With magazines like Positif and Midi-minuit-fantastique the French were ahead of the game in recognising people like Riccardo Freda and Mario Bava; here is a useful index to all manner of French language film magazines over the decades - http://calindex.eu/
Argento - http://calindex.eu/actreal.php?op=listfilm&nar=6470&min=0
Bava - http://calindex.eu/actreal.php?op=listfilm&nar=5425&min=0
Fulci - http://calindex.eu/actreal.php?op=listfilm&nar=5357&min=0
Tuesday, 6 February 2007
Sunday, 4 February 2007
Fellini / Fulci
This afternoon I watched the 1955 Fellini film Il Bidone, about a trio of con-men whose speciality is posing as priests in order to con poor farmers. At the end of the film one of the trio, now working with different partners, attempts to swindle his erstwhile colleagues by claiming he did not take the money from their last marks, who had a crippled, near-saintly daughter. The others beat him and leave him half way down a slope, some distance from the road. He manages to finally crawl up to the road, but fails to attract the attention of a passing group and then slump to the ground:
Watching the sequence I could not help think of Maciara's death in Fulci's Non si sevizia un paperino:
Significantly, both films focus on a character defined in terms of his or her problematic relationship to children, Il Bidone's Augosto having attempted to keep the money for himself so he could give it to his estranged daughter and Duckling's Maciara having been unable to live a normal life as part of the community following the death of her child and the other villagers' suspicions around her.
Watching the sequence I could not help think of Maciara's death in Fulci's Non si sevizia un paperino:
Significantly, both films focus on a character defined in terms of his or her problematic relationship to children, Il Bidone's Augosto having attempted to keep the money for himself so he could give it to his estranged daughter and Duckling's Maciara having been unable to live a normal life as part of the community following the death of her child and the other villagers' suspicions around her.
Saturday, 3 February 2007
The Montesi Scandal
“Early on a windy morning in April 1953, the body of a young woman washed up on a beach outside of Rome. Her name was Wilma Montesi, and, as the papers reported, she had left her home in the city centre a day earlier, alone. The police called her death an accidental drowning. But the public was not convinced. In the cafes around the Via Veneto, people began to speak - of the son of a powerful politician, lavish parties, movie stars, orgies, drugs. How this news item of everyday life exploded into one of the greatest scandals of a modern democracy is the story Karen Pinkus tells in The Montesi Scandal. Wilma's death brought to the surface every simmering element of Italian culture: bitter aspiring actresses, corrupt politicians, nervous Jesuits in sunglasses, jaded princes. Italians of all types lined up to testify in the death of the middle-class carpenter's daughter. They sold their stories to the tabloids, only to retract them. They posed for pictures while pretending to shun the spotlight. Pinkus takes us through Rome in the 1950s, linking Wilma's death to the beginnings of the dolce vita and following the first paparazzi on their scooters as they shoot the protagonists. More than a meditation of the intricate ties among cinema, paparazzo photography and Italian life, The Montesi Scandal narrates the story and its characters as the notes for an unrealized film, brilliant in form and conception. As the reader discovers, the story of Wilma Montesi cannot be understood except as a film – but, ironically, one that seems impossible to produce.”
Sounds like an fascinating read; what makes this interesting for the giallo fan, besides the way it is a real-life example of La Dolce morte, is that among those involved in the scandal were actress Alida Valli and composer Piero Piccioni, whose father was a government minister at the time.
Eroticofollia / The Evil Eye
Roman playboy Peter Crany (Jorge Rivero) finds himself suffering from extraordinarily vivid dreams, in which the members of a mysterious sect try to compel him to commit murder.
At a fashion show a woman, Yvonne Chevrel, confides to Peter that she has been experiencing similar visions, that culminate in his murdering her. They go away together and the nightmare apparently becomes reality as Yvonne indeed wakes up dead.
Unsure of what is going on, Peter seeks the help of psychiatrist Dr Stone (Eduardo Fajardo), with whose assistant, Turino (Eva Vanicek) he quickly falls in love, all but forgetting his beautiful girlfriend Targa (Daniela Giordano).
While Peter and Turino leave for her family's (quiet) place in the country in the hope of getting away from it all, Inspector Ranieri (Anthony Steffen) pursues the playboy whose friends and acquaintances do indeed appear to be exhibiting a rather higher than average mortality rate…
This is definitely one of the odder gialli out there. While a number of filone entries, like Emilio P. Miraglia's The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave and The Lady in Red Kills Seven Times, flirt with supernatural horror before eventually resolving things naturalistically, usually in terms of a conspiracy to drive a victimised protagonist to their death whereby the supernatural serves as alibi for a perfect crime, comparatively few pursue a supernatural direction throughout. Fewer still, with Francesco Barilli's The Perfume of the Lady in Black being one obvious exception – albeit as a film operating at a far superior level of quality to this one – becoming more confusing and enigmatic as they progress in the manner that Eroticofollia does.
