Platicsco
Good story, Not enough for a whole film
Lela
The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.
Geraldine
The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.
Michael_Elliott
Touch of Death (1988) ** (out of 4) Lester Parson (Brett Halsey) is about as evil as you can get. He spends his time looking for rich old women to fall into bed with and then takes pleasure when it comes time to brutally murder them.This later day Lucio Fulci picture is certainly a mixed bag. On one hand it's a low-budget version of Bluebeard but the budget is just so low that it gives the film an incredibly cheap and unprofessional look. The other side, and the positive one, this does contain some outrageous gore scenes and graphic violence that you can only find in a Fulci film. In fact, the majority of these gore scenes were later used in the director's A CAT IN THE BRAIN.There are some rather surprisingly good elements that can be found here including the black humor that the director brings to the picture. There are some really funny moments including one of the women who is a tad bit hairy and Halsey has to deal with her role hair getting into his mouth. Another funny bit deals with a woman whose legs keep popping out of the trunk that he's trying to stuff her in.The main reason to watch this movie is for the gore. The special effects aren't nearly as good as what we saw in earlier Fulci movies but there's no doubt that the majority of the budget went to them. We've got some pretty brutal stuff here including one woman who gets her head bashed in with a large stick. This here is one of the goriest and most violent moments from any of the director's films. There's also a chainsaw scene, which is just pure Fulci in the campiest way.TOUCH OF DEATH has some major problems as well. The story is pretty much non-existent because it's just a bunch of small scenes. We see him meeting a woman. We then see him killing the woman. There's really not too much that happens here so we're basically just sitting through a bunch of boring stuff waiting for the next death to happen. Halsey offers up a fine performance and you can also spot Al Cliver (ZOMBIE).
HumanoidOfFlesh
So I decided to rewatch Lucio Fulci's "Touch of Death" aka "When Alice Broke the Mirror".Unfortunately this gore/black comedy is one of his weakest films."The New York Ripper" was the last solid flick of the Godftaher of Gore.Anyway,Brett Halsey plays a maniac who kills rich women for their money,butchers their bodies with a chainsaw and fed their remains to his pigs.Sounds great,but the action drags and the characters are idiotic.There is also plenty of silly comedy that seems out of place.Fans of Italian cult cinema should recognize Zora Kerova and Al Cliver in small roles.There are only four brutal gore scenes in "Touch of Death" including chainsaw dismemberment,running over with a car and finally there is a pretty nasty sequence,which has a woman bludgeoned with a wooden pole and then shoved into an oven.6 out of 10 and that's being kind.
The_Void
Lucio Fulci is one of the leading names in gore-soaked horror cinema, and Touch of Death certainly does that reputation proud! Fulci's films started to get worse as his career progressed (with the exception of the hilarious Cat in the Brain in 1990), and as this film was released in 1988; you can count on it not being as good as his previous output. In fact, with films like Don't Torture a Duckling and The Beyond in mind; Touch of Death is one of Fulci's weaker efforts, but even so - there's plenty here to delight the man's fans. The film is clearly meant to be something of comedy, but the comedy is more of the absurd, over the top variety than one that will have you in stitches. Fulci's use of music helps to instill the absurdity of the film, which sees lonely widower/gigolo Lester Parson taking women home and putting them to use. He likes to mutilate them in horrible ways, such as beating them with a stick and chopping them up with a chainsaw; and just to add to the proceedings, he eats them too. Fulci also installs a subplot about the investigation into the murders, and the murderer's descent into madness.This film is something a prelude to Cat in the Brain, and it's obvious that Fulci had Touch of Death in mind when he made his self-starring vehicle, as many of the gore scenes from that film are taken from this one. The scenes of gore are really quite nasty, but their impact is lessened by the comic tone. The first scene of gore sees our 'hero' going to work with a chainsaw (surely horror cinema's finest weapon), and then putting the remains of his victim into a meat grinder. Then we are treated to a beating scene (which features some of Fulci's trademark eye violence), a nasty sequence involving a car, a corpse having it's feet cut off and several other scenes along the same line. The film is really dirty; with the poor cinematography adding brilliantly to the overall unclean feel of the movie. The acting is typically low level, but the actors portray their (mostly silly) characters with gusto, and the result is a film that people will like more it's fun value than its credibility. Being a Fulci fan, I am more susceptible to this sort of trash; and I cant really say that non-Fulci fans will get much of a kick out of it.
dweeks-1
"The name is Parson, Lester Parson. That's right, almost like a person. But not quite."Such a strange little, gory Fulci movie. Lester Parson is a sadistic serial killer with a gambling problem. He also talks to his shadow by pressing play on a tape recorder. His shadow talks back with advice and words of wisdom. Yes, this is a freak of a movie which is why I like it so much. Of Fulci's later movies, Touch of Death is definitely one of his best. It has some decent gore and is short and sweet(82min). Most of the clips from Fulci's Cat in the Brain film were taken from Touch of Death.This movie is only for Fulci fans. It might be considered crap by normal folk.
