This is chapter 2 from my book called Giallo Meltdown: A Moviethon Diary. Get your copy right here!

As I promised at the end of the first Giallo Meltdown, I am returning to the world of the giallo. While not as large in scope as the original, I’ve picked 13 titles for GM2 which promise to deliver the body count, the trashy thrills, and the god-awful fashions . I wanted to acquire several more titles before staging another one of these. Now that I have an international DVD player, the world of the giallo has gotten just a little smaller. When I noticed that the Region 1 DVD release of In the Folds of the Flesh had been pushed back yet another month, I gave up waiting and decided to get this party started.

It’s hard for me to stay out of Italy. When life has got you down and you just need a little pick me up, I suggest watching a bunch of poorly dubbed fashion models get slaughtered for some boneheaded reveal at the end of a tasteless cinematic romp. When their neon red blood spurts across the screen, your troubles and cares will just melt away. Screw politics and screw the economy, I’m checking myself into Italy 1972 and I ain’t comin’ back until I’m covered in blood, velour, and J&B.

Friday

I made sure to take care of some of the supply buying the night before. LeEtta and I picked her up some wine and I got myself a supply of Vitamin Water, Mountain Dew Code Red, and Sunkist orange soda. I really hope that Vitamin Water isn’t complete garbage. This is me trying to be “healthy” for a change. No Taco Bell runs or greasy pizza deliveries. This is the moviethon where I don’t get heartburn.

“I’m ready for anything… with the right person.”

5:14 pm

Forbidden Photos of a Lady Above Suspicion

Those are some charming affirmations there, Minou (Dagmar Lassander). Oh good God, this soundtrack is hypnotic and candy-like. Okay, forget the affirmations, she’s mixing tranquilizers and liquor. And suddenly, it’s nighttime. And our hot and sexy little miss trouble is walking along the beach, alone. Bitch, are you crazy? Let the torment begin. This total creep (expert of creepitude, Simón Andreu) starts tearing her damn blouse.

And now it’s time to tear some shit up at the disco. Fabulous! Dang, these are some seriously sexed up horny ladies. Susan Scott (as the slutty Dominique) is here and she is as painfully hot as usual. Say you guys, that’s a nice “decompression chamber” you got there. Show me some science, please. Hey, this guy wants to play with Minou’s body… and her mind. NO THROW CASSETTE IN OCEAN! FISH WILL DIE!

I hope there isn’t anymore blackmail in this movie, I just couldn’t handle- What, more blackmail?!? Nooo! Meh, that’s nothing compared to the tense pea soup eating scene. Minou is quite traumatized by this point; probably by that awful jacket her husband is wearing. My nerves are on edge, I tells ya. Geez, Dominique isn’t too supportive either.

Minou explaining that Peter is her husband and her father figure is a little revealing about her character. Nothing fucked up about that. And now she’s a pill-poppin’ freak as well. Zoinks! They done pulled the old apartment switcheroo! Everything that implicated the bad guy (as well as confirmed his existence) has mysteriously disappeared from that room.

Yes, listen to your doctor; women always invent mysterious blackmailers just to get attention. It’s just something they like to do. Ah, another scary wig! The ending of this film is nicely put together and very tense. However, this is not the most exciting example of the genre. Damn it, Dominique, you are a raging slut! “Personal demonstrations”, really? Chicks, man.

“What I want looks like a big string of sausages.”

6:57 pm

Puzzle

Friends, Romans, duders… I present to you: Luc Merenda! He plays Edward, a guy with some serious memory issues. We just spotted some J&B, y’all. Puzzle wastes no time dumping us into the thick of it. After some very ewww-inducing footage of boys swimming at the local YMCA, we are introduced to Luca, the creepy little sassy-pants bastard. This kid is such a pimp. And now we meet Sara played by Austrian hottie Senta Berger.

Hmm, so Sara plans to leave that chainsaw in the kitchen? I highly doubt that will come up again later. Hey, it’s Bruno Corazzi (from Seven Bloodstained Orchids) as George, the snotty (literally) psycho who leaves a trail of tissues behind him everywhere he goes. Edward is afraid of his memories. He doesn’t want to remember. Traumatized by violence, his character is actually written very well.

