Review #983: 'What Have You Done to Solange?' (1972)

Massimo Dallamano is rarely mentioned in the same breath as his fellow Italian heavyweights Dario Argento, Lucio Fulci or Umberto Lenzi, yet he was responsible for two gialli that can be considered two of the best of their kind. One is What Have They Done to Your Daughters? (1974) and the other another Edgar Wallace adaptation that poses a similarly eye-catching question in its title, What Have You Done to Solange? The latter is one of the finest giallo I've seen, favouring tension and character above blood and boobs - although there's plenty of the red stuff too, and an admittedly unnecessary all-girls-school-shower scene.

Enrico Rosseni (Fabio Testi) is a suave Italian teacher at a School for Girls in London. He is stuck in an unhappy marriage with Herta (Karin Baal), who works at the same school teaching German. To escape the tedium of married life, he embarks on an affair with one of his lovely young students Elizabeth (Cristina Galbo). When on a secret date in the woods, Elizabeth witnesses a murder in which a masked man murders a girl by knifing her between the legs. Enrico dismisses her claims, but when he hears the murder reported on the news, he re-visits the scene and is captured on camera in the process. With the police and his wife breathing down his neck, Enrico tries to divert suspicion without his secret getting out.

Backed by a tremendous Ennio Morricone score (are there any movies he didn't provide the music for?) and gorgeous cinematography by Aristide Massaccesi (a.k.a. shlockmeister Joe D'Amato), Solange's great hook is its engaging plot. Working out who the mysterious killer is as much fun as watching the likeable Testi squirm out of his increasingly desperate predicament. The Solange of the title doesn't get mentioned until the final third, but when she does turn up in the form of I Spit on Your Grave's Camille Keaton, the film avoids cheap thrills and delivers carefully constructed shocks during the fittingly upsetting climax. If there's any justice in the cinematic world, Dallamano will someday receive the respect he deserves.


Directed by: Massimo Dallamano
Starring: Fabio Testi, Cristina Galbó, Karin Baal, Joachim Fuchsberger, Camille Keaton
Country: Italy/West Germany

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie

Review #467: 'The House That Screamed' (1969)

Spanish director Narciso Ibanez Serrador was never happy with the marketing for the release of his first horror film, particularly in the United States, where it was released by AIP. It is understandable when the trailer is not very representative of the tone of the film. The trailer is more salacious, and hints at more kinetic horror than is actually delivered. However, this does not mean that the film fails. Far from it. In fact, the trailer does a disservice to this rather atmospheric, slow-burning story with horror elements, set in a French boarding school for naughty girls. Teresa (Cristina Galbo) is newly introduced to the school, and the tensions of hierarchy are established immediately, and this brooding sense illustrates itself in moments of sexual frustration, sadism and humiliation.

The school of corrective discipline is overseen by headmistress, Sra. Fourneau (Lili Palmer), whose son, Luis (John Moulder-Brown), lives a floor above the girls, but is known for his voyeurism - he often peeps whilst the girls shower (consequently, the girls shower in bathrobes). Fourneau is over-protective of Luis, and refers to the girls who come through the school as no good for him, too unsettled and dirty. You could indeed call Luis a Bates-in-waiting. As Teresa discovers, through gossip and hearsay, girls have been "escaping" because they need to see boys - their sexual urges too great to ignore. But as a love-struck girl, Isabelle (Maribel Martin), takes the advice of Luis to leave with him, she is murdered on her way to meet him, in a slow-motion, abstracted and balletic scene in the forests.

Whilst the finale's "twist" will be spotted instantly, this does not effect the impact of it, with its macabre, and chillingly sycophantic nature. It certainly plods often, particularly in the first half, but it instills a climbing sense of peculiarity. With the dynamic of the hierarchical systems in the school, suspects are everywhere, and it is the relationships, often signified with repressed sexuality, a deeply sadistic nature, the girls are often humiliated, and Fourneau seems to relish (much like her son) these voyeuristic-sadistic explorations, as non-conformist girls get beaten. The setting of a Gothic period piece lends itself to the ponderous repression, and makes the girls less accessible; the time of full coverage, their frocks thicker than a winter quilt.


Directed by: Narciso Ibáñez Serrador
Starring: Lilli Palmer, Cristina Galbó, John Moulder-Brown, Maribel Martín
Country: Spain

Rating: ***

Marc Ivamy

Review #187: 'The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue' (1974)

On the video nasties list as simply The Living Dead (it has several other titles), I watched a version called Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, it is pretty difficult to see why this was on the list to begin with. Yes it has some gory moments, but nothing that is close to the opening of people as, say, The Boogeyman (1980), which was dropped from the DPP's (Director of Public Prosecution) list of films that were prosecuted and eventually banned. But then again, there are many strange entries on the list, as we will discover over this project.

The Living Dead begins with the serendipitous meeting of George (Ray Lovelock) and Edna (Christina Galbo) at an isolated garage. Two individuals traveling up north from "that London". Already condemned when they arrive in a small village, what with their hippie looks, they would most certainly be crazy drug-addled satanists. But something more sinister is occurring, as the living come back from the dead to eat the living.

Well, of course it's a zombie flick! It's implied in the title! It's not the greatest of films by a long shot. But it is a well-made film. The "message" is ecological; the culprit behind this macabre situation is an experimental machine from the department of agriculture, that emits radiation to combat insects etc for crops. Damn you government, with your ill-conceived ideas of progression!! The film does also produce a pretty amusing line from 'The Inspector', Arthur Kennedy; "I wish the dead could come back to life. Because then I could kill you again".


Directed by: Jorge Grau
Starring: Cristina Galbó, Ray Lovelock, Arthur Kennedy
Country: Spain/Italy

Rating: ***

Marc Ivamy