![]() The actress is simultaneously terrifying and amusing, and always mesmerizing, anchoring the occasionally hokey proceedings with her nuanced performance that feels surprising at every turn. Shaye has a field day with her character, for whom such expressions as “It’s time to finally bury that hatchet” and “When it’s your time, it’s your time” have diabolical undertones. Not surprisingly, Joyce doesn’t handle the situation gracefully at all well. ![]() Not long after, Sarah comes to stay at the house for a few days and strikes up romantic sparks with Bob. She also begins a correspondence with Sarah, describing her relationship with her new tenant in wildly exaggerated fashion. She coyly asks him to bring her a towel while she’s taking a bath, and, while he’s out, takes the opportunity to use his toothbrush with an almost erotic fervor. Joyce becomes besotted by Bob and soon begins dressing provocatively (but looking absurd) and flirting outrageously in the manner of a love-struck teenager. The plot machinations of Stuart Flack’s screenplay can be seen from a mile away, but that doesn’t make this familiar tale of a vengeful, obsessed woman any less satisfying. Sarah and Edward leave soon afterwards, but Joyce finds another tenant in the form of Bob (Oliver Rayon), a sexy drifter with a mysterious past and a tendency to get into fistfights. “Only one for you, you’re a little fat,” Joyce announces. And though Joyce and Sarah become friendly, the older woman alienates Edward, particularly when offering them cookies. Joyce’s first guests are Sarah (Valeska Miller) and her boyfriend Edward (Casey Nichols Price), whom she treats with almost motherly attention. ![]() After being periodically harassed by a group of skateboarding teenagers who keep making lewd remarks, she finally snaps, angrily striking back and stunning the group’s leader by forcefully kissing him on the mouth. Peter McEnery as Henry is also very good, never quite letting us fully believe in him as either a hero or villain.It becomes apparent early on that Joyce, who spends most of her time reading romance novels. Bolkan is extremely good, and she is good company. ![]() Turns out little Nicoletta Elmi had also starred in ‘A Bay of Blood’, ‘Who Saw her Die?’, ‘Flesh for Frankenstein’ and ‘Deep Red’ (among others) by this time – not a bad resume for an 11 year old.Īs for everything else, the occasionally muggy story is undoubtedly lifted by the acting. In her bid to reclaim her memory, Alice runs into a little girl with piercing eyes, who looked familiar to me. Luckily the moon shots are brief in total, leaving us more time to enjoy the elegant architecture and beautifully shot (this was director Luigi Bazzoni’s last film) locations in Rome and Turkey. That moment of self-congratulation aside, I found this to be an intriguing, rather artily-shot thriller. What was interesting to me that I spotted that heroine Alice’s short hairstyle was in fact a wig (the join was given away in a close-up early on), and her longer hair – a wig in the film – seems actually to be actress Florinda Bolkan’s real hair. There’s no black gloved killer, no nudity, no gore and no rousing soundtrack. I came away from it deciding it is definitely not a giallo, and that Kinski’s involvement was far too brief. I was first moved to watch this because it been described as a giallo in several articles, and stars the fearsome Klaus Kinski.
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