Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder













This is the last of the “animal series” of giallos from Dario Argento, the others being The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970) and The Cat O' Nine Tails (1971). This time a drummer (Michael Brandon) ends up killing a man after an unfortunate encounter. Then someone who witnessed and photographed the killing starts blackmailing him and soon bodies start piling up as he tries to cover his tracks. Well the “accidental” killing at the start was extremely far fetched and the rest of the plot isn't exactly great either. But as so many times it's the mood Argento sets up which is the driving force of his movies and this was no exception. The score by Ennio Morricone wasn't bad, but really it wasn't used as well as it could have been. The visual side however was well in hand, the compositions were quite great and the camerawork by Franco Di Giacomo was pretty much perfect. Some of the scenes are extremely memorable, whether that's a good thing or not is for the viewer to decide, I sure loved them. The biggest problem of this movie is the long and unneeded explanation of the motives at the end and in this Shameless release of the extended cut it's even longer than in the American cut. It's a shame as the ending is otherwise great it just drags on way too long on the explaining part. Apart from that and the misuse of Morricone's talents, this is a great giallo.
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