THE CRIMES OF THE BLACK CAT

Shirley Corrigan and Anthony Steffen

THE CRIMES OF THE BLACK CAT (aka Sette scialli di seta gialla/1972). Director: Sergio Pastore.

Blind musician Peter Oliver (Anthony Steffen of The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave) overhears what appears to be a murder plot while in a restaurant. A drug-addicted woman, Susan (Giovanna Lenzi), is being forced to participate in several murders that are very cleverly achieved. With the help of his major domo, Burton (Umberto Raho of That Man in Istanbul) and lady friend, Margo (Shirley Corrigan), Peter tries to trace Susan's trail and uncover who is behind the murders. Other characters include Francoise (Sylva Koscina of Deadlier Than the Male), who runs a modeling agency; her lover, Victor (Giacomo Rossi Stuart); the blackmailing Helga (Annabella Incontrera); and her lover, Wendy (Liliana Pavlo). There is a harrowing sequence when Peter is lured onto a roof with gaping holes in it, and a rather disgusting, overly gross lady-gets-slashed-in-the-shower sequence that is out of sync with the rest of the movie. The Crimes of the Black Cat holds the attention and has interesting aspects, but it hasn't much style. Anthony Steffen appears to have been dubbed by Edmund Purdom.

Verdict: Reasonably absorbing giallo film. **1/2.

THE SLASHER MOVIE BOOK

THE SLASHER MOVIE BOOK. J. A. Kerswell. Chicago Review Press; 2010.

This thick, heavily illustrated trade paperback looks at the slasher film genre: Friday the 13th, Freddy Krueger, Halloween, Jamie Lee Curtis, and so on. There are chapters on pre-Psycho horror movies; Italian giallo films; German-made multiple murder films based on novels by Edgar Wallace; British and American Gothic films; "The Golden Age of the Slasher" from 1978 to 1984; and slasher films from other countries in the eighties, nineties, and afterward. In addition to notes on the usual suspects, I came across quite a few movies I had never seen or heard of before. I didn't agree with everything in the book, of course. For instance, Kerswell writes of Psycho: "Equating transvestism with mental illness seems to date the film," but the sequence with the psychiatrist at the end goes to pains to make it clear that Norman Bates was not a true transvestite. But The Slasher Movie Book is more concerned with the later slasher outcrop than anything else, and does as good a job as anyone of knowledgeably surveying the scene. The book is chock-full of movie stills and posters.

Verdict: If you dig this sub-genre, the book is engaging and interesting, if a little gross,  to look at. ***.

STAGE FRIGHT (2014)

STAGE FRIGHT (2014). Writer/director/composer: Jerome Sable.

Camilla Swanson (Allie MacDonald) and her brother, Buddy (Douglas Smith), are cooks at a musical theater summer camp. Ten years ago their mother, Kylie (Minnie Driver), was butchered in her dressing room after her triumph in the starring role of the Broadway show "The Haunting of the Opera." When Camilla learns that the camp is reviving the show, she decides to try out even though she's not a student at the camp. Producer Roger McCall (Meat Loaf), who's like a father to her and Buddy, lets her audition and she becomes one of the two actresses alternating in the lead. But a maniac who despises show tunes is stalking the camp, slaughtering anyone connected to the production. If Stage Fright was meant to be a movie with thrills and laughs a la Scream and its sequels, it doesn't come off, and doesn't quite cut it as a parody either -- instead, it's of all things, a kind of slasher musical that never delivers on the fun it promises, although it does have a couple of grisly moments. Everything in the picture is predictable, from the identity of the killer, to the simpering ersatz show music, to the creepy red herring handyman, to the "big queen" stage manager who embodies a gay stereotype, as well as the good-looking guy who insists he's not gay until, improbably, he realizes he's attracted to the "big queen." The biggest trouble with the movie is that it lacks energy and suspense. MacDonald makes an effective heroine, Smith is compelling as her brother, and Kent Nolan is appealing as Joel, who has an unrealized crush on Camilla. The other actors aren't bad at all, but this movie isn't memorable.

Verdict: More Can't Stop the Music than Scream 2. **.

DARIO ARGENTO AND THE ITALIAN GIALLO FILM

Dario Argento

DARIO ARGENTO.