Consequently it's not particularly surprising that the film – AKA The Evil Eye, foregrounding the notion of the mal occhio and suggesting a tenuous connection with Bava's seminal film of the same alternate English-language title – works best in terms of set pieces and bizarre imagery, even if some moments, like the opening orgy/black mass dream sequence, are more effective than others, such as the various objects that act of their own volition where the lack of resources to match The Exorcist is often all too apparent and leads more to laughter than terror.
On the plus side, the film has an attractive cast, with eye-candy for everyone regardless of orientation and preference; a cool Stelvio Cipriani score; plenty of groovy fashions – Rivero's shiny brown suit a particularly taste(ful|less) example; and a foregrounded J&B bottle.
There are some things you can rely on, no matter how weird a giallo might get.
At a fashion show a woman, Yvonne Chevrel, confides to Peter that she has been experiencing similar visions, that culminate in his murdering her. They go away together and the nightmare apparently becomes reality as Yvonne indeed wakes up dead.
Unsure of what is going on, Peter seeks the help of psychiatrist Dr Stone (Eduardo Fajardo), with whose assistant, Turino (Eva Vanicek) he quickly falls in love, all but forgetting his beautiful girlfriend Targa (Daniela Giordano).
While Peter and Turino leave for her family's (quiet) place in the country in the hope of getting away from it all, Inspector Ranieri (Anthony Steffen) pursues the playboy whose friends and acquaintances do indeed appear to be exhibiting a rather higher than average mortality rate…
This is definitely one of the odder gialli out there. While a number of filone entries, like Emilio P. Miraglia's The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave and The Lady in Red Kills Seven Times, flirt with supernatural horror before eventually resolving things naturalistically, usually in terms of a conspiracy to drive a victimised protagonist to their death whereby the supernatural serves as alibi for a perfect crime, comparatively few pursue a supernatural direction throughout. Fewer still, with Francesco Barilli's The Perfume of the Lady in Black being one obvious exception – albeit as a film operating at a far superior level of quality to this one – becoming more confusing and enigmatic as they progress in the manner that Eroticofollia does.
Consequently it's not particularly surprising that the film – AKA The Evil Eye, foregrounding the notion of the mal occhio and suggesting a tenuous connection with Bava's seminal film of the same alternate English-language title – works best in terms of set pieces and bizarre imagery, even if some moments, like the opening orgy/black mass dream sequence, are more effective than others, such as the various objects that act of their own volition where the lack of resources to match The Exorcist is often all too apparent and leads more to laughter than terror.
On the plus side, the film has an attractive cast, with eye-candy for everyone regardless of orientation and preference; a cool Stelvio Cipriani score; plenty of groovy fashions – Rivero's shiny brown suit a particularly taste(ful|less) example; and a foregrounded J&B bottle.
There are some things you can rely on, no matter how weird a giallo might get.
Friday, 2 February 2007
A question
This morning I was at the University library, reading some things on Argento. One thing that struck me again was how whenever we (i.e. the Anglophone audience) read something about the giallo film in relation to the slasher, it is invariably with cause and effect somewhat mixed up: The American form, though historically later, is taken as the norm / reference point, from which the Italian one deviates, when it is really more the other way round.
So, I wondered, was there anything written in Italian at the time the American slasher film was emerging which looked at the way it deviated from the giallo as norm / model / reference point?
That, for instance, Friday the 13th took the template of A Bay of Blood but substituted a sexual subtext for an economic one, maybe because class based identity politics have never been that important in the USA as compared to Europe and “they” (i.e. Americans) seems to have more problems with sex than “we” (i.e. Italians / Europeans) do.
Or has the interplay always been so convoluted that any attempt to find a point of origin will inevitably fail or entail reifying the fluidity of the giallo into an for once and all essence?
Even if there is no answer, it is an interesting question, I think...
So, I wondered, was there anything written in Italian at the time the American slasher film was emerging which looked at the way it deviated from the giallo as norm / model / reference point?
That, for instance, Friday the 13th took the template of A Bay of Blood but substituted a sexual subtext for an economic one, maybe because class based identity politics have never been that important in the USA as compared to Europe and “they” (i.e. Americans) seems to have more problems with sex than “we” (i.e. Italians / Europeans) do.
Or has the interplay always been so convoluted that any attempt to find a point of origin will inevitably fail or entail reifying the fluidity of the giallo into an for once and all essence?
