cinema Sentries.

Bring Out the Perverts: Deep Red (1975)

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I wrote about Deep Red for my Friday Night Horror movie a little over a year ago. I don’t know that I have a whole lot more to say about it. It is my favorite Giallo. I think it perfectly encapsulates everything I love about the genre.

Dario Argento is a master of creating fascinating visual images. Working with cinematographer Luigi Kuveiller they created a film that is stunningly beautiful, thrilling, and often quite terrifying.

I’ve seen it at least half a dozen times and it has never lost its allure for me. I’m always captivated.

I still do get it confused with The Bird with the Crystal Plumage. They have similar plots starting with a protagonist who witnesses a murder inside a building while he is on the streets of Rome. There is some detail he saw but can’t quite put his finger on.

But it doesn’t matter. Plots really don’t matter in these things, especially in Deep Red. I still couldn’t tell you all the details of what happens in this film, or at least what they mean. There are moments and entire scenes that don’t make any sort of logical sense, but they completely work for me. They are frightening, alluring, or at the very least visually interesting.

The score from the progressive rock band Goblin is an all-timer for me. It is sometimes a bit over the top but it somehow works perfectly within this film.

Everything works perfectly within this film. I love it so much.