A Blade In The Dark

Rating:
Summary: Creepy and stylish with shades of DePalma's Blow Out
Review: A composer is hired to score a slasher film and is sent to an old dark house for inspiration. Strange things begin to occur and bodies start to pile up..only to disappear. This is one of the better giallo films of its time and its miles ahead of the typical 80's slashers that were coming out of the US. After working under his famed father Mario, as well as Dario Argento among others, Bava displays great atmosphere in this film as well as some shocking violence. Another reason to own this film on DVD is that AnchorBay is releasing this in its longest, most complete cut (longer than the EC import laser). On a side note, look for director Michele Soavi (Cemetery Man) in a small but interesting role.

Rating:
Summary: Humour of the Dreadful Slasher
Review: A film in which the hero can't tell the difference between a spider and a cockroach and has to repeatedly rub blood between his fingers to recognise what it is!

Lamberto Bava's A Blade in the Dark (how much more evocative is the original Italian title The House of the Dark Stairway) is by turns a gripping, ludicrous and very (unintentionally) funny Giallo.

There is a certain Argentoish panache to the direction, with some effective set pieces here and there and the murders are in the suitably grotesque Giallo mould.
What detracts from any effectiveness is the dubbing which seems to have been translated literally word by word, which makes the character's seem incredibly dumb except for the odd word like "perspicacious" cropping up in common speech! It's always hard to tell with dubbing if there isn't some style to the original dialogue which has been lost in translation.

However the plot is just plain daft, the identity of the killer a complete give-away (if you haven't guessed who it is, and even have an inkling of why, in the first half hour you must be asleep) and the pathology of the killer is explained in a scant and ridiculous way.
That's not to say you cannot recoup some pleasures from the film, it starts well with a misleading, double bluff pre-credit sequence (which I won't give away), there is a nice play with digetic and non-digetic music, and the first 45 mins (despite the awful, rotten, dubbing) is actually quite intriguing.

[Not the best' for the horror/Giallo crowd, an entertaining couple of hours, but mainly it just makes you appreciate Argento (even his lesser films).

