NekoHomey Purely Joyful Movie!

FirstWitch A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Verity Robins Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

Kayden This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

PimpinAinttEasy Far superior to the cheesy Death Walks at Midnight. After a sleazy first half, where Nieves Navarro/Susan Scott is used as an object of sex (she is made up like a black woman, dons various hairdos and dances semi naked), the film ameliorates into a fine albeit far fetched police procedural thriller. Navarro is a model who is stalked by a masked murderer with piercing eyes. He wants to extract jewels from her about which she has no clue. I liked how the director Luciano Ercoli tied up the main plot to a sub plot involving a diamond heist. It is all preposterous, but who cares? There was a lot of suspense and even the twist at the end involving blocks of ice and a fish vendor was very interesting. Carlo Gentili turns in a fine performance as the sardonic police detective. I see that he was also the set director in both the Death" movies. Frank Wolff and Simón Andreu (who was in the other Death film) play Navarro's lovers. Much of the film takes place in a remote English village. While it is not a film of place (the locales could have been put to better use), there are some attempts by the director/writer to include the "backward" villagers in the plot. It is a violent film and even includes a graphic scene about an eye surgery. This was a solid giallo with a lot of twists. Claudie Lange, Navarro's lookalike makes another appearance as her sexual rival. Stelvio Cipriani's score was had one tense tune which is used during the climax. But I dont I will play it in my car. I recommend it.

Bezenby Another gorgeous looking film with plenty of ridiculous scenes, laugh out loud stuff that no one would get away with these days, a few bare bums and a complex plot. Not much in way of violence mind you. And it's long – damn long!We start off with a guy on a train getting his throated slashed by a balaclava wearing killer with blue eyes, then cut to the guy's daughter. Her name is Nicole and she's a stripper in Paris who is not averse to blacking up and donning a tight afro wig for the delectation of her audience (one of many 'huh?' scenes throughout the film). Seems like her father was involved in some diamond heist and the killer seems to think she might have them (he tells her this via one of those electronic voice box things while threatening her with a scalpel. Nicole needs to get away from it all so it's lucky that English businessman Frank Wolff offers to take her away to England (Spain, really).Once in England (Spain) Frank takes her to his love nest on the coast in a town that isn't far removed from Royston Vasey (not a stretch as Mark Gatiss is a fan of the giallo). People keep staring at her, especially Mallory, played by weirdo-for-hire Luciano Rossi, only this time he has a wooden hand for no reason! There's also some guy spying on Nicole and Frank while they are at it (you really should close the curtains) – Frank must really be turned on by women messily eating grilled fish! That fish of course bought from another weirdo who may hold the key to the killings! "I'll have a couple of red herrings today mate."What killings, however? Well, after making everyone involved look like a suspect, someone bursts in on Frank while he's doing eye surgery and shoots him, but then shortly afterward Nicole ends up dead in the sea. Frank turns out okay, but who's shooting him and why does his wife look so much like Nicole that I thought she'd faked her own death and how did Nicole's boyfriend get over to England (Spain)? And what's with the blue contact lenses?Plenty of twists in this one and there's a particularly hilarious scene later in the film involving Luciano Rossi, but the film is almost two hours long! Followed by two other 'Death' films by the same director: Death Walks At Midnight and Death Walks Like An Egyptian.

ferbs54 Director Luciano Ercoli, screenwriter Ernesto Gastaldi, and actors Susan Scott and Simon Andreu had greatly impressed me with their 1970 giallo offering, "Forbidden Photos of a Lady Above Suspicion." Curious to see whether lightning could possibly strike twice for this same team, I took a look at 1971's "Death Walks on High Heels," and it turns out that this latter film is, remarkably, even better than the first. In this one, sexy redheaded stripper Nicole (appealingly played by Scott) gets into major-league trouble when a masked killer with a mechanical voice box starts to target her, whilst looking for some stolen diamonds. You may think that you know where this stylish thriller is headed (and Ercoli DOES direct with style to spare), but trust me, you're dead wrong. A shocking twist of plot around halfway through really does pull the rug out from the viewer's expectations here, sending us into very strange and uncharted waters indeed. Gastaldi has here provided us with yet another ingeniously plotted story that hangs together marvelously (unlike--for me, anyway--Ercoli and Scott's follow-up film, 1972's "Death Walks at Midnight"); composer Stelvio Cipriani has contributed a chic and catchy score; and some great-looking lensing of Paris, London and the English countryside provides some elegant backdrops for the film's very sinister doings. Add some touches of welcome humor (in the film's latter half), one genuinely nasty slice-and-dice sequence for the gorehounds, and some fairly brutal fisticuffs at the film's conclusion and you have one extremely satisfying giallo indeed. Good luck trying to figure out the killer's identity in this one! As icing on the cake, the DVD that I just watched comes to us courtesy of the fine folks at No Shame, who continue to impress with pristine prints of lost Italian wonders, and with excellent subtitling, to boot. Grazie, No Shame!

The_Void Luciano Ercoli is famous for making three Giallo films; two of which are among the best that the genre has to offer, and along with The Forbidden Photos of a Lady Above Suspicion, Death Walks on High Heels is among the best of the director's films. It would be fair to level criticism at this film, as it is slightly overlong and I guessed most of the major points before they happened; but that doesn't change the fact that this is a fun film and well worth seeing. One common element of the Giallo is a convoluted plot - and this film delights in featuring one of the most convoluted of the whole genre. The story takes in a number of characters, all fuelled by desires of lust, revenge and/or greed. The plot picks up after the attack on Nicole Rochard. The attack seems to have something to do with a stash of diamonds, but when questioned; she appears to know nothing about them. She decides to travel to England along with an eye doctor, and gets followed by her French boyfriend; a man that she believes may be the attacker. They move to a quaint English seaside village, where all appears to be safe...Luciano Ercoli does a good job of setting the scene for this film, and the English village at the centre of the story provides a nice tranquil location for a murder fuelled film like this one. The vast amount of characters involved do bring the film down a little bit, but they also ensure that there's always something going on; and most would agree that it's better to have an overcomplicated plot than an underdeveloped one. Unfortunately, however, there isn't a great deal of gore in the film. The ensemble cast do well, and once again Ercoli's then spouse Susan Scott heads the cast. Scott does well at delivering the seductive and sultry lead performance that we're used to from her; although it's unfortunate that she doesn't get a great deal of screen time. The rest of the cast is good also, with Ercoli's other frequent collaborator Simón Andreu giving the best performance of the support. It's fairly easy to get confused during this film, but unlike many other Giallo's, at least almost everything here makes sense by the end. Ercoli tops the film off with a strong ending that sees all the characters get their comeuppance, and overall; this is a strong film and comes highly recommended!