“Look inside the head, unlock the memory, and the universe lies open like a map.”
It rains in Minneapolis, but not that much. It's such a trip seeing a Dario Argento film shot around my stomping grounds. The Grain Belt Beer sign, the Hennepin Avenue Bridge, Nicollet Mall, a St. Paul diner, a Cub Foods grocery bag, Five Corners Saloon (I knew as the Nomad World Pub growing up, and which is not in the warehouse district like the film…
“We’ve changed too. We used to eat our enemies, now we study engineering.”
“I can save her” cinema. 24 roses and 2 lilies. On rewatch you can see it all laid out from the start. Evil rites and sadistic games as “a test of man’s mental strength over his weaknesses.” Still incredibly cryptic, but the clues are all there. A cut to the hand and allusion to Nosferatu licking the wound. But this isn't Transylvania. Silvia is in Technicolor Wonderland,…
“Men aren’t born pigs. It’s just something they become.”
A little tamer and more playful than Emanuelle in America, but still contains a scene where a rich weirdo with a melted face and one eye rapes a blindfolded girl. And there’s some dog-and-snake-on-girl action. Oh and Emanuelle is forced at gunpoint into hobo fellatio (but it helps her put the final piece in place to expose the white slave trade, once and for all!).
The usual D’Amato grossness (like a…
Watched with audio commentary by film historian Tim Lucas.
Eastwood’s Man with No Name not as an Avenging Angel, but a Holy Ghost. A comforter.
“You're such a good boy. You're the bestest. You're the bestest of the best.”
One of those bizarro movies where the characters smoke a joint, take shots of tequila and then play a set of tennis at apparently 2am. Maddy vacuuming under the bed with a full glass of wine on the end table made me extremely anxious. Stuff the baby under the sink, Karen.
“An enemy a day keeps the doctor away.”
Petri’s Most Dangerous Game, with titty guns. Italians are already killing each other, why not do it for pleasure? For a sponsorship? A “safety valve for humanity” to release their anger. Not as incisive as Petri’s later political satires, but it’s entertaining enough. It’s more fun to admire the ultra-mod pop art sets, Ursula Andress’ outfits, and the predicted vision of 21st century life than follow the actual plot, to be honest. The film's biggest failure is introducing a bonkers alligator-in-the-pool murder gag and not following through on it.