Rating:
Summary: BRILLIANT!!
Review: A textbook example of the giallo, Lamberto Bava's A Blade in the Dark is an obvious homage to Dario Agento, the Italian director who (along with Bava's father Mario) served as his filmmaking mentor. Bava worked as assistant director on Argento's Tenebre, shot the year before; that film's influence is readily apparent. A major plot element is lifted from Argento's Deep Red (1975) as well - Blade's story also revolves around a composer who finds himself embroiled in a bizarre series of homicides. But Argento was working with much bigger budgets, longer production schedules, and better stories. Unfortunately, A Blade in the Dark can't begin to compare to its inspirational sources.
Originally envisioned as a limited, episodic series for Italian TV, it was shot with a European theatrical release also in mind. The spare scenario (penned by prolific exploitation scribe Dardano Sarchetti) establishes only the most bare-boned of plots. Bruno (Andrea Occhipinti), a young composer, rents a large, rambling villa in which to work on his latest project, the score for a horror film being directed by his friend Sandra (Anny Papa). To the detriment of Bruno's solitude the house comes complete with a suspicious-acting caretaker (are there any other types in Italian horror?) and some unexpected visitors - Katia (Valeria Cavalli) and Angela (Fabiola Toledo), two attractive women, acquaintances of the former tenant, who live nearby. When the women mysteriously disappear shortly after he meets them, Bruno begins to suspect they've been murdered on the premises... He can't find any bodies, but clues abound. (Knife-holes and bloodstains would certainly qualify in that regard!) Someone definitely entered the villa uninvited and destroyed his latest demo tape, that much is sure. Stupidly, Bruno never once picks up the phone to dial the police.
If our dimwitted hero did the smart thing, however, there'd be no movie. More people die horrible deaths. Meanwhile Bruno wanders about the house and its grounds, poking around and peering into the dark. There are a lot of such scenes in the flick, which will severely test the patience of even the most avid giallo fan. (Rapido, Lamberto!) Obviously this was done to pad out the running time; too many of these sequences are obvious red herrings, devoid of any suspense, or just plain pointless.
Bava does pile on the shocks, though, in the film's two main murder sequences. The stalking/slaying of Katia owes a lot to Tenebre in look and style (particularly the murder of the hotelier's daughter in that film), but Bava ends
the set-piece with an original motif - the victim is trapped behind a sheet of chickenwire through which the killer slowly slashes her to death with a box-cutter - that's guaranteed to get your flesh crawling. The death of Angela, when she's attacked in the villa's bathroom, is a real doozy: a brutal, nihilistic bit of filmmaking that some could easily interpret as an exercise in misogynistic sadism. (Here Bava does for hair-washing in the sink what Hitchcock's Psycho did to taking a shower...) But amidst the unrepentant brutality Bava injects an occasional touch of sardonic humor, most notably when Sandra the horror director is strangled with a spool of her own film - murdered with her own movie.
Aside from the visceral thrills and chills generated by these murder scenes the film is pretty much a misfire. The characters are all uninvolving ciphers. It's not much of a mystery, either; most of the red herrings offered up by the plot are plainly obvious for what they are. As mentioned, an inordinate amount of time is spent following Bruno as he wanders about the villa, checking this room and that - scenes devoid of dialog but accompanied by repetitious theme music that quickly becomes annoying. In one way the dearth of dialog is a good thing... The English dubbing job is poor, featuring ludicrous translations ("You're a female!";"I am not a female child!" etc.) that might be funny in a Godzilla movie, but not one about a sadistic serial killer. At times it seems evident that the translators weren't even looking at a copy of the script - how else can one explain the scene in which Bruno chides Katia over her fear of a spider, telling her with a straight face that the bug isn't even a spider, but a cockroach... at the very moment we're shown a close-up shot of (yep) a SPIDER. Huh???
A Blade in the Dark has fans, no doubt appreciative of its effective, wince-inducing set-pieces. We love gialli, too - just not this one. We'd much rather watch Bava's supernatural splatterfest Demons (1985) for the umpteenth time than sit through this one again.

"Just a case of being a bit overwrought."
Sandra sums up the movie

Anchor Bay does a fine job with A Blade in the Dark considering it's a fairly obscure title here in America. The transfer is letterboxed and anamorphically enhanced for 16x9 TVs; as the film was originally shot in 16mm the picture is understandably on the grainy side. The Dolby mono audio track is serviceably clear. In addition to the theatrical trailer, a short (10 min.), interesting video interview with director Bava and screenwriter Sarchetti is included. (This is in Italian, with easily readable English subtitles. Do not watch this before viewing the film itself. It's chock full of spoilers, including the murderer's identity.)

Rating:
Summary: God Has Punished Me, Yet Again...
Review: Do not watch this DVD. It is soo scary and gave me nightnares. It would be real good to watch for Halloween in a dark room with your friends, if you have any after showing them this movie. It's too scary and good people are in it that act real good and scary. I ate popcorn while I watched and now I do that every night, pop popcorn and watch this movie in the dark, by myself, because all my friends are too scared to watch it over and over again, but not me. I like being scared. Especially around Halloween time and I also like owning two copies of this movie on DVD because I know I will wear the copy that I keep watching, because it's soo scary, out. So don't buy this DVD, because my copies might wear out and I'll need to buy another one and there's no telling when a scary movie like this will be real hard to find. Buy 'The Tigger Movie' because I own two copies of that one too and it's not soo scary but it's a good movie and I think that you will like it. But if you want to watch my copy of this DVD, I think that would be fine as long as you close your eyes with me during the scary parts, which come at different times of the movie. If you do find a used copy of this movie then buy it because I don't buy used copies and that would be fine. If there's anything that you want to know about this movie just ask because I know everything about it and all of the scary parts. I don't even know who could write such a scary movie, they must be real nice and smart, but scary too. Thank you for reading.

