Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Eyeball

Eyeball (1975)
AKA Gatti rossi in un labirinto di vetro
AKA The Secret Killer

Starring: Martine Brochard, John Richardson
Directed By: Umberto Lenzi

Review By: "Machine Gun" Kristin

SPOILERS! (*Zoinks!*) 



The poster for this film, "Eyeball" definitely surpasses the film, which is always a bummer. I didn't think the movie was as terrible as said through some various sources, including its "dog" rating from the Deep Red catalog itself. This movie is pretty far removed from calling it a gore film since it's maybe 20% bloody and too obscure to find a cult Lifetime channel movie type status. I'd say it's more mystery than horror, but being directed by Umberto Lenzi ("Cannibal Ferox") might just give it the Italian horror title, but it's probably more towards the Giallo side of the genre. Giallos a lot of times are like soap operas or romance novels. 


We follow a nervous wreck of a woman named Alma (Marta May), popping pills on a plane bound for Spain which is where this whole movie takes place. I kinda wondered if Umberto had some frequent flyer miles to blow and decided to make a movie around that so he could be surrounded by really good looking women for a couple of months. We end up hanging out with an odd batch of travelers making goofy remarks about America, led by a completely insane tour guy with a penchant for scaring people with fake spiders. As soon as they start "sight"-seeing (harhar, see what I did there?), an innocent girl is knifed to death. Her eyeball is removed, leaving a dark spot over her face. We're bounced around from one failed theory to another as to who's committing these same exact killings, which occur a few times. It's fun to guess who it may or not be, because thankfully I didn't guess it right, so at least there's that sense of interest to keep you watching. I mean, you might as well "see" it through right?  (sorry, I'll stop with the puns). There's some nice scenery, some kool outfits ("look" at the stewardess on the plane!), a discotheque, and even a creepy haunted house ride. We end up seeing part of that sequence twice in the pretty lazy opening credit display of a hodge podge of scenes that don't have anything to do with another. They might have been trying to string together some symbolism with the various red raincoats and night robes shown throughout, but who knows. I certainly know they thought people would appreciate the cute lesbian couple or the multiple pairs of boobs dispersed through the movie. haha. 


The music in the film was sort of maudlin and kinda bland. It was a bit repetitious, since they used the same two pieces over and over. The first one sounded like the traditional power ballad type opening keyboard notes, which kept making me think of that horrid "Don't Speak" song by No Doubt, getting stuck in my head. Then the other piece of music sounding just like the theme from CAN"T THINK OF IT FOR THE LIFE OF ME! Anyone? Anyone?


Anyway, there are better movies than this of the genre, but it's not as awful as people say it is. Just be warned, it's very tame. 


Check out the trailer for "Eyeball":


Make sure you follow me on Instagram to check out my cult movie, etc buttons that I make and sell. Here's one I made just for this review. 
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1 comment:

  1. Okay, I figured out the theme I was thinking of! It was "Charlie's Angels" !

    ReplyDelete

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