VIDEO
VIDEO
Film historians David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson from the yellow jackets of the plethora of detective ARROW state VIDEO that “a genre is easier to recognise than to novels that began to saturate the Italian market in the BLOOD AND BLACK GLOVES define”define”.. Rarely has this seemed more relevant than late 1920s, among them translations of the works of when referring to the giallo – a sensual, stylish and authors as diverse as Arthur Conan Doyle, Raymond Michael Mackenzie on the Giallo luridly violent body of Italian murder-mystery films Chandler and Agatha Christie. The giallo film is ARROW which, like the AmericanVIDEO films noir which preceded something altogether different and more narrowly them by a few decades, responded to a unique defined, emerging in the early 1960s and enjoying set of sociocultural upheavals and were therefore a brief spell of immense popularity in the early-to- influenced as much by the period in which they were mid 1970s. The conventions of these films have been VIDEO ARROWproduced as by generic conventions.VIDEO The Italians well-established elsewhere and are iconic enough have a specific term to describe this phenomenon: that even those without an intimate knowledge of filone , meaning ‘vein’ or ‘streamlet’. These faddish, the genre can recognise them: the black gloves, hat often highly derivative genres each tended to enjoy and trench coat that disguise the killer’s identity and VIDEO ARROWa brief spell of immense popularity andVIDEO prolificacy gender; the modern urban locales which provide a beforeore fading into obscurity as quickly as they backbackdrop to the carnage that unfolds; the ‘whodunit’ firstt appeared, their creative potential (and their investigative narratives with their high body counts audience’sience’sARROW appetite for more of the same) exhausted. and multitude of suspects and red herrings; the VIDEO Throughout its long and colourful history, the ItalianVIDEO amateur detective who is often a foreign tourist in film industry has borne witness to the rise and a major European city; the lush lounge scores by fall of an almost mind-boggling number of filoni , composers such as Ennio Morricone, Bruno Nicolai VIDEO ranging from SpaghettiARROW Westerns to high-octane and StelvioVIDEO Cipriani; the allusions to animals in the poliziotteschi crime thrillers to playful sex romps. titles, which often have little to do with the content There is something uniquely compelling about the of the films themselves… Critic Stephen Thrower giallo , however, that not only allows it to stand the defines the mood of the giallo as “one of moral ARROW VIDEO test of time but also invitesARROW repeat viewings – the decay and cynicism, with ever more convoluted plots better to unpick their hidden meanings. emphasising morbid details in a Janus-faced world of paranoia and betrayal” – and that cuts straight to The word ‘ giallo ’ is the Italian for ‘yellow’, and derives the central conceit of these films: everyone is guilty
ARROW Humphreys Humphreys Humphreys Graham Graham Graham by by by Artwork Artwork Artwork VIDEO ARROW 164 165 ARROW VIDEO
ARROW VIDEO
ARROW
ARROW VIDEO
VIDEO because everyone has something to hide. stripped away – often as a result of the machinations of a duplicitous femme fatale. ARROW The first ‘true’ giallo film is broadly agreed to be VIDEO Mario Bava’s 1963 effort The Girl Who Knew Too Much A year after the release of The Girl Who Knew Too (La ragazza che sapeva troppo ). Shot in striking Much , Bava returned to the giallo , bringing it closer black and white, its plot is – as its title implies – to its final form with Blood and Black LaceARROW ( Sei VIDEO decidedly Hitchcockian, detailing the exploits of an donnene per l’assassino , 1964). A lush, Technicolor American tourist, Nora Davis (Letícia Román), who, extravaganza, the film introduces the rich primary while visiting her sickly aunt in Rome, inadvertently colours, baroque architecture and ultramodern witnesses a murder on the Spanish Steps and, in fashion thatVIDEO would come to define these films, and ARROW the face of police inactivity, turns amateur sleuth in the notion of the giallo as a showcase for a series of order to track down the so-called “Alphabet Killer”. graphic murder set-pieces – earning it the reputation Many of the early, prototypical gialli of the 1960s for being “the first authentic body count movie”. take their cues from this film, offering up a series of VIDEO ARROW VIDEO emotionallyly fragile women – many of them played With these two early gialli , Bava laid much of the by American star Carroll