Eyeball (1975) aka Gatti rossi in un labirinto di vetro

Directed by Umberto Lenzi(Cannibal Ferox(1981), Seven Blood-Stained Orchids(1973), Napoli Violenta(1976))

Starring Martine Brochard(Milano trema - la polizia vuole giustizia(1973), Riot in a Women's Prison(1974)), John Richardson(Torso(1973), One Million Years BC(1966)), and Ines Pellegrini(Salò(1975), Escape from Women's Prison(1978))




For those of us fans of the Giallo, there are certain elements that we expect in the pre-slasher italian classics, no matter whether the movie is good or bad. In fact, those of us that are fans of the Giallo genre usually don't care whether it's good or not, we will typically watch it regardless. While there are many gialli that are considered by cinematic and horror classics, for every good one you can count are there being at least three bad. But even if the film is considered a masterpiece by fans of the genre, there are still going to be many out there who consider it pure garbage. So goes the plight of the genre-film nerd, as is the rule for all of nerdom.

Eyeball(1975) is not a giallo I would consider a genre masterpiece. In fact, if you read through the comments section of IMDB, you'll find that many people don't consider it as such. As a giallo fan, I don't really give two fucks what people had to say about it, I enjoyed watching it. It had everything I expect out of the giallo genre, and then some.

Premise....A busload of "American" tourists land in Madrid for a group tour. Little do they know is that there is a killer among them. Almost upon arrival, buddies start stacking up wherever the bus lands, turning everybody into a supsect. Not only are the murders quick and brutal, but the victims are all found with there left eye removed in the most hideous fashion.

As with most gialli, most of the main characters are considered suspects at one point or another. Obviously. It is of course, a step above your typical murder mystery, but it is still a "whodunit". Unlike the stereotypical black leather gloves and trenchcoat, our killer wears red gloves with a red plastic raincoat, and not a slicker either. I'm talking about the throwaway types that are given to bus ride tourists in NYC when the weather is shitty. Such a cheap and gawdy disguise really adds to the comedic element of the movie, even if it wasn't the directors intention. But this is a Lenzi film, and those of us familiar with his works also know this type of unplanned comedy appears often. I also found the attempt to make the actual murders seem believable also added to the unintentional comedy. I've seen off-off Broadway scenes that have more believable murder scenes. The gore was there, but the speed at which the dagger was coming toward the victim could have been escaped by a person in a wheelchair.

As with many giallo's, some of the old standards were present. We got a fairly healthy dose of lesbianism, jazzy music, and even a discotheque scene. I don't know what it was that made Italian directors in the 70's obsessed with girl-on-girl action, but it's a pretty prevalent theme... and it sell movies to a mostly male audience. I just answered my own question.

Despite Eyeball not being one of the best of the genre, I really enjoyed the film. Lenzi might not be the best writer, but he definitely has mad skills with the camera, as well as knowing how to film in some excellent locations. Not only did Eyeball provide me with 90 minutes of non-stop thrills and laughs, but it also made me add Madrid to my destination map of places I'm going to eventually see in Europe if I'm ever able to save up money to do so.

Poliziotteschi Classics Tomorrow Evening at Spectacle

Looks like Spectacle Theater is going balls out this weekend with the Italian genre cinema. Poliziotteschi Saturday and Spaghetti Western Sunday along with their Midnite grindhouse spectaculars. I'll tell you this...if I were single, I would probably be there all weekend, especially for the Poliziotteschi films. I understand some of you readers might not be as familiar with this high action Italian genre I am. Just in case, here's a brief definition lifted from the pages of CG, "Poliziotteschi is a sub-genre of crime and action film that emerged in Italy in the late 1960s and became popular in the 1970s. Poliziotteschi films are also known as poliziottesco, Italo-crime, Euro-crime or simply Italian crime films."

Got it? I that wasn't enough think about this: a whole genre of film influenced by crime classics like Dirty Harry, but being that they are produced in Italy, are extremely over the top like a great deal of Italian genre cinema from the 70's. Lot's of revenge, mob hits, shoot outs, car chases and explosions. Everything a guy could ever want in a movie.



No Way Out(1973) aka Tony Arzenta at 7:30 PM.

IMDB says - "Duccio Tessari's superb Italian crime film stars Alain Delon as hit man Tony Arzenta who decides that it's time to retire from the game. After a brutal attack on his family he sets out for revenge. Also stars genre regulars Richard Conte, Anton Diffring, Marc Porel & Erika Blanc with a great soundtrack by Gianni Ferrio."

