Karl Zinny Movies
The polar-opposite worlds of opera and horror collide in this gory giallo film from director Dario Argento. Christina Marsillach (Tom Hanks' romantic interest in Every Time We Say Goodbye) stars as Betty, a beautiful understudy who gets an unlikely break to play the female lead in a contemporary opera of Verdi's Macbeth. Her fear of Macbeth's notorious curse proves to have foundation when a psychopath with a strange connection to Betty murders a stage hand in the midst of her debut and later kills several ravens being used in the opera. Characters introduced at this point who could be the killer include: the show's director, Marco (Ian Charleson); Betty's publicist, Mira (Daria Nicolodi); and the police inspector, Alan Santini (Urbano Barberini). The middle third of the film is devoted to the killer's bloody work which serves to torment Betty. The madman binds her and tapes a row of tiny needles beneath her eyes so that she is forced to watch him butcher a young stage manager and a costume designer, among others. With the police investigation going nowhere and the killer zeroing in on Betty's death, Marco decides to enact his own plan to stop the madman; he releases the ravens (apparently, they always remember their enemies) during a performance. The birds circle wildly before attacking the killer and plucking one of his eyeballs out. He absconds with Betty, but dies in a fire after revealing his demented motivation and his connection to the young singer. A final scene set in the Swiss mountains provides a couple of final shocks. ~ Patrick Legare, Rovi
- Starring:
- Christina Marsillach, Urbano Barberini, (more)
- 1987
This uneven giallo thriller from Lamberto Bava stars the amazingly well-endowed Serena Grandi as Gioia, a centerfold model for Pussycat magazine. Her co-workers are murdered with pitchforks and bees, among other things, and posed in front of photos of her, which Gioia receives from the taunting killer. A solid cast including Capucine, Daria Nicolodi, and Luigi Montefiori (aka "George Eastman") goes through the motions, upstaged constantly by Ms. Grandi's imposing pulchritude. Nevertheless, Bava's stylish direction has some interesting touches, such as having the killer seeing his victims as hideously deformed monsters, and the production is slick and polished. ~ Robert Firsching, Rovi
- Starring:
- Serena Grandi, Daria Nicolodi, (more)
NYC humans attempt to defend themselves against attacks from malevolent androids in this sci-fi martial arts actioner. ~ Kristie Hassen, Rovi
Italian horror auteur Dario Argento produced and co-wrote (with director Lamberto Bava) this gory, nightmarish horror film set almost entirely within the "Metropol," a huge, cathedral-like Berlin cinema showing an invitation-only screening of a rather lame slasher film. The difference, of course, is that the cheap scares on the Metropol's screen are child's play compared to the horrors which soon emerge to lay hold of the unsuspecting filmgoers: when a young woman is scratched by part of a display in the theatre lobby, she begins to mutate into a fanged, slavering creature who then attacks other audience members, spreading the demonic infection until only a handful of survivors are forced to combat rampaging armies of inhuman beasts, making the latter portion of the film resemble Night of the Living Dead. A handful of sequels followed; there's a little "reward" for those who stick around for the end credits. ~ Cavett Binion, Rovi
- Starring:
- Natasha Hovey, Urbano Barberini, (more)
- 1984
Enhanced by a good musical score and good cinematography, this first-time directorial effort by Francesca Comencini is an engrossing, partially autobiographical story of a drug-addicted couple who heroically try to break their destructive habit. Maria (Giulia Boschi) and Paolo (François Siener) agree to live apart and not reunite until they are heroin-free. Their scheme works, and to celebrate they take a vacation in Sri Lanka together -- but it was ill-timed. The two lapse in their resolve and soon they are shooting up as before. Paolo despairs of being normal again, and Maria devotes herself to playing her grand piano as a consolation and inspiration in her fight against her drug habit. The couple's differing attitudes toward their addiction soon reach dramatic and tragic proportions, as the film nears the closing credits. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
- Starring:
- Giulia Boschi, Giovannella Grifea, (more)
- 1983
In this post-apocalyptic action film, a nuclear war has spread its contamination to all but a few protected cities. Scores of irradiated people are left outside the cities, and hunting them becomes the new sport for a group of elite citizens. It is up to a renegade engineer named Alan (William Mang) to remain alive long enough to stop the atrocities ~ Iotis Erlewine, Rovi
- Starring:
- William Mang, Marina Costa, (more)