Rating:
Summary: Very strong giallo
Review: Five Stars for Bava, who - before sliding into the nirvana of Demons and the abyss of Italian TV Giallos - directed this crisp, vicious, claustrophobic thriller. It looks and feels like a Dario Argento Movie, but actually has a better script. The perfect double bill for Tenebre. Buy it at all costs.

The DVD transfer itself is excellent. The important light and sound recordings clearer than on every other available dvd (there's a german one out there).

Rating:
Summary: A Dark, Bizarre Film For Lovers of the Giallo
Review: From the opening sequence with the bloody tennis ball to the grotesque and surprising ending, A Blade in the Dark is never short of suspense, style, or shock. Next to the Demons movies (which are nothing like this), this is Lamberto Bava's finest work. An eerie soundtrack, interesting characters, and murder with an Exact-o knife make this truly disturbing film well worth one's while.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: It's great that all these Eurohorror obscurities are now readily available. Why Bava would revert from making giallos is puzzling after this...masterpiece?

In the beginning we see three young boys, two taunting the other saying he's a female. Now we go the present where a pianist has taken residence in a house inhabited formerly by a "Linda." Brutal murders happen in this house, and it is investigated. The ending reminds me of Psycho.

Beautifully choreographed murders. I was sure I figured out who the killer was until the final moments when the red herring was finally ruled out. This has an intriguing storyline also. I would highly recommend this for horror buffs, and also fans of Argento, Fulci, Mario Bava and Lamberto Bava. Lamberto Bava is an underrated director, though the proof comes in this brilliant film that is because his films are of varying quality. I want to seek out more of Lamberto, then eventually Mario. Long live horror!

Rating:
Summary: A Dario Argento He's Not
Review: Lamberto Bava is lucky to have a dad like Mario. According the the bio in the DVD, his dad used to feign illness to let Lamberto direct scenes from "Shock." How nice of the more talented Bava to humor him like that! It also said that Mario asked Lamberto to help him with scripts when the story wasn't so good. After you watch "A Blade in The Dark," you'll ask yourself, "What was Mario thinking?"

This movie begins promisingly enough. Three young kids (although sadly, none of them are malevolent) enter an old creepy building late at night. One of them throws a tennis ball down a long, dark staircase. In some sort of bizarre Cool Kids Club initiation ritual, the two really tough kids tell the third wimpy kid he has to go down and get it. If he doesn't do it, he's a sissy little girl. They begin to chant, "You're a female, you're a female," over and over again until he starts down the stairs. (Thanks, boys. Some of us were born this way!) Seconds later, we hear a scream, and the tennis ball flies up and hits the wall behind the two boys, leaving a bloody stain.

After then, the opening credits begin, and the awesomeness has ended. We then learn that the prologue is actually a scene from a horror film the main character has been contracted to score. As it turns out, the scene was based on an actual event that happened to someone the director really knew. Alright! I can get behind that! That opening scene really held my interest! I wanna know what happens next! Tell me more!

Sadly, I never got to find out. The "traumatic childhood experience," that is obviously very central to the plot, is never explained. All we know is that it was based on a story told to the director by her friend, but never what the whole story actually was. What we never find out is what really went on down there, why did the little kid scream, and most importantly, why was the tennis ball bloody?

Like most giallos, this one is about a regular guy who is not a detective or a police officer, who is trying to solve a murder. Dario Argento, undoubtedly the master of the giallo, usually has his protagonist as an eye witness to a murder who sees some weird detail that he is sure is important, but the police don't take him seriously. This leads to the protagonist trying to solve the mystery himself. But this, of course, is AFTER the protagonist has already gone to the police and they didn't buy his theory. This isn't really a very hard concept to work into your script. However, this guy never even goes to the police. The director he's working for asks him the same question I'd been dying to ask the entire movie. "Why don't you call the police?" He explains that since there are no bodies, they would think he was nuts. Well, if you don't have a body, you can't make an arrest, and it's true that none of them have been found yet. But this is AFTER he's found a blade-shaped hole in his bathroom counter top with blood coming out of it. Now, I think that constitutes physical evidence of foul play, don't you? That at least warrants a police investigation. Maybe if they did a search of the area, they could find out where those bodies are?