Spectacle says - "In this stylish and moody revenge-driven bloodbath, an icy and lethal hit man who wants to quit the game but the Mob doesn’t want to let him go."



and at 9:30 PM High Crime(1973)aka La polizia incrimina la legge assolve starring the superbly wonderful Franco Nero.

IMDB says - "f you have never seen an Italian crime movie, this is a great place to start. unlike many other films of this type, it actually works on an emotional level as well as being very entertaining, simular to the films of Scorsese. it's a very violent film, but none of the violence is gratuitous. lots of stylish slow motion shootings, car explosions, and people run over by various moter vehicles, and the excellent musical score by Guido and Maurizio De Angelis captures the emotion of these scenes perfectly. the cast is also very good, especialy Italian Star Franco Nero. highly recommended."

Spectacle says - "A fast paced, violent, gritty, and innovative crime thriller about a tough cop going hard after an international drug ring. One of the best crime thrillers ever made, this film is relentless and brutal, and filled with a constantly shifting storyline, and a mesmerizing score by Guido De Angelis & Maurizio De Angelis."

Spectacle 124 S. 3rd St., (at Bedford Ave.)Williamsburg, Brooklyn

The Visitor(1979) and Then Some on Thursday Evening

It's nice to see Spectacle Theater add an extra night of cult cinema to there already heavy roster. I don't know if WTF!?!? Thursday is going to be a regularly scheduled occurrence, and if it is I'll be the last one complaining. This week's WTF, The Visitor(1984), which I understand is an Italian rip-off of The Omen with sci-fi replacing the satanic. I had never heard of it until this morning, but it sounds like a reason to head into Williamsburg on Thursday night.

Spectacle says - "The holiest of all Holyfuckingshits, The Visitor has the highest JDPM (Jaw Drops Per Minute) ratio of any film of its era, Italian ripoff or not. It's a wonderful mishmash of The Omen and Close Encounters, but that barely hints at the whacked fervor with which director Michael J. Paradise hurls his hastily assembled "all-star" cast (John Huston, Glenn Ford, Shelley Winters, and, yes, Lance Henriksen) into the cinematic void, sh...owering them with what Austin, TX's revival cinema gem The Alamo Drafthouse has called "a blackhearted blowout of interplanetary possession, telekinetic avian assault, exploding basketballs and ecclesiastical laserstorms". Just when you think you've nailed down which direction the film is heading in, it completely shatters your notion of the time-space continuum with enough force to rival a thousand screenings of Zabriskie Point. If you miss out on this one, then you have as much regard for cinema as you do for a discarded toenail clipping. (Bret Berg - Cinefamily)"



After the main feature, feel free to stick around for Brain Bludgeon, which has no IMDB entry, so there isn't much I can tell you about it besides the one paragraph description I have found on a few different websites: "Sewn together from hundreds of forgotten horror films, BRAIN BLUDGEON is a transcendental fusion of trash exposing the willing to everything curious, bizarre, hilarious and awful about no-budget genre films. Hot penny torture, exploding 3d skulls, brutal "de-fetusing", raping zombies, and much more collide in this blissfully IQ-withering amalgamation of exploitation hell."

Thursday, May 19th at 9:30 PM Midnight @ Spectacle 124 S. 3rd St., (at Bedford Ave.)Williamsburg, Brooklyn

Black Sabbath/Tre volti della paura, I (1963)

On occasion, I run across a horror movie that actually keeps me on my toes, even spooks me a bit. I watch quite a few horrors, so more often than not I'm just sitting around looking for a good story or an incredible amount of gore. Of the movies that have actually scare the shite out of me, Stephen King's The Shining has always been on the top of the list, and probably will stay there. To this day, I won't ever reproduce just for the fear of having creepy, twin girls. Twins by themselves are creepy, ghost twins downright terrifying...but back to the review. I've been on a bit of Mario Bava kick lately, and last night I decided to watch a couple I've been waiting for, the second being Black Sabbath(1963). Known in Italy as the Three Faces of Fear, it is not one story, but three stories hosted by Boris Karloff who stars in one. All three were good and ran the gambit from spooky to keeping this guy on the edge of his seat. let me run down all the three

The Telephone A suspense thriller that was actually more of a mini-gialli than actual horror movie. After watching this, you can see how much piece-of-dogshit movies like Scream were just idiotic rip-offs of this original. Our main character, Rosy, is prepared to spend a quiet evening at home, But a mysterious voice at the other end of the receiver has different plans. The voice is apparently Rosy's ex-boyfriend who just escaped from prison, and he wants revenge. And according to his voice, Rosy isn't going to make it to see the sun rise. After many harassing phone calls, Rosy calls for the aid of her ex-lover, whom she had threatened never to see again. This women is more than happy to be at Rosy's side in her time of need, but, as with any good gialli, nothing is really as it seems.

