A White Dress for Marialé

A White Dress for Marialé

Maybe we're not all innocent?

As a child, Marialé (Ida Galli, credited as Evelin Stuart) witnessed her father murder her mother and her mother's lover before turning the gun on himself. Now, years later, she finds herself in a crumbling pallazo married to Paolo (Luigi Pistilli), a rich brute who secretly sedates her. To ease the boredom and seek help, Marialé invites friends over for a raucous party. Guests include her former flame, Massimo (Ivan Rassimov), Semy (Shawn Robinson) and her racist husband Gustavo (Edilio Kim), and Mercedes (Pilar Velasquez), Joe (Giancarlo Bonuglia) and Sebastiano (Ezio Marano), who form their own open love triangle. Passions are unleashed over dinner, but things soon turn serious when one by one, the guests start turning up dead. Is Paolo offing his unwelcome visitors? Has Sebastiano's jealousy finally gotten out of hand? It all leads to a bloody conclusion!

In its first half, A White Dress for Marialé is one of those freak-out gialli like Death Falls Lightly or Spasmo, where a dream-like stream-of-consciousness narrative skips around, disorienting the audience until we're dizzy and confused. In the second half , the movie sobers up and sticks its landing as a standard drawing-room whodunnit. If you find the crazy psych-out style tedious like I do, just watch the first 15 minutes and then skip ahead to the movie's midpoint. 

• It's not a great movie by any stretch, but there's some real talent on both sides of the screen. Ida Galli, Ivan Rassimov and Luigi Pistilli are Giallo all-stars. Editor Francesco Bertuccioli worked on Sister of Ursula and Strip Nude for your Killer and Bruno Nicolai, one of the best composers of giallo scores ever, goes uncredited here.
• The movie was filmed at the Palazzo Borghese in Rome.
• We breeze quickly through character introductions at the beginning of the film, so it's easy to get confused about who's who and how they're all connected. On top of that, Gustavo and Sebastiano sort of resemble each other and they spend half the movie in stage costumes and makeup, making things even more confusing. I had to draw a diagram to keep everything straight.
• There seems to be a half-hearted "relflection" motif, where characters – especially Marialé – are shown in mirrors or reflected in windows. I was expecting it to foreshadow a split-personality twist, but that never came to pass

What the Hell am I Watching?

So much to cover here...

 Let's start with the part where a harmless garter snake – no more than half an inch around – crawls over Mercedes' foot. When she screams, Paolo immediately pulls out a gun and shoots it off her. Paolo is a). more than a little over-reactive and b.) an amazing marksman.

Let's talk about the scene where Semy feels up and gropes an empty suit of armor.

The women in this movie really get brutalized. Before getting murdered, they're constantly slapped around and Mercedes gets raped in one disturbing scene.

Speaking of getting slapped, my brain broke at the sight of Gustavo wearing a ballerina's dress in a slap fight with a naked Semy. The fight is broken up by Joe, who beats Gustavo with a whip. For real. What the hell am I watching?

Throughout the movie, I kept asking myself: Do these people even like each other? Why are they here? Why are they in these toxic relationships?

Fashion Moment

True to the title, Marialé does wear a white dress. In fact it's the same white dress her mother was murdered in. You can clearly see the two bullet holes on her chest. Foreshadowing!

Things get out of hand at the costume dinner.

And the aftermath of the feast looks like a Renaissance Dutch still life.

Cross Current

Cross Current

"You are careless, leaving a gun around in anyone's reach."

Recovering from a speed boat crash and risky surgery, Marco Breda (Philippe Leroy) returns to his villa to recuperate, joined by his wife, Monica (Elga Andersen) and their friends Burt (Ivan Rassimov) and Terry (Rosanna Yanni).  Marco is under strict doctor's orders to avoid stress, but he is haunted by gaps in his memory and questions about his life before the accident. When a former gardener turns up dead, the police ask questions that he can't answer and before long, more people close to Marco are murdered. Did Marco black out and commit murders he can't remember? Or is someone trying to drive him crazy? Soon, Marco resumes his affair with Terry, putting himself in even more danger. Who is behind these murders and how is Marco involved?

