No lizards involved as far as I can tell... (A Lizard in a Woman's Skin (DVD))

Member Name: hogsflesh

Product:	A Lizard in a Woman's Skin (DVD)
Date:	20/07/09 (70 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Well made, surprising

Disadvantages: Badly dubbed

A review of just the film. A region 1 DVD costs about £7.50 on amazon.

Made in 1971, this is an Italian giallo directed by Lucio Fulci. Gialli are elaborate murder mysteries in which the brutal murder scenes and general scary ambience make them into horror films rather than detective films. They proliferated in Italy from the late-60s onwards. There are absolutely loads of them and they're very formulaic.

Carol Hammond, the wife of a rich lawyer (and daughter of an even richer lawyer), starts having crazy dreams which all end with her sleeping with her decadent female neighbour. Then one day she dreams that she brutally murders the neighbour... and soon enough the neighbour turns up dead, with wounds that exactly match those in Carol's dream. An open-and-shut case, you might think, but of course there wouldn't be much a film if it were.

This is a genuinely impressive film. Most gialli I can take or leave - they're strings of set-piece murder scenes with an often ludicrous plot to tie them all together. This one is a lot better than average, and does some genuinely surprising things while staying within the format. It has a number of giallo trademarks - unrestrained colours, a lengthy scene in which the heroine is stalked by a killer, a lounge soundtrack, a complicated plot - but it's not just going through the motions until the next killing. In fact the murders, of which there aren't many, are generally not shown at all, we just see the dead bodies. There's one startlingly unpleasant scene, in which Carol somehow stumbles across a vivisection lab in a hospital, with eviscerated but still-living dogs dangling over buckets. It's incredibly realistic, and Fulci had to prove in court that no real dogs were harmed in the scene.

Fulci went on to become a noted Italian horror director, giving us ultra-gory movies like Zombie Flesh Eaters and The New York Ripper. He's someone who horror fans tend to rave about, but he doesn't have the kind of mainstream name recognition of someone like George Romero or Dario Argento. Although I've enjoyed a lot of Fulci's films, I think fandom has tended to rather overrate him. But this is genuinely impressive in a way that some of his later films aren't. He directs the hell out of it, with fancy camera angles and crazy movement, which actually adds to the film's atmosphere (that kind of thing can all too often distract from the story and just be irritating). The vibrant colours and the use of focus also add to the film's effect - these kinds of films aren't usually made as well as this, or with as much thought. I was pleasantly surprised.

There is real tension at times (the big chase scene is long, but keeps the suspense going), and there's a great sense of slightly visceral unease. The scene with the dogs is both gratuitously gory and genuinely disturbing. The dream sequences occasionally evoke Francis Bacon, kind of (and Carol's apartment has some rather weak imitation Bacons all over the walls - presumably they couldn't use real ones for copyright reasons). The film has ambition, if nothing else...

It's filmed in London and finds some good locations without ever showing us Big Ben or Trafalgar Square. This does cause some problems, though, as most of the cast are clearly Italian; the dubbing is often slightly out of synch with their lip movements, and the voices don't sound quite right. (The version I've seen is dubbed into English, although it switched to subtitled Italian for one scene - this isn't unusual in DVD releases that try to piece together the most complete versions of films from different sources.) The police sirens are completely wrong, too.

But the cast is good. Florinda Bolkan, later to take the title role in Flavia the Heretic, is excellent as Carol, doing confused, tortured and scared extremely well (she sort of looks miserable even when she's meant to be cheerful, which isn't a bad trait for an actress to have). The detective investigating the case is played by Stanley Baker, a Welsh hard-man actor who was very popular in Britain in the 50s - he's pretty good, constantly smoking and drinking, and quite convincing as a cop. Veteran character actor Leo Genn is also very good as Carol's concerned father.

Other than the odd dubbing catastrophe, this does use sound well, especially Stanley Baker's constant, annoying whistle. The soundtrack is provided by the great Ennio Morricone in lounge mode. It's good stuff, with some of the best tracks being featured on one or other of the Mondo Morricone compilations, but he did much the same kind of soundtrack in dozens of films. It's good music and a pleasant accompaniment to the film, but it doesn't really complement the action.

There isn't a huge amount of nudity or violence on offer here, but I suspect it would still be an 18 if released in the UK (mainly for those dogs, but there's a fairly gruesome nude corpse, too). This is a good film with an engaging plot. Usually you can guess whodunit in a giallo fairly easily - anyone still alive in the last 20 minutes who hasn't been suspected already - but I failed dismally to second guess this one. The title is kind of explained, but it's a bit tenuous - I'd guess they just went with it because it's memorable and strange - something I'd say is true of the film itself.

Summary: A much better than average Italian horror