I thought I knew what was going down the second I read the title of this first-of-three, so I just tried to sit back and relax, but by the end of The Telephone, I was actaully wishing I hadn't consumed so much caffeine. Bava's use of a ticking clock as background noise throughout is what really kept me anxiously waiting for Rosy's would-be killer. So anxious, in fact, that I actually jumped a little anytime the phone rang, and I've seen this story before. I was also quite surprised over the lesbian subtext that was very apparent. To have such a taboo subject matter in a film from the early sixties was typically verboten, so much in fact that it was actually cut from the AIP release in the Good Ole' U.S. of A. Ain't that a fuckin' surprise?

The Werdulak Boris Karloff stars as a vampire-huntin, family patriarch in this second installment obviously inspired by eastern european folklore. When Gorka(Karloff) leaves his family to hunt down a werdulak, a vampire that only feeds on loved ones, he informs them that if he is not back in 5 das he has probably been turned. In which case he should be slain if he does indeed return. The 5 days do pass, and Gorka returns within a couple of minutes after midnight with the head of the turkish werdulak. His family is unsure of whether to kill the wounded Gorka, or not. But the answer soon becomes clear when Gorka's youngest son is slain a he kidnaps his own grandchild.

I found this story the most surprising of the three, because classic vampire stories are typically more campy than spooky to me. But again, Bava's use of background sound combined with the nightmarish backdrop added a whole new level I have barely found in vampire movies from this era. The family-feeding dynamic is what really made this story move. Seriously, who wants to slay a loved one, especially if it's the man who raised you, or the 3 year-old son who passed who through your loins? Not exactly the easiest decision to make. Sure, it's a fairly common dynamic, but the psychology behind such a situation is hardly ever portrayed as accurately and believably as it is in the Werdulak. Last but not least, it has Boris Fuckin' Karloff. The guy practically invented horror movies, and that should be enough for anybody to own this movie.

The Drop of Water Is the final piece and was the most frightening in my opinion. A nurse is called in the middle of the night to take care of the freshly dead, corpse of her patient, a friendless medium who died in the middle of channeling spirits. The nurse, being a skeptic, believes the old crone was the victim of a hard attack, and in turn has no qualms about thieving from the dead. In this case, a very valuable-looking ring. Upon taking the ring, our untrustworthy friend the nurse is curse by some some terrifying occurrences almost instantaneously, including the sound of dripping water that just won't go way no matter how many hard she tightens the faucet. But the dripping is the least of her problems.

I've harped on enough about Bava's use of sound in the first two features, and it's apparent within the title that the same could be said for his final installment. I always find ghost stories to be the genre with the most consistency of keeping me anxiously entertained. I actually jumped a couple of times. A ghost story was the perfect way to end this movie, especially one directed so well. I could harp on like a fanboy about how amazing Bava's direction and camerawork is, but it's been said before and anybody who has seen his movies would agree.

Although I haven't experienced even half of Bava's body of work, movies like this leave me craving for more. As far has italian directors go, I find Bava's movies to be the most consistent. Argento and Fulci have both put out some gems, but I find those two directors to be slightly overrated and definitely inconsistent. Thankfully I was able to view the italian copy of this movie, considering I hear the AIP's copy is edited, and that just seems wrong to me.

If your a fan of Italian horror,classic horror, giallo or just horror in general, you are really missing an important part of your life by not watching this movie. This is one of the best movies I've seen in the past couple of weeks, and despite the amount of films I watch a year, will always be remembered.

Bay of Blood/Twitch of the Death Nerve trailer

I think I'm just going to start adding trailers, if available to my reviews. I found this one on, surprise-surprise, youtube. Apparently you can find anything there accept naked people. Oh well, who needs naked people. This trailer is actually quite artsy and screams "look at all the terror". Does it not make you want to run out and by a copy of Twitch of the Death Nerve, which apparently is more commonly known as Bay of Blood? At least here in the states, according to IMDB.