‘There is an abundance of spirit here; you will find it hard to accommodate yours!’
A young architect gets a commission to remodel a rundown castle but when he arrives, finds the resident noble family behaving oddly. The lady of the house is prone to sleepwalking with a loaded gun and lapses of memory. Her condition seems to have worsened since her cousin fell to her death from the battlements…
Clumsy and slightly muddled black and white Giallo from writer-director Angelo Dorigo, who had already tackled similar material with the underwhelming ‘A… For Assassin’ (1966). Unfortunately, the second time around, there is little evidence of improvement, and he delivers another generally unsatisfying experience.
The Lady Barbara McDonald (Mara Berni) is not in a good place. After her cousin Mary (Anita Todesco) takes a header off the roof one night, her mental condition takes a turn for the worse, further worrying over-attentive husband Walter (Giuliano Raffaelli). As the audience, we know that Todesco’s accident was nothing of the sort; she fell while being chased in the film’s opening sequence.
Enter handsome young architect John Brenton (Gianni Medici) who gets his gig on the recommendation of old college chum Frances (Janine Reynaud) who also happens to be a seemingly permanent guest at the castle. Medici finds himself drawn to Berni, despite her mood swings and the insistence of everyone else that she’s going mad. The staff provide further complications; there’s smooth estate manager Clark (Luigi Batzella), a gossipy maid, a hard as nails housekeeper and suspicious handyman, The Mute, played by US ‘hard man’ actor, Lawrence Tierney!
‘You mean, you’re not my knight in shining armour?’
Sadly, all this results in is a lot of heavy-handed dialogue exchanges which rob the film of any pace or interest. One particularly odd thing is the frequent reference to chivalry and something called ‘The Tower Game’ which is insufficiently explained. It would seem to be a party game that involves choosing who you would throw off a building if there were three of you and only space for two. At least that’s all I can make of it.
These regular ruminations on courtly behaviour may help to explain one thing about the production, though. The cast all speak their native Italian (except Tierney who doesn’t get to talk at all) but are supposed to be English. The film takes place at ‘Nottingham Castle’, and there is talk at one point of a quick trip to London to buy antique furniture in Regent Street. (Dorigo obviously didn’t know his English geography too well, that’s a round trip of about 250 miles!) Perhaps he also believed that we English still behave like knights of the round table, so his somewhat obscure examination of the art of chivalry needed to take place here.
Perhaps the writer-director would have been wiser to concentrate on his plot a little more. A lot of the developments don’t stand up to very close scrutiny. Even after the (unsurprising) resolution of the mystery, it’s hard to work out why some of the killer’s victims were targetted. Replacement maid Betty (Rita Klein) has only been on-site a couple of days before she’s despatched. What she could have learned in so short a time that would be a threat to the killer is never revealed. Perhaps it was that she was too lively a character, whose late introduction to the proceedings does briefly suggest that the film is starting to get going!
‘This catalogue modelling lark is a piece of cake.’
There’s also a curious dream sequence experienced by one of the principals where footage from the killer’s point of view is repeated. This would seem to be telling us the identity of the murderer. But why do that when the big reveal is more than a quarter of an hour away? And if this person isn’t the killer, then it makes no sense! Which is it? Watch the movie to find out. But either way, it’s a baffling decision to include it.
Also working against the film is the musical soundtrack by Coriolano Gori. Clashes of instruments emphasise every dramatic moment to such an extent that it almost seems the composer believed the film to be a parody. Matters are also ‘topped and tailed’ by unnecessary wrap-around scenes filmed at an Italian street festival. These seem to exist solely for the purpose of further reflections on the art of chivalry. It’s all pretty confusing and probably something lost in translation.
If Tierney’s appearance in a minor, non-speaking role in an Italian film of the late 1960s seems a little surprising, then it’s merely down to the fact that he needed the work. He’d enjoyed brief stardom in the title role of hit b-picture ‘Dillinger’ (1945) and featured in many similar vehicles before a showy supporting role in Cecil B DeMille’s ‘The Greatest Show On Earth’ (1952) seemed to promise elevation to bigger productions. Unfortunately, Tierney liked to drink, and his drinking often led to violence and trouble with Johnny Law.
‘Give me another drink or I’ll punch your lights out.’
After multiple arrests, film roles began to dry up, and he appeared mostly on television before moving to Europe in the 1970s. A return to Hollywood followed in 1983, and he played many guest roles on network TV shows such as ‘Hill Street Blues’, ‘Remington Steele’, ‘The Simpsons’ and ‘Star Trek: The Next Generation.’ He even appeared on an episode of ‘Seinfeld’ and was considered so good that it was possible to make him a recurring character. Unfortunately, he stole a knife from the set and pulled it on the show’s star, Jerry Seinfeld. A late-career appearance in Quentin Tarantino’s ‘Reservoir Dogs’ (1992) failed to revive his fortunes as his health was already failing and, during the time of filming, he had shot his nephew during a drunken binge.
Rather weak and off-centre Giallo which may interest fans of the genre but will most likely frustrate and confuse everyone who sees it.
Mark David Welsh 