Why do I like many of the films of Italian horrormeister Dario Argento, and dislike others just as much? Part of this is Argento's over-reliance on gore (although this can be very effective in some movies) and his acceptance of screenplays that, to be charitable, need a lot of polishing that they don't always get.

On the other hand, if you study Argento's films, especially his great ones, you can easily see that the Italian giallo filmmaker is miles ahead of the hack (no pun intended) directors of "mad slasher" schlock like, say, most of the Friday the 13th films and their ilk. His films generally have plenty of style, and his best movies are undeniably creepy and suspenseful and have some kind of (slightly demented) mind behind them, as well as some bravura sequences.

Argento never got mainstream respectability, like Hitchcock, but Argento is not in Hitchcock's league as a filmmaker. Some of his fans are simply interested in the gory shock scenes (Argento tends to cater to them too much) even though there are those of us who also enjoy the twisting plots and tense moments that are virtually in all of his movies. As Argento got older, he perhaps tried too hard to capture the young American mad slasher/splatter movie crowd even though he was capable of far greater things. Argento has never quite fulfilled his potential despite such memorable films as Deep Red and Trauma. (Argento's first film was the creditable The Bird with the Crystal Plumage in 1970).

Argento's other films are of varying quality. Great: Sleepless. Good: Phenomena; The Card Player; Cat O'Nine Tails. Mediocre: Four Flies on Grey Velvet. Bad: Do You Like Hitchcock?; Giallo. And there are others.

Argento's films were clearly influential on such diverse movies as The Eyes of Laura Mars and 88 Minutes, among others. Argento, who is now seventy-five, last directed Dracula 3D, and his next film will be the serial killer thriller The Sandman.

Below you will find reviews of some of Argento's other movies, as well as a write-up on a book about the director and his work.

GOING TO PIECES: THE RISE AND FALL OF THE SLASHER FILM, 1978 - 1986

GOING TO PIECES: THE RISE AND FALL OF THE SLASHER FILM, 1978 - 1986. Adam Rockoff. McFarland; 2002.

When such films as Halloween  and Friday the 13th became big money makers, there was a rush to come out with cheap, gory films with psychos on the loose slashing and hacking at everyone in sight. Rockoff intelligently dissects the genre, which he loves, examining the styles of different directors, as well as going behind the scenes of many productions. The book is bolstered by comments from producers and others. A final chapter looks at the revival of the genre with the Scream movies. [It's too bad this came out too early to cover all the recent remakes of famed slasher films such as Friday the 13th, My Bloody Valentine, and others.] Being human, Rockoff does at times tend to be kinder to films made by people who consented to be interviewed as opposed to others, but when he thinks a film is a stinker he isn't shy about saying so. The book is quite well-written as well.

I appreciate that Rockoff mentions my 1985 tome Stay Out of the Shower: 25 Years of Shocker Films Beginning with "Psycho," and acknowledges it as one of the very first books to discuss slasher films (along with other horror films.) However, I can't say that I "loathe" such movies as he claims [I've certainly seen plenty of them, then and now.] I've always enjoyed the original Friday the 13th, among others in the genre, but I confess I do prefer films -- slashers, among them -- that have decent production values, a firm directorial hand, some three-dimensional characters, generous suspense, and a plot with some kind of mystery to it, and most slasher films -- maybe most movies -- don't fit that criteria, more's the pity. So I would say I don't so much loathe slasher films but am disappointed by them.

Verdict: Slasher movie fans will love this. ***.

SCRE4M

SCRE4M (also known as Scream 4/2011). Director: Wes Craven.

"How do you think people become famous? You don't have to do anything. Just have fucked up things happen to you."

It's been eleven years since the last Scream movie [Scream 3].  Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) has written a book about her ordeal and is back in town to promote it. Wouldn't you know there's yet another deranged individual who begins phoning teens, asking about horror movies, and slicing and dicing with abandon. The film is full of far too many unlikable characters, full of attitude, but sometimes the more appealing people get killed off as well. Emma Roberts plays Sidney's cousin, Jill, and Hayden Panetierre is her friend, Kirby. Mary McDonnell is Jill's mother. David Arquette and Courtney Cox are back as Sheriff Dewey and his wife, reporter, Gail Weathers. Anna Paquin is supposed to be in this but I swear I never noticed her, possibly because she's older than she was in X-Men. The picture isn't badly directed by Wes Craven [Kevin Williamson returns as writer], but you often get the impression that the music is doing most of the work. The acting is generally good, and whatever its flaws, the picture is entertaining and suspenseful.

