Director: Sergio Martino
Year: 1972
Country: Italy/Spain/United Kingdom
Alternate Titles: Tutti i colori del buio; They're Coming to Get You; Day of the Maniac; Demons of the Dead; I Am Scared, Darling
Genre: Giallo
Plot:
Traumatized by her unborn child's death, a woman finds that a figure from her past is causing more stress in her life which sends her into a Satanic cult which soon forces a strange murderer to strike her friends and finally brings her to an even dangerous breaking point.
Review:
This is quite the engaging and wholly fascinating Giallo. One of the strongest elements working here is the way this one manages to incorporate so many incredibly varied elements into a skillfully blended whole. The complex scenario, which initially appears as a deep-set psychological trauma/mystery about the bizarre dreams and the psychiatric manner of recalling it all, the film moves into psychedelic supernatural horror to a full-fledged Giallo and all these elements make for a very enjoyable time as it blends the real and unreal very well. Opening with the bizarre dream sequence with deliberately over-the-top camera angles and distorted lenses as the figure continually stabs at the naked woman, it gradually moves into an even more stylized take with even more visualized sequences taking the actions of her visualizations to even further, darker realms as the impressive scenes add a great deal to the tension of the scenes.
The wild and stunning Sabbat sequence, complete with the shrouded extras in the strange mansion and the strange manner in which they all congregate around her which brings about the greatness of the later scenes within their meetings with the hypnotic leanings and disorienting action bringing along plenty of chilling moments. Even more effective are the strong action scenes here, from the series of dreams depicting the murder of the strange woman to the chasing in the apartment as well as the short chase through the woods away from the cult's mansion that manages to spice up the film a little more. Going even further here in the last half here with the whole affair starting to come undone as well as finally featuring the ambush on the couple in the safe-house that becomes a full-fledged series of stalking and encounters throughout that offers up plenty to like, really making this one incredibly fun and enjoyable.
It does suffer from a few minor problems, most notably the fact that the film decides to forgo a lot of traditional genre set-ups in favor of the hypnotic visuals and strange hallucinations. There's no real murder mystery at the heart of this one as it goes for the mental stress she's undergoing more anything, leaving this one somewhat dull for long strands of time as it goes about detailing these more than putting her in danger of a psychotic killer. That might be a source of discomfort for some, as well as the continual need for going back-and-forth between the dream sequences and reality in order to keep the surprises coming. Otherwise, there's quite a lot to really enjoy here.
Overview: ****.5/5
While it does offer up a few small missteps in its eschewing of traditional genre fare for a combination of different outside elements, on the whole, this is still one of the more enjoyable giallo out there. Give it a look if you're a fan of this kind of non-typical Giallo effort, a genre completist in any aspect or Eurohorror in particular as well as aficionadoes of the creative crew, while viewers turned off by the flaws should heed caution overall.
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