Cross Current is an interesting take on the classic film Diabolique, re-imagined for the post-Argento age. The fun of the film is as much in figuring out the conspiracy as finding the identity of the killer. Besides an Argento-esque eye for production design and costumes, there's also a sly reference to Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca with the Breda's scowly maid. 

• This is director Tonio Ricci's second movie and his first giallo, but he had good sense to fill out his cast with giallo veterans like Rassimov, Franco Fantasia, and Franco Ressel. 
• The original Italian title is Un Omicidio Perfetto a Termine di Legge, which loosely translates as A Perfectly Legal Murder.
• Check out Liana Del Balzo as the gardener's mother. She would go on to play a small but pivotal role in Dario Argento's Deep Red.
• If you think the editing of this film was a little, shall we say, "poorly realized," consider that it was dome by Armedo Giomini, who was also responsible for Slaughter Hotel.  It all makes sense now.

What the Hell Am I Watching? 

The movie opens with an extended dialogue-free speed boat race, but we're given no context about how things are done and what's going on. What's at stake? Who's winning? Why is there no sense of urgency?

There's a fantastic death scene where a victim wearing all white stumbles across the length of a white room in slow motion, smearing blood on absolutely everything in her path.

Fashion Moment

The Bredas' house and furnishings have a tastefully georgous ultra-modern style and the clothes were okay. But the thing that caught my eye were the 1970's era racing helmets with the cool Speed Racer-style bubble visors.

 

Spasmo

Spasmo

"It's all so absurd, meaningless. But what's absurd is dangerous."

When Christian Bauman (Robert Hoffman) and his girlfriend Xenia (Maria Pia Conte) discover an unconscious woman named Barbara (Suzy Kendall) lying on a rocky stretch of beach, it's only the beginning of a bizarre series of events. Christian starts an affair with Barbara at a hotel, but while he's getting ready in the bathroom he's attacked by a thug in a black suit (Dario Argento look-alike Adolfo Lastretti). During the struggle, the attacker's gun goes off, killing him, but upon returning, Christian finds that the body is gone. Christian and Barbara then hide out at a seaside castle, where they encounter an old man named Malcom (Guido Alberti) and a young woman named Clorinda (Monica Monet), who seem strangely familiar to Christian. Soon, the killer returns to stalk the castle's residents. Was he sent by Barbara's jealous boyfriend, Alex (Mario Erpichini)? Or by Christian's brother, Fritz (Ivan Rassimov)? And who is staging murders in the woods with life-sized rubber mannequins? Nothing is as it seems as Christian tries desperately to untangle the mysteries that surround him.

Spasmo (not to be confused with the giallo Orgasmo, which, in turn, is not to be confused with Trey Parker's super hero comedy Orgazmo) is a big sweaty fever dream for its entire first hour.  It follows an incomprehensible, disjointed story line, features absurd, wooden dialogue comprised largely of non-sequiters, and has characters whose actions have no basis in reality. It's like ten different screenwriters each wrote five pages on their own, which were then shuffled up and filmed. Things come together in the last 30 minutes and, though it's never completely coherent, at least it attempts to explain the preceding story elements and draw the film to a reasonable conclusion. This movie is cocoanuts.

• The title is as meaningless and incomprehensible as the plot and Ennio Morricone's dissonant, chaotic score captures the lunacy well.
• Ivan Rassimov, who is billed third, doesn't show up until over an hour into this 93-minute movie.
• After two scenes, Xenia disappears from the movie. This is never explained.
• I do appreciate how the movie comes full circle, with a body on the beach.
• Four of the six fake murders are committed on rubber dolls.

What The Hell Am I Watching?

The dialogue in this movie is bonkers.  Before heading to a hotel for their rendezvous, Barbara asks Christian to shave off his beard. He politely offers to rape her in the car instead and she laughs it off like he's just said something charming. WHAT?

Later, when Christian stumbles out of the bathroom with a gun in hand after apparently murdering a random attacker, Barbara reacts by asking "What's the matter?" instead of "OH MY GOD WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH A GUN?"