Luca, you stupid fuck, don’t lose the dog! Now look what happened! Anita Strindberg makes a cameo but the only thing memorable about it is her awful, awful hair. The climax is approaching and all of the pieces start to fit together. When the bad guy is revealed, he is a really bad ass dude. We get a very tense finale with some awesomely gratuitous slow motion. Too bad that closing song is so heinous that it almost spoils everything.

Cigar Break

I light up my delightfully awesome Chateau Real cigar. This is a light cigar with a lot of flavor. Of course, it is complimented perfectly by a Sunkist orange soda. You see, Sunkist is one of the few orange sodas with caffeine. It’s like more addictive than like crack and meth put together, probably. From my vantage point on the porch, I see that LeEtta is watching the first McCain/Obama debates. Isn’t that interesting?

More importantly, fall has finally come! The air smells so good. Living in Florida really makes you appreciate even the slightest weather changes. The sky is both cloudless and moonless tonight. All of this is made perfectly eerie by my Giallo Mix spiked with helpings of 60s/70s era Rita Pavone. Once the cigar is done, LeEtta prepares a cheese platter for us and we snack ourselves silly.

“He’s a typical Italian: lazy. Not like the Swedish.”

9:29 pm

Death Carries a Cane

Now that’s the kind of quality I’ve come to expect from a DVD. This glorified bootleg (from X-Rated Kult) looks murky as hell and features some great scratchy audio. Doesn’t really matter because that opening music by Roberto Pregadio is goddamn lousy. Hey look, it’s Susan Scott again. This time she plays Kitty, a chick who witnesses a murder. Man, Italy is friggin’ scary. We are introduced to her jerk boyfriend Alberto (Robert Hoffman). He is suspect number one because he has a mustache and he’s a fucking bastard. I hate him.

These two make a great couple. Kitty wears floppy hats and makes weird sculptures of mutilated bodies while Alberto likes to stab them repeatedly for, you know, art or something. Creepster Simón Andreu shows up again but this time as Marco, a composer who suffers from impotence. Hey, hold the phone! Marco’s astoundingly sexy lady friend is Lidia (Anuska Borova), the hot reporter. And she has a twin sister? There is a God.

What giallo would be complete without indifferent and incompetent police? We have our man in the form of Inspector Merughi (but I call him “Inspector Asshead”). The cheesy zooms and close-ups of guilty faces are astounding. Okay, the composer has redeemed himself. The really freaky stalking music is all aces. This movie should be called Death Limps Along Slowly.

Stripper ballerina! Go! Go! Go! Now look who decided to join us! It’s Luciano Rossi and he is playing a suspicious looking guy named Richard. That’s my name! The body count is climbing so let’s dress up Kitty like a hooker and use her as bait for the killer. Death Carries a Cane has some wacky shit going on and it is all funny as hell. And it’s a bloody and violent film too.

How about some more red herrings? The genius of the writing comes when Kitty keeps having to go pee pee during the climactic investigatory scene. The ending is pretty intense but it is all ruined when the killer’s motives are explained. My jaw drops as some fucking incoherent psychobabble garbage comes out of my TV. Okay, that was lame.

“But it’s been said that no one is closer to God than a loony.”

10:57 pm

Autopsy

SOLAR FLARES! THEY ARE TO KILL YOU! Now this is one of my favorites. A weird and unsettling music score by Ennio Morricone, stock footage of sun flares, and a rash of violent suicides. Mimsy Farmer (of Four Flies On Grey Velvet) plays Simona, our demented heroine with terrible hair. She is a morgue attendant who has visions of fornicating corpses. She is the cold fish girlfriend for her frustrated boyfriend Edgar (Ray Lovelock). Oh, now I get it. She’s got daddy issues to go with her sex issues.

J&B will not save you. Death will destroy you as this is one ghoulish film. The morgue is especially clammy and freaky. After his sister supposedly kills herself, Father Paul Lenox (Barry Primus) shows up to prove that she was murdered. How is he going to find her killer if he drives like a dang maniac? Between the lousy priest, Father Paul (who was a racecar driver ‘til he killed a bunch of fans in an accident), and her sex addicted boyfriend, Edgar (collector of vintage pornography), Simona should just go ahead and become a lesbian.