Even if there is no answer, it is an interesting question, I think...
Worth a look
If you like Spaghetti Westerns – and I am sure you must if you are here – then check out http://dollarirosso.blogspot.com. It is in Portuguese, but even looking at it without knowing the language you can tell it is good.
Sette note in nero / Murder to the Tune of Seven Black Notes
As a child Virginia she saw her mother commit suicide. It is the kind of traumatic incident that is not especially unusual in the world of the giallo, but for the fact that Virginia was in Florence, Italy at the time and her mother Dover, England.
“Mummy!”; compare to the death of Jill's mother in The Beyond
Just like the killer's demise at the end of Don't Torture a Duckling
After almost 20 years Virginia (Jennifer O'Neill) has managed to just about put the memory behind her, and is newly married to Francesco (Gianni Garko). As he departs on a business trip, Virginia travels out to his villa in the country, which she plans to redecorate.
En route, she has a vision of a middle-aged woman being buried alive by a bearded man with a limp. Arriving, she is shocked to discover the place looks exactly like the one she has just seen in her mind's eye. Worse, there is a skeleton behind one of the walls.
Note how a couple of clergy dressed in red 'just happen' to walk past to provide another instance of colour association
From the skeleton, the police are able to determine that the victim was aged around 25 and was murdered around five years previously. It soon emerges that Francesco's lover Agnesi disappeared about this time. Unable to provide a satisfactory alibi – he left for the US shortly after, but still had a window of opportunity – and with Virginia's visions obviously inadmissible, he is arrested on suspicion of murder.
Virginia, aided by her parapsychologist friend Luca (Marc Porel) and sister-in-law Gloria (Ida Galli / Evelyn Stewart), thus sets out to locate the limping man in her vision and prove her husband's innocence.
While it is probable that the commercial success of Deep Red played some part in Lucio Fulci's decision to not only return to the giallo after a five year absence but also introduce a supernatural / fantastical element to the proceedings, it would be a mistake to label Murder to the Tune of Seven Black Notes / The Psychic as nothing more than a rip-off.
Rather, it seems to have been one of his more personal, committed projects whose failure to find an audience is perhaps less a reflection of weaknesses as confounding preconceptions as to what a Fulci film is.
The pre-credits suicide sequence is pivotal in this regard. The slow-motion shots of Virginia's mother smashing off the rocks are the kind of shock images that grab you and makes you wonder where the film-maker is going to take you next, especially if you know that his previous giallo, Don't Torture a Duckling, had ended with pretty much the same shots.
As it turns out, however, the remainder of the film performs something of an about face, presenting a paucity of violent set pieces likely to disappoint anyone coming to it with expectations raised (retroactively we must remember) by the likes of The Beyond or The New York Ripper.
Nevertheless, as the immediate referencing of Don't Torture a Duckling also indicates, the film is otherwise of a piece with Fulci's other horror and giallo work.
Stylistically Fulci uses the same panoply of devices – extreme close-ups and zooms, especially on and into the eyes; rack focus into or out of objects or characters such that figure becomes ground, the concrete abstract and vice-versa; down to the momentary bleaching out of the image by the police photographer's flashbulb as he photographs the crime scene as in A Lizard in a Woman's Skin. (If it isn't broken, don't fix it.)
Giallo brand cigarettes against a blue backdrop
Black and white as the crime scene is photographed
Thematically the film likewise turns on the same question of what the protagonist's dreams or visions mean and how they relate to past, present and future, reality and possibility, the main difference lying in the interpretive schema used, parapsychology rather than psychoanalysis; even if the hard-headed officers of the law in both films regard them as equally pseudo-sciences compared with the facts provided by their forensics.
The genre colour is also significant within the diegesis through the clues of the cigarette with a distinctive yellow paper and the livery of the cab seen by Virginia, as it turns out that Gloria smokes the former and that there were only 16 of the latter in the city at the time of Agnesi's disappearance.
The main question, one suspects, is whether this, combined with the assured performances – O'Neill a suitably fragile beauty, Garko disarmingly charming and Galli (in dubbing voice at least) bitchy yet protective – and restrained yet effective score from frequent Fulci collaborators Frizzi, Bixio and Tempera is sufficient.
Here one admits to not being so sure and to finding it more a film to be appreciated than enjoyed. Then again, this sense of hesitation and inability to decide – does the avoidance of gory set pieces make or break The Psychic? is a palette of seven black notes / tonalities sufficiently expressive? – is itself the hallmark of the fantastical.