On the lam, late in the movie, Christian hitchhikes with a young woman who tells him "You remind me of a dying chicken." Have I been taking crazy pills? WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?

For most of her time on screen, it's unclear weather or not Clorinda is a robot.

Fritz has edited together a very specific set of home movies for the end of the film. Why would you want to watch Super-8 footage of your father's funeral? Or document your trip to the insane assylum? Weird!

Here's a Spasmo drinking game: drink every time some exclaims "Look!"

Fashion Moment

The Killer (whose name, we later learn, is Tatum) wears this black suit with a red shirt. It's basically a standard-issue hitman uniform.

Later, once the movie turns a corner, Christian puts on the suit, taking over the tough guy role.

The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh

The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh

"A wall is no use against Jean. What I need is protection against myself."

Julie Wardh (Edwige Fenech) is, outwardly, the respectable wife of the American ambassador to Austria, Neil Wardh (Alberto DiMendoza), but in secret, she hides S&M fantasies and a kinky blood fetish. Upon returning to Austria, Julie begins an affair with the rakish George Corro (George Hilton), cousin of her friend Carol (Conchita Arioldi). At the same time, a razor blade-wielding maniac is terrorizing the city, murdering beautiful young women, and Julie thinks her stalker, ex-boyfriend Jean (Ivan Rassimov) might be responsible. Someone has been leaving bouquets of roses for Julie with  vaguely menacing notes, Julie is being blackmailed over her affair, and before long, Julie herself is being chased by the killer. Is Jean responsible? Or maybe it's someone else in her life?

The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh (not to be confused with Vice has Black Stockings) is equally well-known as Blade Of the Ripper and is Sergio Martino's first giallo. It's also one of his best. In addition, this is the first of four films to star giallo's "golden couple," Edwige Fenech and George Hilton.  While the film starts off hitting all the standard beats, the last 20 minutes really shake things up with some fantastic twists and double crosses, making this film a standout of giallo storytelling.

• There's a shower scene which was obviously influenced by Psycho. We see the killer's shadow slowly creep up on a shower curtain before he tears it open and hacks up the poor victim. But it's over pretty quickly and it's missing the pathos of the Hitchcock version.
• Besides Psycho, there's a clever take on Strangers On a Train as well.
• Carol is a great sidekick. In the tradition of giallo films, she's the free-spirited, worry-free counterpoint to the more sensible main character.
• One of the notes on a bouquet of roses includes the phrase "Il tuo vizio é una stanza chiusa dal di dentro e solo io ne ho la chiave." This line became the title of Martino and Fenech's next collaboration, Your Vice Is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key.
• Some of the music from Mrs. Wardh was used in Kill Bill Vol. 2.
• Ivan Rassimov re-joined Martino, Fenech, and Hilton a year later in the film All the Colors Of the Dark. It's not a giallo, but rather a supernatural thriller in the same vein as Rosemary's Baby.
• There's a scene where Carol goes to an empty park at closing time in place of Julie in order to pay off the blackmailer. She is chased through the woods and murdered by the killer – a scene which closely resembles a memorable part of Dario Argento's Four Flies On Gray Velvet. Argento's film was released only 11 months after Mrs Wardh hit theaters, but production schedules were fast. Did Argento "borrow" ideas from Martino? I'll leave it up to you to decide.
• Director Sergio Martino is known for his Westerns and that style of film making permeates this giallo. This is especially noticeable during the one-on-one desert showdown at the end.

What the Hell Am I Watching?

Julie's fantasy sequences are mesmerizing and beautifully shot in slow-motion. Especially the first one in the rain, when we don't know at first what's going on.

At a party, two women are wearing paper dresses.  Along comes some drunk jerk who tears the back of one of them. The other woman starts laughing and the woman with the torn dress just lunges at her. They both fall to the floor shredding each others' clothes until they're both naked, while the rest of the party-goers just laugh and stare.

Fashion Moment

George has an awesome collection of sunglasses. There's this Elvis-inspired pair...

 

...and these mirrored aviators.

Also, check out the Wardhs' space-age apartment.

This exact same set, with its distinctive wallpaper and architecture, was also used in The Red Queen Kills Seven Times.