The editing of Autopsy is top notch. A little dog abuse. Woops, that’s not nice. Geez, I hope that dog bit the fuck out of his handlers that day. There is menace around every corner and something ugly everywhere in this grotesque entertainment. This movie is so friggin’ loaded with craziness. Death is here and so are the show-stopping setpieces. What’s up with that breakdancer?

Mimsy Farmer has had enough, y’all. She just took a fork to a guy. Whoa, this movie is getting a little kinky. And why not? Everything in this film is sweaty, ugly, and claustrophobic so why not freaky nasty too? We’ve got wall to wall sex and sleaze. This is a guilty pleasure for sure.

And there’s a whole lotta pseudoscience. They hook her paralyzed dad up to the talking machine. What? It’s all total nonsense. Now this… THIS is the aesthetic I crave all the time. Italy is an alien landscape and I’m a friggin’ astronaut, y’all. The slow motion birds mean that everything is going to be all right. Just ignore the brains splattered on the pavement. Bless you, director Armando Crispino, bless you.

Saturday

In bed last night after Autopsy, my mind was racing. I was trying to write my own giallo in my head but I couldn’t get past the first killing, much less the plot. Screw it, the plot for my yellow film will have something to do with a wacky inheritance scheme. No one’s ever done that before.

My dreams were equally erratic. I kept running around in various imaginary films trying to solve the mystery and expose the killer’s identity. When the alarm started beeping at 8:45am, the phrase “WE SELL DECORATIVE TILES” was echoing through my head as though someone had just screamed it into my ear. Perhaps that is the vital clue to figuring out who the killer is.

We get the usual breakfast at Einstein’s. LeEtta gets a spinach and bacon panini while I stick to my asiago cheese bagel with plain cream cheese, lettuce, tomato, and bacon. We head straight for the liquor store for a bottle of J&B (WE WERE OUT!), a bottle of Jameson’s, and some wine. I spotted a bottle of Mount Gay rum which amused me very much. Back at the apartment, I take a ceremonial shot of J&B which hits me like a punch in the face. How the fuck did people drink so much of this stuff in all these Italian movies?

“You have a great talent for simplifying everything, don’t you?”

10:59 am

The Designated Victim

Tomas Milian, you magnificent son of a bitch! Gah, that opening song is painful. Milian plays Stefano, a guy with big dreams. Big dreams of spending his shrewish wife’s fortune, that is! And he wants to run away with his mistress. Wow, what a likeable guy. Enter the fruity Count Matteo Tiepolo (AKA Freddie Mercury) who is flamboyant beyond belief. Hey look, it’s Enzo Tarascio (from The Night Evelyn Came Out of Her Grave)!

After a chance encounter in Venice, he offers Stefano the whole Strangers on a Train thing. If Stefano will kill Matteo’s abusive brother, then Matteo will take his wife out for him. Wait, that’s totally unrealistic. How the hell did Matteo get that female slave of his? How did he get a slave at all? He seems like a bottom to me. Anyway…

Aside from that odious opening song, the soundtrack by Luis Enríquez Bacalov is superb. The scenes in the rotting Venice are gorgeous. Modern science cannot measure the amount of homoerotic overtones in Stefano and Matteo’s relationship. I keep waiting (though not exactly hoping) for them to break the tension by making out or something. This movie is pretty dang awesome by the way.

This situation is getting sticky and Stefano’s mistress’s helmet hair is growing. Stefano never agreed to their little pact but he’s just desperate enough (thanks to Matteo’s manipulations) to go through with it. It’s not that he isn’t guilty as hell of trying to rob his wife blind but I kind of feel bad for the guy. Dang it, Tomas Milian is so cool it hurts. He makes me want to run out to a bar and get into a pushup contest. That sounds kind of gay too, actually. Maybe I won’t do that.

“My frontal lobes are very developed.”

12:38 pm

Plot of Fear

Nice apartment, duder. Is Oscar Wilde your decorator? My my, we’re off to a kinky start. Feel your eardrums melt as the fucking awesome opening music pummels you to death! There is a very brutal bludgeoning with a monkey wrench. Our friendly neighborhood police inspector for this slick giallo is Inspector Gaspare Lomenzo (Michele Placido). This guy is neurotic, egotistical, and brilliant. He and his black girlfriend exchange some endearing racial slurs. Ain’t that sweet? “You’re the queen. So kiss your white slave!”

