Ecologia Del Delitto
This was ahead of its time since the slasher film wouldn't become popular for a decade. And we don't have just a group of teenagers with a psycho with something sharp after them, oh no, everybody gets in on the fun in this one, with no less than 13 gruesome murders for the horror buff. The special effects and modes of death are pretty brutal for this time period, the gore pretty decent for early efforts. In 2005, the magazine Total Film named Twitch of the Death Nerve one of the 50 greatest horror films of all time. That would kind of bump it from the Cult movie category you'd think but who am I to argue with film buffs? I only pick 'em apart, not tell you what others think they should be.
People initially did not take to this film well. As I said this is pretty early in the game. Jason would not make his appearance until 1980, Michael Myers in 1978 and Freddy Kruger in 1984. I believe, unless I have the wrong psycho, that one of the killings in this movie is copied in the original Friday The 13th, but don't hate me if I'm wrong. Point being, people were not used to this type of 'sicko' movie and it does not follow the formula created decades later - this is not a story of a bunch of young people (although there are four) up alone in a cabin or the woods who are pursued by a single psychopath. In this movie, everybody is a psycho pretty much, and all get involved in the gore and splatter.
(Twitch Of The Death Nerve)
aka Blood Bath, aka
aka Blood Bath, aka
Reazione A Catena (A Bay Of Blood)
(1971) Italian
Woof, what a mouthful for an early look at the future of slasher films. And these were the titles they actually used - there were lots they thought of while working on this film - like Odore Di Came (The Stench Of Flesh), Cosi Imparana A Fare I Cattivi (Thus Do We Live To Be Evil) and Reazione A Catena (Chain Reaction) - when American film distributors got a hold of it they simply called it Carnage. I don't really know which title I like better, they all fit pretty well. This starts in HUGE letters telling you it's one of the Mario Bava collection so I had to look him up. Essentially he is the father of the slasher film (at least in Italy). In fact, another of his, Black Sunday (God knows how many other titles it has) is also on my cult list. He made movies from 1943 until 1980 - the year he died. It is a VERY long list. Impressive.
(1971) Italian
Woof, what a mouthful for an early look at the future of slasher films. And these were the titles they actually used - there were lots they thought of while working on this film - like Odore Di Came (The Stench Of Flesh), Cosi Imparana A Fare I Cattivi (Thus Do We Live To Be Evil) and Reazione A Catena (Chain Reaction) - when American film distributors got a hold of it they simply called it Carnage. I don't really know which title I like better, they all fit pretty well. This starts in HUGE letters telling you it's one of the Mario Bava collection so I had to look him up. Essentially he is the father of the slasher film (at least in Italy). In fact, another of his, Black Sunday (God knows how many other titles it has) is also on my cult list. He made movies from 1943 until 1980 - the year he died. It is a VERY long list. Impressive.
This was ahead of its time since the slasher film wouldn't become popular for a decade. And we don't have just a group of teenagers with a psycho with something sharp after them, oh no, everybody gets in on the fun in this one, with no less than 13 gruesome murders for the horror buff. The special effects and modes of death are pretty brutal for this time period, the gore pretty decent for early efforts. In 2005, the magazine Total Film named Twitch of the Death Nerve one of the 50 greatest horror films of all time. That would kind of bump it from the Cult movie category you'd think but who am I to argue with film buffs? I only pick 'em apart, not tell you what others think they should be.People initially did not take to this film well. As I said this is pretty early in the game. Jason would not make his appearance until 1980, Michael Myers in 1978 and Freddy Kruger in 1984. I believe, unless I have the wrong psycho, that one of the killings in this movie is copied in the original Friday The 13th, but don't hate me if I'm wrong. Point being, people were not used to this type of 'sicko' movie and it does not follow the formula created decades later - this is not a story of a bunch of young people (although there are four) up alone in a cabin or the woods who are pursued by a single psychopath. In this movie, everybody is a psycho pretty much, and all get involved in the gore and splatter. |
| Looks ordinary to me... |
The whole mess begins with a beautiful bay (looked like a lake to me) surrounded by a forest (it wasn't, they somehow managed to patch in the appearance of one) that everyone wants to get their hands on for financial profit. This is a pure murder for money type of movie, with no one having any kind of conscience whatsoever. We start with old lady Federica who is strangled and hung by her husband Filippo. Right afterward he receives a billhook (machete) to the throat by someone unseen and thrown in the bay. With her hanging there and no husband around, the police settle on suicide and the whole schmear is left to her illegitimate son, Simon, who plans on selling off the whole thing and getting the hell out of there.
