Smile Before Death (1972) by Silvio Amadio


Director: Silvio Amadio
Year: 1972
Country: Italy
Alternate Titles: Il sorriso della iena
Genre: Giallo

Plot:
Following her mother’s death, a teen moves home to look into what’s going on and discovers the awkward relationship between her stepfather and his assistant, but when she starts to make strange claims about the incident forces them to play a thrilling plan to protect a deadly secret between them.

Review:

This here is an effective and enjoyable enough sleazy thriller. Among it’s better features is the wholly impressive storyline at play that offers quite a lot to like. With the initial belief of the suicide taken care of and arriving at the studio where the photography and modeling career she inadvertently enters into, this provides a stellar backdrop for the caregivers to appear appropriately shady. Given how this slowly dawning facet with their interactions with each other or treatment towards her is played out, the disbelief at the suicide prognosis feels realistic.

When this setup fully blows up into the assumption of something happening, the full-born changeover into how she presents herself to the turn into a dual-pronged sexual game is quite fun. Playing the innocent girl just discovering her wild and uninhibited side with each of them, how this plays out with her seduction towards them both as the sexual escapades under the guise of trying to carry out a relationship with them both is quite impressive. As the manipulations carry on and both sides become aware of everything the tension and suspense is just as great as the eroticism.


That is also one of the other fine positives in its sleaze and genre-trappings. The various photoshoots and scenes of the two together where it usually resorts to fully nude couplings add nicely to the sleazy air here just as much as the traditional erotic moments of him and her being together. Since we’ve seen this occur through their seduction and corruption, this is quite a fun addition to the film with the more overt thriller elements in the final half which employs some action and suspense as well as several solid twists that are quite surprising for a lot to like here.

There are a few minor issues with this one. One of the main flaws is the rather clumsy work done for the heroine of the film which makes sense in the finale yet before gives this a confusing and rather unsympathetic lead. Openly coy about seducing both of them and going from the doe-eyed ingenue with little believable means of accomplishing that is a bit confusing, much in the same way that the end reveals seems to throw all of the events from the previous build-up about them which all makes for an unlikeable lead. Overall, these here hold this one back.


Overview: ***.5/5
A throwback effort more focused on the sleazy goings-on and the intricate double-crosses than actual stalking and slashing, this has a lot to like for fans of this format. Look into this one if you’re a fan of the creative crew or prefer the suspense thriller side of the giallo while those who prefer the body-count variation of the genre will be slightly put off here.

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