Things get creepy as more about the infamous “Fauna Lovers Club” is revealed. Rich creeps watching raunchy cartoons and playing sex games… nasty. With all these folks turning up dead, it’s obvious that there’s some shady shit going down at the Villa Hoffmann. I love how both Eli Wallach and Tom Skerrit are in this movie and both of them are dubbed by lame voice actors. The hottie of Plot Of Fear is Jeanne (Corinne Clery) and oh yeah, she gets nekkid.

Hookers and tigers don’t mix! Forget solving the case, Gaspare is so wound up, I think he’s going to explode. There is some great misdirection with the killings. Where will the clever killer strike next? I sure hope he doesn’t strike during the gratuitous sex scene. Wow, this film by director Paolo Cavara gets better with every viewing. Once again, I am blessed by my international DVD player. LeEtta just made the best lunch: couscous, fresh asparagus, with a fried egg on top. This will give me the strength to survive.

Oops, we just got to the sped up fight scene. Okay, that really didn’t need to happen. Why did the editor turn into a douche right there? The relentless detective is a mess in his personal life but is all aces in solving the case. There are some very evil and totally reprehensible characters in this movie. Plot of Fear seems to be trailing off at the end but it all comes together at the last minute. It might be just a little convoluted but it’s still a classic.

“You have to regain consciousness or I get no pleasure.”

2:12 pm

The Black Belly of the Tarantula

I’m making this a Paolo Cavara double feature so I’m turning back the clock to 1971. While not a favorite, Black Belly is still a grand giallo. Any film that starts with Barbara Bouchet getting a sensual massage is automatically good. Uh oh, the killer (wearing brown gloves not black) means business. Geez Miss Bouchet, do you think your nightgown is friggin’ complicated enough? Why don’t Italian ladies listen to their dogs? “BARK! BARK! Hey lady, the killer is in the house! BARK! BARK!”

Ennio Morricone does it again with another freaky and sultry score. In a rare appearance in a giallo, Giancarlo Giannini is awesome as Inspector Tellini, a flawed but very interesting character. He is constantly questioning himself and wondering if maybe he would be better suited for a different line of work. Another cool (though minor) character is “The Catapult”, an eccentric private dick who always gets his man. Oh shit, roll out them creepy mannequins.

There are so many familiar giallo starlets in this movie that it’s easy to get confused. Barbara Bach (of Short Night of the Glass Dolls), Rosella Falk (of The Fifth Cord), and even Annabella Incontrera (of The Case Of The Bloody Iris), are here to make me feel special and really, really nerdy. Detective Tellini’s greatest accomplishment in this movie? Busting the spider/drug smuggling ring! It’s all in a day’s work our hero. And so is getting humiliated in front of the entire police force. God, give this guy a fucking break!

Tellini’s wife, Anna (Stefania Sandrelli), is such a great character. I sure hope the killer doesn’t go after her. I sure hope there aren’t any gay stereotypes in this- OH SHIT! TOO LATE! Eugene Walter, the guy from The House With The Laughing Windows, plays the crazy waiter with his homoguts cranked up to 11. You better get home, Inspector, your lady friend is in trouble. Careful Mr. Killer, Tellini has had enough of your bullshit. Ah, I swoon at that final shot with our hero just disappearing into a crowd of people.

Power Nap

I am able to sneak in an hour long power nap in before LeEtta wakes me up to let me know that our friend Shelly has arrived. I didn’t dream about giallos but I did wake up with a start. So maybe I’m having psychic revelations about the killer while I sleep but I just haven’t sorted them out yet.

“My specialty is courting women in front of their husbands.”

5:16 pm

The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh

Director Sergio Martino (Torso) finally makes his appearance in this moviethon. Mmm, Julie Wardh (the loverly Edwige Fenech) likes it rough and she’s haunted by the memories of the kinky and freaky sex her old boyfriend used to deliver by the truckload. The spectacular Ivan Rassimov makes any film he appears in very special and this one is no exception. No way! Is that the same lame ass wallpaper from The Red Queen Kills 7 Times? Or is that just the same dang apartment?