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| No her skirt doesn't go any lower... |
But there are complications. Lots of them. First we have four young people, two English males, a French girl and a German girl. Why that mix I have no idea, let's just get on with it, okay? At 26 minutes if you're interested in that sort of thing the German girl decides to skinny dip in the bay and discovers the rotting corpse of Filippo (not bad work for a soaked corpse, a little green but...) and terrified grabs her very short dress (you could see the color of her underwear every time she raised her arms and she didn't bother putting them back on) and runs back to the house... ah, the pretty girl goes boom.
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| What was more lethal, the machete or that hair? |
The billhook (sigh, I mean machete) whacks her throat, not very well but bloodily enough and down she goes. One of the young men hears a strange noise and opens the door (There's a poster that says 'Anyone that goes alone to check out a strange noise must die.') and slam! A machete to the face. Not really a killing blow, nasty looking for sure but in this movie he dies. Then comes the last two, in bed and very busy. They get a spear through the two of them and the mattress on the bed (Wasn't that copied in another movie?) and our four are finished.
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| In horror movies, have sex, immediately die... |
Now all of this has been carefully orchestrated by several people, each with their own agendas. Real estate agent Frank and his lover Laura plot to take possession of the bay. They had arranged with Filippo to murder his wife and sell them the bay. They don't realize though that Filippo didn't live long past Federica. Surprise surprise, the illegitimate son Simon has been the killer - so far. Enter Renata, Filippo's daughter who wants everything for herself. For some unknown reason, she and her husband have carted up the kids with them to the property to 'take care' of everyone who may be in their way of getting the money. They've towed this fifth wheel in a Mercedes - wow. The two kids look to be around 8 to 10 but we won't be seeing them until...
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| Daddy with a side of squid. |
Renata turns out to be just as ruthless in matters of whether people in her way live or die. After finding out her father is actually dead (and pretty nastily green and sodden by this time) she gets ill, goes into the bathroom of the house to be sick, and finds our four young people for some reason collected into the bathtub. Not entirely squeamish, she realizes there are others that also must be 'collected' in order for her to get that money. She gets her husband into the act, planning to kill her half-brother and also a nosy couple who live on the grounds so that no one will be left to contest her plans.
If this sounds way too involved for a slasher film, you're right. Slasher films are usually gather the young 'uns together, make sure they have no cell phone service, have a psycho you either know about or they keep secret, and just see splatter after splatter until there's a girl left or in most cases, no one left. There's really no more story than that. What these people made was a murder mystery with a hell of a lot more murder than people were used to in 1971. And gore. And nudity.
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| This was... umm... hmm... let me think... |
To get this movie ended a little more quickly (it was only 84 minutes so this review shouldn't be so long) Renata and her husband end up killing everybody else alive (including the agent and his girlfriend), making sure her father's corpse would be found by the police so they would know he was killed (Why? Sigh... dunno.). They will go away and wait for the police to 'clean everything up' then come back and claim the property.
They return to their RV, figuratively rubbing their hands together at the thought of all that money... oh yeah, remember the two little munchkins in the 5th wheel? Well it seems daddy left his shotgun in there and surprise! Mommy and daddy get shot to death by this dead-eye ten year old boy, then both children skip over their corpses so they can go down to the bay to play. Probably the most shocking murders (to the audience) of the whole movie. It broke two taboos - don't involve children, don't show matricide or patricide... although that was smoothed out by the time Halloween came out but in 1971 - whew!
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