I know that if the police had gotten involved, he would have been asked to leave the house, and there would be no movie. Call me an armchair quarterback if you want to. I'm not trying to say that if I found a bloody dent in my bathroom, I would react more rationally. But Argento was able to create characters that were believably obsessed with solving the puzzle. This guy's only motivation is his safety, and that's a problem that could be easily solved by calling the police.

Let's quickly review this movie's strength's: for one thing, it has the hot babe who played Eva in Aenigma, the Lucio Fulci film that borders on the absurd. (I say that as if it's the only one.) Not that I really care about that hot babe, or anything, I just thought you might. Also, the death scene in the bathroom was very well done. Lamberto managed to do the blade-through-the-hand thing even better than the master Argento did in "Phenomena." That's pretty impressive, because I don't think I ever recall watching any horror movie and saying to myself, "they did that better than Argento!" even if it was in "Sleepless."

Getting back to other things that really annoyed me...there is a red herring that makes no sense whatsoever. We find out that one character has been telling ridiculous lies about where she's been. The main character even goes to the trouble of finding a PHONE BOOTH to make the call to find this out. Anybody who watches giallos knows that a phone booth means serious business, and an important plot point is about to be revealed. However, as it turns out, these gigantic lies have nothing whatsoever to do with the story, and we never even find out why she told them! Now I can appreciate the red herring. And I know that if you don't have at least one, Dario Argento will kick you out of his Super Secret Giallo Society. But if you're going to have the main character enter a phone booth to discover someone else was lying to him big time, you obviously want us to think she's the killer. Then, when you pull the rug out from under us, (you really had me going with that phone booth) could you at least explain what the heck was going on there?

Lamberto Bava's finest moment was by far the supernatural horror flick, "Demons." In that movie, people enter a theatre and begin to transform into Demons for reasons that seem to exist, but don't really make much sense. But that part doesn't matter, because it's fun. Unfortunately, "A Blade In The Dark," is a giallo, and when giallos don't make sense, they just don't work.

Rating:
Summary: You Are A Female! You Are A Female!
Review: Lamberto Bava's A BLADE IN THE DARK from 1983 is one of the greatest giallos of all time regardless of the dubbing, which is rather incongruous and weird at times. This movie is a combination of the great Dario Argento's DEEP RED (my favorite giallo) and TENEBRE (Awesome ending!), where a composer is drawn into a bizarre murder mystery involving the former tenant of the villa that he's rented to compose a horror movie score. This movie had me on the edge of my seat whenever the killer was on the loose; the box cutter clicking made my skin crawl and the bathroom scene made me cringe with fear! The scene where the director of the horror movie in question gets strangled by the film of her own final reel, the one she doesn't anyone to see, left an impression on me; this was perfectly ironic and kind of humorous when you consider that the director is killed by her own movie! I also like the humorous tone of this movie (I actually read the booklet that came with the DVD, which is how I learned about the sense of humor); this must be a precursor to SCREAM in that respect.
Lamberto Bava learned a lot from his father Mario and Argento, with whom he worked with on INFERNO and TENEBRE, which is why this film is so good. I loved the music score in this one as well and I still have it stuck in my head as I write this review! In my opinion, although I knew about this movie since I read about it on Terrortrap.com (which summarized the entire film), the way the killer is revealed made me scream just like the ending in TENEBRE did! A must for giallo buffs and horror movie fans alike!

Rating:
Summary: Lamberto Bava's best film besides DEMONS
Review: Lamberto Bava, son of the great Mario Bava, comes through with one of the most interesting giallo's of the era. Slickly shot, paying homage to his father and Dario Argento, this is Lamberto's best shot film aside from DEMONS. A great tale to be told and a masterful way of showing it. The music score is great, this is a must buy for Argento, Bava, and/or Italian horror/giallo films!!!!