George Hilton (of My Dear Killer) is pretty damn smooth in this flick but that kind of goes without saying. Wow, swingin’ party! So this is what people did before reality TV. Rassimov’s character is such an amazing bastard. Hey baby, let’s make love on a bed of shattered glass. That’s what ladies really want. I love the oversaturated soundtrack with reverb and echo doubling up and threatening to explode my friggin’ speakers.

There is a plethora of sex and nudity in Strange Vice. We also get the cute and vapid Carol (played by Conchita Airoldi). Poor Julie, why is her husband, Neal, so vanilla? Doesn’t he know he should beat on her once in a while to keep the spice in their marriage? Speaking of spice, check out George Hilton’s fringe jacket. He may win the award for worst dressed man in this moviethon. And I don’t even give out awards.

I think Julie has a propensity for bad relationships. Her old boyfriend is a sadist, her husband is a cold fish, and her new lover is going to get them both killed in a motorcycle accident by riding like a goddamned maniac! From this tawdry tale, I’ve learned two things: 1. When your husband is a diplomat, you have to cheat on him and 2. Don’t ever come between a woman and her bratwurst.

The stalking scenes are very well done and that bloody dream sequence kicks ass. I think Julie has issues. She gets all upset when people try to kill her and stuff. Okay, so maybe that harpoon was meant for her but she should just chill. Woman down! Woman down! Hey doc, the fuck is with that bizarre archaic resuscitation technique? And I don’t think that duct tape on a window makes it hermetically sealed.

This is a top notch giallo. Why the hell didn’t this get picked for the last Giallo Meltdown? Oh yeah, that’s right, I left that playlist up to chance. Never doing that again! This flick even has the old ice in the latch trick (saw that in Autopsy). Very clever. One of the best things in this movie is the glee that the killers get from committing their “perfect crime”.

Cigar & Dinner Break

We retreat to the patio where I have a Mountain Dew and a Flor De Nicaragua cigar. LeEtta is drinking some Carlo Rossi Paisano wine while Shelly drinks Peroni Nastro Azzurro. That’s right… Italian beer! Shelly has truly gotten into the spirit of things. We talk about God knows what until my cigar is gone. Then we head inside to order some Chinese food.

“You’re trapped, shit-face!”

8:34pm

Delirium

Mickey Hargitay (of Lady Frankenstein) grabs us by the hair and dunks our faces into his sleazy world. He plays Herbert, a sex maniac. These pitiful day for night scenes are giving me the willies. I love Marcia (Rita Calderoni) the sedated wife, and the nearly comatose servant girl. This is supposed to be England? Who wrote this fucking thing? Eww, this movie is dirty. Stupid and dirty. Lick your shoulder, servant girl, LICK IT!

Pseudoscience, psychobabble and a light whipping. Red panties, no panties, white panties! Now that is consistent filmmaking. Whose daydreams are these, anyway? Gah! We are being molested by ugly faux Tom Selleck. Oh, he’s into young stuff. That’s a shocker. Ha ha ha! His wife is still a virgin! He’s an impotent dumb loser dumbass.

Speaking of impotence… Asian Wok brought me the wrong goddamned entrée. I ordered chicken with broccoli and instead I got shrimp with mixed vegetables. This is not a crisis situation but it is certainly a downer. My egg rolls will get me through this. Nothing will get me through this fucking movie though.

Joaquine, were you a whore in another movie? And now we have what… poltergeist activity? Oh, it’s just a tape recorder. What in the unholy fuck is going on here? Screaming, screaming, and more screaming. Miss Marcia just keeps freaking out, calming down, and then starts up again. And again. Seriously, the last half hour is just her ranting and raving. This… oh… THIS WILL NOT END!

“In Italy, I feel… I’m in my underwear.”

10:28 pm

Death Walks at Midnight

Oh Luciano Ercoli, only you can heal the damage brought on by Delirium. Hey there, Susan Scott, you’re back! Thank you so much. Girl, you own this movie. Scott plays Valentina, a goofy broad who agrees to take a hallucinogenic drug so that she can be interviewed during her trip. Unfortunately, while under the influence, she witnesses a brutal murder in an apartment across from hers.