Verdict: The Scream franchise reinvented for the youtube generation. ***.

STRANGLER OF BLACKMOOR CASTLE

THE STRANGLER OF BLACKMOOR CASTLE (1963). Director: Harald Reinl. West Germany.

A British nobleman, Lucius Clark (Rudolf Fernau), expecting to be knighted, lives with his niece, Claridge (Karin Dor), a reporter, on the rented estate of a weird Scottish Laird (Hans Nielsen), who is only one of many suspects in a series of murders around and about the estate. A very lively and sadistic maniac, who always wears a hood concealing his identity, strangles numerous victims, in some cases branding their foreheads and generally beheading them in various grisly and creative ways. He also has only nine fingers. Inspectors Mitchell (Harry Riebauer) and Watson (Gerhard Hartig) try to fit the murders in with some stolen diamonds and a nightspot called the Old Scavenger Inn, while Claridge's associate Mike Pierce (Hans Reiser) also tries to figure out what's what. Entertaining mystery-horror pic is no masterpiece but it moves along at a brisk pace and keeps you guessing.

Verdict: Heads will roll! **1/2.

THE HAUNTED STRANGLER

THE HAUNTED STRANGLER (1958). Director: Robert Day. 

James Rankin (Boris Karloff), a writer, is fascinated by the case of the presumably long-dead Haymarket strangler. Rankin is convinced that the wrong man was hung for the crimes, and that the real killer disappeared after his surrogate's death. Rankin eventually becomes possessed by the spirit of the true killer and begins a murder spree of his own -- but there's a clever final twist on top of that. The great Karloff is at the top of his form in this very entertaining and well-made horror-mystery, which is completely absorbing and has many effective sequences. Anthony Dawson is Superintendent Burke and Tim Turner is Rankin's handsome young assistant; Elizabeth Allan and Diane Aubrey are the women in Rankin's life.

Verdict: Highly watchable chiller with an exemplary Karloff. ***.

THE SHORTCUT

THE SHORTCUT (2009). Director: Nicholaus Goossen.

It seems there's this shortcut through the woods that most people stay away from since some teens who wandered in there went missing decades ago. The chief suspect in their disappearance is a sinister old man who lives in a house near the woods, and whose family pretty much once owned the town. Now Derek (Drew Seeley) and some friends investigate when a pet disappears in the woods, and Derek's little brother says he found a dead dog with a hostile old man standing over him. The film switches back and forth from the 1940's and 50's and the present day, as we see the background of the main suspect intercut with the modern-day teens' investigations. In many ways this is a typical teen slasher flick, but it does boast some good characterizations, some neat twists that you don't see coming, and decent acting from the cast members, both young and not so young. Not as gory as many other similar movies.

Verdict: Credible, if minor, suspense item. **1/2.

THE BURNING

THE BURNING (1981) Director: Tony Maylam.

Cropsy (Lou David), a cruel camp counselor, becomes the victim of a practical joke which inadvertently burns and disfigures him. Years later he stalks a group of kids and counselors at a summer camp, with the climactic would-be victim (Brian Matthews) being one of the kids (now grown up) responsible for his condition. This reasonably effective stalk-and-slash film is especially disturbing at times because we get to know and like many of the victims, and their deaths have more of a resonance. The gruesome "highlight" of the film has Cropsy jumping up out of a canoe and using huge shears to attack and kill several campers on a raft at once (this sequence stretches credulity, however). Jason Alexander plays one of the counselors and exhibits his usual upbeat personality. Holly Hunter is one of the kids but she doesn't stick out of the crowd. Fisher Stevens is one of the people punctured on the raft. Some of the lesser-known actors actually offer very good performances. There is some genuine suspense of a minor kind, and the climax is somewhat exciting. Producer Harvey Weinstein contributed to the script.

Verdict: For mad slasher addicts only. **1/2.