Schlocktoberfest XV – Day 03: Deep Red | Hard Ticket to Home Video

Deep Red (1975)

Country of Origin/Production: Italy

Trailer:

*Spoilers Throughout*

What’s This About: A killer in black stalks Italy. Pretty much the basis of all Giallos if you boil it right down.

Here are some of my observations as I watched the film:

Let’s see: Soundtrack by Goblin? Check. A killer wearing black gloves? Check. Daria Nicolodi stars? Check. Congratulations Signor y Signora Alberghetti – it’s a Giallo.
Goblin were definitely in a Mike Oldfield phase with their music for these opening titles.
White text on a black background – very Landis/Folsey.
That should have been the name of the font they always used in their titles.
Exactly one minute in and there’s a stabbing during Christmas. I fucking adore Giallos.
That’s a piano fit enough to make Rick Wakeman jealous.
Argento’s POV’s were always superior to everyone else’s IMO.
This Congresso di Para Psicologia shouldn’t put the wheelchair dude in the aisle. That’s a fire vio if I’m not mistaken, and I seldom am.
This scene is very deep red. Capice?
C’e qualcosa che vuoi condi vedere con il resto di noi, fantastico larry?
A smoking priest in Harry Potter glasses is fucking frightening. He must have just gotten laid.
The congress on Scanners had a much better entertainment value to it.
If Kirsten Dunst has an older Italian Aunt somewhere in Rome, Helga is her.
There’s something about cheesy Giallo acting that comes across as very sincere.
That cunt huckster Theresa Caputo wishes she could hold a crown like this.
Uh oh. Black Gloves.
Helga can feel the killer and his thoughts, but is completely unaware that the prick is ten feet away watching her.
Fucking Argento. You can’t hate the guy. Red yarn on black velvet with child drawings of murder. Molto bene.
Was that a Phantasm orb?
Tra l’altro, tutte le scene con i guanti neri sono state girate da Argento.
The killer insists upon heavy eyeliner it seems.
Some of these shots are just worth pointing out how awesome they are.
My subtitle file isn’t picking up Helga’s German. Che cosa?
That was an incredibly odd scene setup – but one of the best meat cleaver murders this author has seen in the past two weeks.
Jazz pianist guy from the opening is solemnly walking around Rome at night like he’s in a Level 42 video from 1983.
That was esoteric even for me.
This scene with the drunk bandmate could have been cut signore.
Un urlo nella notte! Evoca Batman!
In this stupid fucking woke culture, you can no longer publicly toast a rape out loud. Even when intoxicated. What the Hell is the world comin’ to?
In one of the greatest kill scenes ever put to celluloid, Marcos sees Helga get murdered in her window – and when she gets hit in the head with the meat cleaver; her obvious mannequin stand-in hits the glass. Her throat is cut on the shards of glass and then the music sounds like Vince Guaraldi jumped into a session with Yes when he was not invited to do so.
We need more bass solos in horror movies.
Holy shit Marco! Way to destroy and contaminate the fucking crime scene.
Is it bad to say Helga had nice tits when she was pulled off the window pane shards? Nah.
Argento’s actors always went the distance for him, ya gotta admit.
The fucking soft subtitle file won’t activate when needed even with English dub. The actors go from English to Italian for no reason in some parts.
The asshole cop eating a sandwich while interrogating Marcus is quite the cunt.
Hey everybody! It’s Asia Argento’s mom!
To me it’s a big deal.
Marcus pulled Helga’s body off the window, asked the cops about the status of the crime scene, and then wonders why the polizia are pissed off at his brazenness.
I bet it would have been fun to be that drunk walking around Rome at night back in 1975.
Don Corleone’s funeral was far more regal.
I know Italian films had no sync sound, but for fucks’ sake we’re jumping from English to Italian every five minutes here.
Argento era un vero maestro, ma la sua comicità, beh, non è poi così buona?
The Man In Black was fucking up shit long before his appearance in 1989’s Halloween 5.
Asia’s mom had a kinda Eve Arden in Grease kinda thing going on.
This arm wrestling scene could have been cut too.
If you’re gong to smoke those Johnny Depp, More 120 looking bastards – it helps if you know how to do some tricks with them.
Saying you’re here to see Carlo is not a good thing were this the Godfather.
Crazy old actress Mother of Marcus’ friend Carlo is not giving off any weird vibes at all.
Knew that was a dude. No mustache jokes on Italian women please, I’ve heard ‘em all. I’ve wrote ‘em all.
The fucking English cut out to Italian in the middle of the fucking sentence that time.
The smoky Italian jazz bar is a scene I regretfully will never dig.
I always loved how Argento would silently crash through a window for a scene transition.
A killer that brings a reel to reel tape player to a kill is definitely not fucking around.
Judging by the killer’s voice, I would guess that it’s Mercedes McCambridge.
The Italian parapsychologist Elon Musk-looking stronzo finally gives us some exposition with the House of The Screaming Child lore.