It is perhaps this that ultimately marks the film out as a vital point in Fulci's filmography as the moment of transition from the rational world of the gialli that preceded it, where there has to be a reason / explanation for everything that happens, and the absurdist horrors that followed it, where the dead walk.
It is also worth noting in this context the way in which the pivotal moment in The New York Ripper, upon which the identification of the maniac hinges, again relies upon an ambiguous vision.
“Mummy!”; compare to the death of Jill's mother in The Beyond
Just like the killer's demise at the end of Don't Torture a Duckling
After almost 20 years Virginia (Jennifer O'Neill) has managed to just about put the memory behind her, and is newly married to Francesco (Gianni Garko). As he departs on a business trip, Virginia travels out to his villa in the country, which she plans to redecorate.
En route, she has a vision of a middle-aged woman being buried alive by a bearded man with a limp. Arriving, she is shocked to discover the place looks exactly like the one she has just seen in her mind's eye. Worse, there is a skeleton behind one of the walls.
Note how a couple of clergy dressed in red 'just happen' to walk past to provide another instance of colour association
From the skeleton, the police are able to determine that the victim was aged around 25 and was murdered around five years previously. It soon emerges that Francesco's lover Agnesi disappeared about this time. Unable to provide a satisfactory alibi – he left for the US shortly after, but still had a window of opportunity – and with Virginia's visions obviously inadmissible, he is arrested on suspicion of murder.
Virginia, aided by her parapsychologist friend Luca (Marc Porel) and sister-in-law Gloria (Ida Galli / Evelyn Stewart), thus sets out to locate the limping man in her vision and prove her husband's innocence.
While it is probable that the commercial success of Deep Red played some part in Lucio Fulci's decision to not only return to the giallo after a five year absence but also introduce a supernatural / fantastical element to the proceedings, it would be a mistake to label Murder to the Tune of Seven Black Notes / The Psychic as nothing more than a rip-off.
Rather, it seems to have been one of his more personal, committed projects whose failure to find an audience is perhaps less a reflection of weaknesses as confounding preconceptions as to what a Fulci film is.
The pre-credits suicide sequence is pivotal in this regard. The slow-motion shots of Virginia's mother smashing off the rocks are the kind of shock images that grab you and makes you wonder where the film-maker is going to take you next, especially if you know that his previous giallo, Don't Torture a Duckling, had ended with pretty much the same shots.
As it turns out, however, the remainder of the film performs something of an about face, presenting a paucity of violent set pieces likely to disappoint anyone coming to it with expectations raised (retroactively we must remember) by the likes of The Beyond or The New York Ripper.
Nevertheless, as the immediate referencing of Don't Torture a Duckling also indicates, the film is otherwise of a piece with Fulci's other horror and giallo work.
Stylistically Fulci uses the same panoply of devices – extreme close-ups and zooms, especially on and into the eyes; rack focus into or out of objects or characters such that figure becomes ground, the concrete abstract and vice-versa; down to the momentary bleaching out of the image by the police photographer's flashbulb as he photographs the crime scene as in A Lizard in a Woman's Skin. (If it isn't broken, don't fix it.)
Giallo brand cigarettes against a blue backdrop
Black and white as the crime scene is photographed
Thematically the film likewise turns on the same question of what the protagonist's dreams or visions mean and how they relate to past, present and future, reality and possibility, the main difference lying in the interpretive schema used, parapsychology rather than psychoanalysis; even if the hard-headed officers of the law in both films regard them as equally pseudo-sciences compared with the facts provided by their forensics.
The genre colour is also significant within the diegesis through the clues of the cigarette with a distinctive yellow paper and the livery of the cab seen by Virginia, as it turns out that Gloria smokes the former and that there were only 16 of the latter in the city at the time of Agnesi's disappearance.
The main question, one suspects, is whether this, combined with the assured performances – O'Neill a suitably fragile beauty, Garko disarmingly charming and Galli (in dubbing voice at least) bitchy yet protective – and restrained yet effective score from frequent Fulci collaborators Frizzi, Bixio and Tempera is sufficient.
Here one admits to not being so sure and to finding it more a film to be appreciated than enjoyed. Then again, this sense of hesitation and inability to decide – does the avoidance of gory set pieces make or break The Psychic? is a palette of seven black notes / tonalities sufficiently expressive? – is itself the hallmark of the fantastical.
It is perhaps this that ultimately marks the film out as a vital point in Fulci's filmography as the moment of transition from the rational world of the gialli that preceded it, where there has to be a reason / explanation for everything that happens, and the absurdist horrors that followed it, where the dead walk.
It is also worth noting in this context the way in which the pivotal moment in The New York Ripper, upon which the identification of the maniac hinges, again relies upon an ambiguous vision.
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