There are some strange duders in this movie. There’s Peppito (the lady man with a beard) with some vital information, and the killer with the spiked glove who looks like somebody’s grandma. Why don’t we all go on a little trip to the funny farm? I think I need to go. This shit just gets crazier and crazier every second. Valentina sporting her tin foil wig! WTF? This here is some crazy craziness! Did I mention the crazy?

Luciano Rossi (my hero) turns in one of his most unnerving performances as the hired killer with the throwing knives and a childish laugh that can strip paint. Good God, why can’t all giallos be as good as Death Walks At Midnight? The fight scene at the end is the icing on this bloody cake.

Short Break

At great personal risk, I take an invigorating stroll to go and get some caffeine. The best thing about apartment living is that there’s always a soda machine around for a late night boost. It is very quiet for a Saturday night (I keep my ears open for approaching footsteps). I breathe deep of the cool night air and I feel really good about the rest of the moviethon ahead of me. In the overlit laundry room, I get a Mr. Pibb Extra from the machine. I get back home to find LeEtta and Shelly ready for the next flick.

“If I was a girl, I’d become a hooker.”

12:25 am

The Suspected Death of a Minor

We finally get to a flick I’ve been really wanting to see and judging by the funktastic Goblin-like music by Luciano Michelini, this is going to pretty awesome. Okay, since the great Sergio Martino (All The Colors Of The Dark) is the director of Suspected Death, I might be a little biased already. Uh oh, pissed off Kevin Bacon, what are you going to do? Why must you brutally stab the sexy lady?

Mmm hey, this movie is filled with pretty people. There are hookers and pimps and then there’s our hero. Paolo is a detective but he sure as hell doesn’t act like one. He knows the only way to catch criminals is to get down and dirty. When the rest of the force is too concerned with gambling on soccer than solving a few murders, it’s up to Paolo (with the constantly broken glasses) to save the day. He even enlists some goofus to help him uncover a conspiracy.

Can I be the first to ask what the fuck is going on? This film is very entertaining, sleazy, action-packed, and fun but I am totally lost. It just keeps pulling the rug out from under you? The slapstick scenes are priceless. And that nutty car chase… What is this, a Charlie Chaplin giallo? The soundtrack for this film is really out there. Was that a Deep Red parody I just saw?

Oh snap, Little Orphan Slutty just burned evil Kevin Bacon’s face real good. The self referential moment where the theater is playing a Sergio Martino movie is very pleasing to my nerdy brain. Hey look, Paolo finally got some new glasses and he’s about to solve the mystery. What a strange friggin’ movie: a comedy cop thriller with some giallo overtones and a couple of brutal death scenes. Awesome.

Short Break

Shelly takes her leave of the Moviethon and LeEtta has claimed that she is going to bed. However, she is in the kitchen making a lot of noise. I sneak in to get my other egg roll and I see that she is cleaning up. What a woman! I am extremely sleepy right now but I’m thrilled at the opportunity to see another unseen giallo. It is a sequel of sorts to What Have You Done To Solange? Let’s hope this one is really good or else I’m gonna be totally screwed. As the movie starts, LeEtta goes to bed wishing me luck.

“It’s a disgrace, Inspector. Lovers, drugs, double life- She was only a child!”

2:08am

What Have They Done to Your Daughters?

A young girl has been found hanging from the rafters in a trashy apartment. Um, that’s not a very convincing setpiece there. They keep showing the body too and it’s pretty fake. A female district attorney? Now that’s progressive! She is Assistant DA Vittoria Stori played by Giovanna Ralli (from Cold Eyes of Fear) and boy does she have a mess on her hands (other than her huge hair).

Hey look, it’s Claudio Cassinelli. He was just in Suspected Death Of A Minor. Now he’s Detective Silvestri. So if you drop out of college one of your employment opportunities is “professional agitator”. The suicide leads to another crime and another. This is going to be a very sad story, isn’t it? SEX IS BAD AND DIRTY!

This mystery intrigues me. My brain feels like someone is holding my brain. What? Oh, hell yeah. That dismembered corpse just made my day. I mean my morning. It makes up for that not so great hanging corpse from earlier. Beware the scary motorcycle killer, he’s got a big ass machete. The car/motorcycle chase is frickin’ great! With its seedy characters, broken morals, and destroyed innocence, this film plays on the conservative fears of the time. The youth has gone wild!