Argento wanted this scene to be noisy, so a press conference and standing in front of a cappuccino machine should do it.
You walk into your living room and find a baby doll in a noose hung from your ceiling. You immediately leave and start a new life 14 states away am I right or wrong here?
Amanda runs out of her house and screams for Elvira. I have no idea what Cassandra Petersen could do in this situation. However being such a huge fan, I am open to suggestions.
The killer’s eye in the hall closet was really fucking cool.
È un occhio molto femminile, quindi l’assassino è sicuramente una donna.
That was a spoiler if you are translating these.
Amanda had a baby doll and it’s head popped off.
Amanda has access to the Laurie Strode knitting needle defense kit thankfully.
What are the exact odds for spearing your pet bird out of the air in mid-flight with a knitting needle, without even really aiming?
Yeah, don’t crawl for the front door Amanda, crawl for the bathroom. Ritardato.
The killer burns Amanda in hot bathwater, just like Michael Myers will do the same to Pamela Susan Shoop in seven years.
Fucking Marcus is a giorno late and a lira short in getting to Amanda’s house.
That’s two murders you’ve been present for Marcus and two crime scenes you’ve destroyed. Maybe Italy is not the place for you, capice?
The POS police captain went total Hanson Brothers on that macchina per coke.
La polizia italiana non ha mai catturato il mostro di Venezia, quindi non vedo nemmeno questo assassino incarcerato.
Does Michale Vick live here?
Does anyone in Italy know how to handle a fucking crime scene?
There are huge amounts of hot water in italian bathrooms – must be nice.
Giordani figures out that Amanda was trying to write something on the wall in the steam as she died. Turns out all she wrote was, “It was.” Thanks for fucking nothing.
I never realized just how many shots were ripped off from Argento.
Jesus fuck, that was a real lizard with a needle through it. European horror in the seventies did not give a fuck about animal cruelty in case you were wondering.
Creepy as fuck little ginger piece of shit.
We’re gonna watch Marcus explore every inch of this fucking Villa aren’t we?
Si.
OK, there’s definitely a clue in the mural painted underneath the sheet rock. Are we going to watch Marcus scrape off every fucking inch?
Si.
That window glass falling on Marcus could have been something but it wasn’t.
After all that scraping, the final figure in the mural is revealed after Marcus leaves. This is becoming the weirdest level of Myst I ever completed.
This obvious set-up for Giordani’s murder is taking so long, I’m surprised he didn’t fly to India to grow the tea leaves for the cup off tea he takes a year to pour.
Holy shit & biscuits is that fucking doll creepy.
The killer fucking curb stomps Giordani on all of the furniture in his room like it’s American History X. Then impales him through the neck on to a table. Il Maestro!
Daria Nicolodi is very weird in this film.
Ok Dario, we got 26 minutes left, andiamo with the coda.
This is becoming a giallo about the mysteries held within poorly applied sheetrock.
Gotta hand it to Marcus though, he Indiana Jones’s his way outta almost everything.
Liberty style architecture was very conducive to free climbing.
That room with the old Christmas tree looks like the attic in the house I grew up in. The dead body wasn’t there though. I don’t think…
Another blow to the head, another concussion. This movie is worse than the NFL and the NHL combined.
Not to Monday morning quarterback, but I think some of the clues in the Menendez Brothers case were overlooked.
Gianana is really being set up as a falsa pista.
Creepy ginger kid drew the same killing picture as the one in the mural under the sheet rock. They used to burn them for a fucking reason folks.
Only Argento could make a scary abandoned boarding school look scarier.
There’s that fucking drawing again.
Gianna wasn’t the killer folks, Carlo stabbed her. Duh-duh-duhnnnn!
In an awesome murder set piece, Carlo escapes Marcus and the cop. Then gets hit by a garbage truck, dragged down the fucking street underneath it, smashes his head on every curb available, then finally gets his head run over by an oncoming car. Sheer. Bloody. Poetry.
Gianna survived. Va bene.
Uh oh. The black gloves are after Marcus again.
It was Carlo’s crazy-ass mother. Who saw that coming?
I guessed it.
She looks like an older Pam Adlon with a face full of flour.
She looks like Joan Crawford in flashback.
Killed her husband right in front of Carlo on Christmas day with that fucking kid’s song playing. Well, that explains it all. Time for the wrap-up.
Carlo’s killer Mom gets her necklace caught in an elevator.
Like you do.
Marcus then sends it down – decapitating her.
La fine.

Final Thoughts: If I had to, in terms of quality, plot, sound and art direction; I’d consider this Argento’s Empire Strikes Back. Even more so over Suspiria which was his visual masterpiece. It’s been awhile since I’ve been to il paese di Giallo, and I’ve been gone far too long…

How Italian 🇮🇹 is it: You might as well ask how Italian Sophia Loren is. The name giallo is probably your first clue – it screams it for fucks’ sake. 100% Tariff.

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