Baker – and revelling in groundwork for what would become the ‘classical’ their psychological torture, often with littleARROW to no giallo . However, it was not until 1970, when young explicit bloodshed. Of these, the quintessential first-timet-time director Dario ArgentoVIDEO gave the world VIDEO example is arguably Romolo Guerrieri’s The Sweet The Bird with the Crystal Plumage ( L’uccello dalle Body of Deborah ( Il dolce corpo di Deborah , 1968), piume di cristallo ), that the floodgates truly opened which details the increasing paranoia and mental ARROWand the giallo boom was born. Forty-fiveVIDEO years instability of a wealthy American woman, Deborah after its release, it remains a striking, innovative and (Baker), who is menaced by the vindictive ex-lover of masterfullyterfully constructed film. The plot is that of a her new husband’s deceased wife. Others, like Lucio model giallo , focusing on an American novelist, Fulci’s One on Top of the Other ( Una sull’altra , 1969), Sam DalmasmasARROW (Tony Musante), who, while bumming VIDEO focus on morally and psychologically compromised around Rome waiting for inspiration to strike, male business professionals who fall into downward becomes involved in a fiendishly twisted murder spirals as the wealth and privilege they hold dear are mystery when he chances upon a beautiful woman ARROW VIDEO ARROW Much Too Girl Who Knew The 166 167 ARROW VIDEO
ARROW VIDEO
ARROW
ARROW VIDEO
VIDEO being attacked in an art gallery by a knife-wielding prism of how they affect the films’ male protagonists. Following the success of The Bird with the Crystal of Mrs. Wardh ( Lo strano vizio della Signora Wardh , maniac. Through the amateur investigation that While the main focus of any gialloARROW tends to be the Plumage , the imitators soon came thick and fast. 1971), he combined two distinctive strands of the follows, Argento explores, in an oblique manner, central mystery surrounding the identity of the killer, Over VIDEO the next five years, virtually every jobbing giallo — the violent, urban and typically male-centric concerns about globalisation, urbanisation and thesee films also explore, albeit indirectly, a plethora director working in Italy turned their hand to at body count thrillers popularised by The Bird with the changing dynamic between men and women of less initially obvious problems which play out in least one giallollo . Some were merely content to churn the Crystal Plumage and its imitators, and the more – key themes which tapped into the sociocultural parallel to and often overlap with the ‘whodunit’ARROW out uninspired imitations,VIDEO seemingly ticking off a languorous, psychologically-driven female-centric anxieties prevalent during this period and would go narrative,ative, all of which help to form the colourful checklistlist of elements: the black-gloved killer with films in the mould of The Sweet Body of Deborah on to preoccupy the giallo as a whole. and unpredictable backdrop against which these a psychosexual motivation, an obscure reference to — to create a hybrid which proved that the ‘F- gialli ’ murder-mystery scenarios play out. an animalal in the title, and so on. Others succeeded in (female gialli ) could be every bit as bloody and The late 1960s and early 1970s were a time of immense VIDEO ARROW harnessing the giallo ’s genericVIDEO conventions to explore frenetic as their ‘M- gialli ’ (male gialli ) counterparts. social upheaval, and what arguably makes the films Similarly, rather than providing concrete solutions to their own preoccupations and crafted distinctly The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh established the produced in this period so potent is the way in which thesee perceived problems, they instead contribute different takes on the genre. It is a testament to the formula that Martino would go on to employ in his they reflect tensions and anxieties lurking beneath to an ongoing discourse about the changing nature giallo ’s malleability that houses entries as distinct four subsequent entries in giallo canon, alongside a the surface of society. To be clear, gialli rarely, if ever, of society. AttemptsVIDEO to characterise these films as ARROWas Aldo Lado’s Short Night of Glass DollsVIDEO ( La corta plethora of fellow filmmakers who leapt at the chance comment directly on real world events, preferring either purely reactionary or purely progressive are, notte delle bambole di vetro , 1971), a disturbing to craft narratives of their own about harangued, instead to thrill their audiences with a potent mix however, overly reductive. Indeed, one of the most political thriller set in