There is much big violence. Much bleeding. Vice is a sickness at the core of it all and its corruption spreads all the way to the top in a conspiracy of sin. At least, that’s the message of this movie, I guess. The crying and the melodrama make for a nice mix with the tense stalking scenes. Leave the little girls alone, please.

“We’ve got to go back to the start and begin again.”

3:42 am

My Dear Killer

My face feels hot. My Dear Killer is a classic and this moviethon must end with it. It was one of the first non-Argento giallos I ever bought. It opens with one of the best death scenes ever. George Hilton plays the brilliant but flawed Detective Luca Peretti. Luca is a little eccentric and has a short fuse. His wife, Dr. Anna Borgese (Marilù Tolo), is hot. You know they gonna have marital issues and shit! That ancient answering machine of hers is pretty great.

Eurohorror super-starlet Helga Liné makes a nice though brief appearance. There’s a 3 second strangulation but the scene is saved by the subjectivity of several unreliable witnesses. A child’s drawing holds the key to the entire case. Where have I seen that before? There is a super dark slab of depressing storyline in this film.

I love how the schoolteacher (Patty Shepard!) goes home after work and watches Django on TV shortly before being brutally murdered with an electric saw. Oops, was that a spoiler? Oh boy, I am a detective with a pencil-thin mustache and I am under so much pressure right now. This case makes me unable to pleasure my wife who happens to be mind-bendingly sexy!

My Italy looks like this. I’m finally at the point in this moviethon where I get that indescribable feeling. I can find my new perpetual home inside of one of these gorgeous scenes. There’s just something about that 70s Italian cinematography. The shit is drugged, yo!

This is such a grim story but I know our awesome detective can save the day. Everyone who watches these movies knows that the best giallos always have some poor slob who gets murdered in his shack. You know, struck down in cold blood while trying to sleep in his shanty. Look at the cops. They’re cruising around in a boxy Mercedes.

THE ENDING = PERFECTION. I’m not fucking joking around! Once all of the hoopla with the red herrings is finally put aside, we get to the nitty gritty. When Hilton confronts his group of suspects, the lights go out a la Agatha Christie and the tension just explodes.

The Conclusion

Sometime around 5:30 in the morning, I’m singing in the shower. The lyrics go like this: “Giallo! Oh! Giallo! Oh! Aiuto! Aiutoooooooooooooooo!” A very groggy LeEtta catches me in mid song just to make sure I’m coming to bed. Next thing I know, I have flopped my weary body into bed and for a moment, I’m too tired to sleep. While trying to find some meaning to the clues and more ingenious ways to ensnare the elusive black-gloved killer, I pass out.

Just before 10:00am, I wake up to one of our cats, Sparkles, stomping on us and meowing very insistently about food or something. I remember dreaming about lists and lists of giallos. There were pages and pages of titles that I was highlighting and getting all fired up about. I was ogling the directors, actors, and composers of these imaginary flicks. How dull is that? I think that means the killer got away again.

Dang it! LeEtta has understandably vetoed my mumblings about extending the moviethon into another day. Come on! We could watch The House with the Laughing Windows, Knife of Ice, Delirium: Photos of Gioia, and Crimes of the Black Cat. Shit, it looks like I’m building the playlist for Giallo Meltdown 3 already. The post-moviethon hangover is mixing with the euphoria of 13 giallos all so nicely.

Why do I have this compulsion with these films? Why do I have two and a half shelves of Italian films on DVD? And why is it that 80% of those films are giallos? The beautiful and often naked actresses are a bonus and the gallons of fluorescent blood are important. The delicious 70s kitsch and the mouthwateringly sumptuous soundtracks by mad Italian composers are essential. And of course, there’s also the presence of immeasurably cool duders like George Hilton and Ivan Rassimov.

I still can’t formulate the right combination of words to describe the feeling that I get after a moviethon like this. All I know is that the real world becomes more beautiful and is sharpened into a razor’s edge of tangibility. I know this is isn’t Italy 1972 but it sure does feel like it. Prepare, mio amico, this is only part 2 in a trilogy. I can feel it in my yellow bones.