cinema history class: the black belly of the tarantula (1971)

The session: "Giallos in Honor of Mrs. Zuber"
Keith's mother-in-law passed away, so this month of giallos is dedicated to her.

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 2: The Black Belly of the Tarantula (1971)
Directed by Paolo Cavara

My Level of Prior Knowledge:
I think I'd heard of it, but I'm not sure. All these giallos have poetic titles that reference animals.

Plot:
Women are being stabbed to death, and a conflicted investigator is trying to solve the mystery.

Reaction and Other Folderol:
I'm really not a huge giallo fan, but this was a great bit of psychosexual mystery, and a really good (arguably great) movie. Whereas many giallos have confused and confusing endings, this did a good job of tying together the loose ends. There were little touches that I really appreciated, though I probably missed some. I would have totally missed the bit with the lost contact lens if not for the fact that Joe pointed it out -- and he said he missed it the first time he saw the movie.

I have to wonder why there were so many redheaded women. Was it for distraction? Was it because they looked dramatic against drab backgrounds? I wouldn't mind except that so many similar-looking women made the plot confusing.

One thing I found particularly disturbing is the fact that the murder victims were apparently paralyzed but kept conscious before being stabbed -- a particularly cruel touch. But it did serve the purpose of connecting the movie with its title.

But spiders aren't insects, damnit!

Ratings
Me: 9.5
Bob-O: 9
Christina: 9.4
Dave: 9.4
Ethan: 8.5
Joe: 10

cinema history class: the bird with the crystal plumage (1970)

The session: "Giallos in Honor of Mrs. Zuber"
Keith's mother-in-law passed away, so this month of giallos is dedicated to her.

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 1: The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970)
Directed by Daroio Argento

My Level of Prior Knowledge:
This is one of those movies that I was peripherally aware of -- primarily through my association with Keith and this class. But I really knew very little about it beyond the basics.

Plot:
After witnessing a murder, an writer decides to involve himself in the investigation -- with terrible consequences for himself and his lover.

Reaction and Other Folderol:
By way of full disclosure, I should note that I have, sadly, come to realize that I'm not really a big fan of the genre. I can't exactly say why. I remember, back in 2017, The Quad Cinema (in Manhattan's Greenwich Village) was having a Bava festival -- showing the films of Mario Bava. Ethan and I saw half a dozen or so Bava giallos, and I was less than enthralled. It has been suggested that I overloaded myself, seeing too many of the films in a short period, so maybe there's that.

At any rate (and trying to factor out my general disinterest in the giallos), this is a good mystery. There were many twists and turns, and I really had no idea where it was going until the end. There were a lot of red herrings, and I loved the sense of artistic voyeurism. Tony Musante, known for his performances in some great Spaghetti Westerns, turned in a really strong performance, but the real kudos go to Suzy Kendall who played the girlfriend. There's a scene near the end, where she is alone in her apartment trying to keep the murderer from breaking in. That scene is pure adrenaline and suspense, and Kendall made it.

I'm not sure what it says about how movies have trained me that, during the final scene -- almost an epilogue -- I kept expecting something shocking to happen. Maybe the plane would explode, maybe the flight attendant would reveal herself as the murderer. Something. After Carrie and other movies with endings that did the same, it just didn't feel right to me to have the movie end with a clear ending.

I'd like to note something about giallos. They tend to have poetic, intriguing titles that are peripherally related to the plot, but that don't really tell you what the movie is about. This is a good example -- the title is a reference to a specific -- and important -- element of the plot. But it doesn't really give much away. Unlike, say, Slumber Party Massacre, the tile of which kind of tells the audience exactly what to expect.

Ratings
Me: 8
Bob-O: 9.6
Christina: 9.6
Dave: 9.7
Ethan: 8.5
Joe: 10

cinema history class: the wild bunch (1969)

The session: "And the Train Kept a Rollin'"
We look at Spaghetti Westerns with an eye toward trains and how they helped change the West

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 4: The Wild Bunch (1969)
Directed by Sam Peckinpah

My Level of Prior Knowledge:
I knew of this film and its reputation for being very violent and very good. But I knew nothing about the plot. I think I had imagined it to be something like The Magnificent Seven. I was wrong about that

Plot:
As the old West is making way for the new, an aging gang, used to the old ways, tries to pull off one last glorious robbery.

Reaction and Other Folderol:
The Wild Bunch is, in one important way, the odd man out in our annual month devoted to Spaghetti Westerns: It's an American film, and therefore not a Spaghetti Western. I actually asked Keith about his choice when he first told us what he would show. And his explanation was that this movie, despite being American, owes a lot to Spaghetti Westerns. In fact, he told me, Sam Peckinpah said he never would have made The Wild Bunch if not for Sergio Leone's The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

Having gotten that explanation from Keith, I was expecting to see something that felt like a Spaghetti Western. But I didn't get that. The fact is that The Wild Bunch feels very much like an American Western. I never would have mistaken it for its Italian-made relatives. What it does owe to them, however, is the extreme violence. The violence isn't brutal the way it is in the Italians' films. The torture that we expect from Corbucci and Leone is absent -- or at least largely so. And yet the violence itself -- most of it through repeated gun battles -- seems to be unending. There's a lot more of it than the Italian films had.

There is definitely a theme to this film. We have a bunch of men coming to terms with their own obsolescence. There are frequent references to the fact that the world is changing. The heroes as such, are thieves and killers. But they stick to a code of honor and the story is told from their perspective. And the audience (or at least I) can't help but sympathize with them and hope that, if they can't stop the world, they can at least leave it on their own terms. And this movie, making its point about the changing world, is the perfect one to close the session on, because the civilizing of the west was a major theme in all the movies Keith showed this session.

A great cast makes this a really great movie.

Ratings
Me: 9
Bob-O: 9.8
Dave: 9.8
Ethan: 9.5