Soviet Prague which serves as emotionally unstable female protagonists and their of sensuality, globe-trotting adventurismARROW and striking aspects of the gialli is the way in which they an allegoryARROW for the establishment’s suppression of luridly violent mishaps. One director who succeeded audacious set-pieces.es. However, they nonetheless simultaneously undermine and VIDEOreinforce traditional the aspirations of the young, and Fulci’s A LizardVIDEO in in harnessing this format to his own end was Luciano allude, in a refracted manner, to the existential crisis gender values. The confused and often contradictory a Woman’s Skin ( Una lucertola con la pelle di donna , Ercoli, who crafted a number of gialli as vehicles for that was engulfing Italy, and indeed the Western nature of the giallo articulates the confusion and 1971), a lurid Repulsion -esque psychodrama set in a his wife, actress Nieves Navarro (aka Susan Scott). world at a whole, at this time. These films, produced ARROWcontradictions of a sociocultural milieu in VIDEOwhich the decidedly post-SwingingARROW London, lifting the lid on Of these,VIDEO the standout is Death Walks at Midnight for a primarily male audience, invariably view the old assumptions about the way the world works the hanky-panky going on behind the lace curtains (La morte accarezza a mezzanotte , 1972), in which various sociocultural anxieties with which they can no longer be relied on. Regardless of whether of Belgravia and exposing a society at an ideological Navarro stars as Valentina, a fashion model who engage exclusively in terms of their effect on men. the underlying feelings towards the social changes crossroads post-1968. believes she has witnessed a murder while under As a result, themes that are in theory not gender- of the 1960sARROW and 1970s were positive, negative or VIDEO ARROW the influence of an experimental hallucinogenic. specific, such as alienation within an increasingly indifferent, the gialli capture them on celluloid in a One filmmaker who succeeded in adding a distinctive While most female giallo protagonists are shrinking homogenised urban metropolis, become specifically way that is entertaining, idiosyncratic, ostentatious, spin to the giallo was Sergio Martino. In his first of violets in the mould of Edwige Fenech – the star of masculine concerns and are viewed through the and even thought-provoking.ARROW VIDEOfive films made within the genre, TheARROW Strange Vice The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh and the actress who 168 169 ARROW VIDEO
ARROW VIDEO
ARROW
ARROW VIDEO
VIDEO can most legitimately lay claim to the crown of giallo Infascelli’s The Vanity Serum ( Il siero della vanità , ‘scream queen’ – Navarro was made of sterner stuff, 2004), there is a definite sense that,ARROW with Deep Red , and her brash, forceful persona provides a welcome Argento had succeeded in perfecting the form and VIDEO antidote to her less assertive counterparts, typically said all there was to be said about it at that particular called upon to do little more than strip, scream and point in time. swoon (and not necessarily in that order). ARROW VIDEO The giallo ’s legacy, however, lives on, and almost By the mid-1970s, the giallo was in decline, with halff a century later, they continue to beguile, enthral the genre having followed the same trajectory as and disturb audiences with their striking visuals, the Spaghetti Western, the peplum, and countless mesmerisingmerisingVIDEO soundtracks, and convoluted narratives ARROW other filoni . Tired of films about black-gloved killers of paranoia, conspiracy, degradation and vice. slicing and dicing their way through the bourgeoisie, audiencesiences sought out new pleasures at the box office, and transferred their allegiances to the VIDEO ARROW VIDEO poliziotteschi , which engaged more directly with contemporary concerns about political corruption and society on the brink of violent collapse,ARROW and to that perpetual staple of the industry, the commedia VIDEO VIDEO all’italiana . It seems somehow fitting that the giallo boom both began and ended with Argento, who in 1975 delivered what critic and author Julian ARROW VIDEO Grainger calls “the final word on the subject”: Deep Red ( Profondo rosso ), not only the last great giallo of the classical era but arguably also the greatest giallo ever created. While both Argento and other ARROW VIDEO directors would subsequently return to the form and indeed use it to explore new territory with films like Argento’s Tenebrae ( Tenebre , 1982) and Alex ARROW VIDEO ARROW Tenebrae 170 171 ARROW VIDEO
ARROW VIDEO
ARROW
ARROW