Director: Jess Franco
Year: 1974
Country: Spain
Alternate Titles: La noche de los asesinos; Night of the Assassins; Night of the Killers
Genre: Giallo
Plot:
Following their father’s death, a group of relatives are brought together to look over his will during a raging thunderstorm to figure out what their inheritance will be, but when a masked madman begins killing them one by one must figure out his plan and stop it to escape alive.
Review:
Overall, this was a fairly fun genre outing. Among the better elements within here comes from the rather formulaic storyline that manages to make this one tie into the genre rather nicely while giving everything a rather unique and likable touch. The usual employ of a group of greedy and unscrupulous heirs looking to get their hands on the inheritance of their late patriarch after his death, only to find themselves drawn into a murder plot while being forced to stay at his mansion house as a term for the release of the money to them, makes for a generally serviceable storyline. Knowing the formula to everything from the get-go, this allows the film to go through the motions of getting everything out in the open from the start, including the matter of getting a chance to look at everyone’s history that includes any number of nefarious activities and sexual deviances that make for a solid series of red herrings to pop up. From the son who married a foreigner the patriarch didn’t approve of, a lecherous family member who carried on abusing the maid in violent rituals for his perverse desires, and scheming relatives coming out of the blue with claims to the property left there, these all allow for a solid slew of familiar melodrama to emerge out of the storyline setup.
As well, that also provides this with the kind of ambiance that serves this with no small means of Gothic atmosphere. With the setup allowing this no small opportunity to allow the characters to stab each other in the back for their own gain already, the setup takes place on the house grounds during a series of violent thunderstorms that capture a killer in a skull lurking around killing them off one by one. Using the shadows and the various convoluted hallways around the house to skulk around the various rooms of the estate leaving a trail of bodies in their wake ranging from being killed with a knife plunged into their back, smashed in the face with a rock and left to drown on nearby rocks as the tide rolls in, and another being set on fire while still alive. While not particularly violent or graphic, this is often brutal enough to get the point across about how conniving and ruthless the killer actually is, since this offers up more of a murder mystery regarding who’s responsible and why. Falling back to the expected finale where everything comes together, including the reveals and different motivations coming together for the interactions present within here, this has some rather fun moments that are enough to make for a fun time here.
There isn’t much wrong here, but it does manage to bring about a few mild flaws. The biggest issue will undoubtedly be the general familiarity found here with the film’s setup and storyline coming across as inherently overused in the genre. Since this comes across as essentially unaltered from the central setup used dozens of times over in this style where a group of relatives are brought together to read the will of a dead member of the family only to find themselves being stalked and killed by someone unwilling to share everything with them makes this quite easy to spot what’s going on and what’s going to happen rather easily. The plot turns, and the general format of the film will be rather obvious for some out there who will be able to figure this out easily and early on, making it possible for some to find the film unexciting as it goes along. There’s also a rather obvious lack of violence or sleaze here that might be somewhat off-putting, especially for those looking for this type of content in a film that seems served to showcase such salacious material, where we get brutal but somewhat bloodless kills and hardly any nudity, which is a bit distressing. This isn’t a necessity, but it does make the film seem more old-fashioned than it really is, and with the low-budget presentation being quite obvious, are what holds this down.
Overview: ***.5/5
An overall enjoyable if somewhat flawed Gothic-tinged giallo effort, there’s a lot to like here, which offers up plenty of enjoyable factors that hold this up quite well over a few minor issues. Those who appreciate any of the aspects of the style within here, enjoy Eurohorror from this era in general, or who are fans of the creative crew will have a lot to like, while those turned off by these factors should heed caution.
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