Giallo in Venice (1979) User Reviews

Worth Seeking Out

[coolranchdavidians · 6/10 · 13 November 2013]

Giallo a Venezia, also known as Giallo In Venice, has a reputation for being one of the sleaziest films produced in an already sleazy sub genre. Giallos, for the uninitiated, are Italian horror films known for their extreme violence punctuated by scenes of explicit sex. They heavily influenced the American slasher films of the late 70s and early 80s, but for the most part these American films were not as extreme as their Italian counterparts.

There are few death scenes in Giallo a Venezia but they are quite gory. There's an immolation, a graphic dismemberment, and the usual requisite stabbings. Giallo a Venezia does feature plenty of sex and nudity, but the bare bodies on display do further the plot. After finding a married couple's dead bodies on the Venice beach our main character, a detective, is baffled by the crime's seemingly lack of motive. We spend the rest of the movie inter-cutting between the detective working on his case and flashbacks of the deceased married couple. The film's flashback structure is unique telling the story of the married couple's last days before their death. Their marriage is, to put it politely, very rocky. The husband is a cocaine addict and frequently indulges in kinky sex to debase his wife.

While Giallo a Venezia may lack the social commentary of Lucio Fulci or the swooping camera-work and visual styling of Dario Argento, it is still a giallo that can comfortably stand on merits of its own. Unlike some other giallos that have been loving restored and even presented on Bluray, tracking down a copy of Giallo a Venezia may present quite a challenge. I had to settle for a sub par VHS rip.

Nasty offering

[adriangr · 5/10 · 18 March 2008]

My god, this film is a piece of work. Rough as a bag of spanners. One of the ugliest and sleaziest giallos you could ever hope to see. Plot wise there is very little to say, the impact in this film comes from its audacious insistence on making everything look as unpleasant as possible.

But let me give you a quick plat re-cap. Two dead bodies are found at the edge of a canal in Venice. The police start asking friends of the late couple for clues, but as soon as they start their investigations, more dead bodies start piling up. What is the connection, and out of all the unsavoury characters that appear on the screen, does any of them have a clear alibi (or conscience)?

Enough of that then, what is really so bad about Giallo A Venezia? Well it's just that the sleaze factor is so high it's off the scale. The dead couple are at the centre of the plot, and the film consists of many flashbacks in which we see how the husband took pleasure in humiliating and sexually abusing his timid wife. The poor actress who plays Flavia (the wife) suffers the indignity of being stripped naked and roughed up in nearly every scene she appears...I hope she got paid well. Worse still, her husband Fabio is not blessed looks-wise, and add this to the fact that the sex scenes between the pair of them are completely devoid of chemistry makes watching them a real chore – and they go on for AGES!! You'll see a lot of Flavia naked which might have looked nicer if things were better filmed but the whole thing is done so sloppily that a lot of the time it's just not that exciting. Especially when Fabio is slobbering all over her (he's a really terrible kisser!) and trying to roll all over the place without showing his private bits, whereas of course there's no modesty allowed for his wife who is shown very graphically naked in several scenes.

The reason why I have had to devote a full paragraph to describing the sex scenes is because that's really all that happens for 75% of the films running time! Other than that, we have to sit through the police force carrying out their investigations which is kinda boring, even with the running gag of the main inspector eating hard boiled eggs in every scene (why? who knows... It must be an Italian thing), and some half hearted attempts by director Mario Landi to spin a web of mystery around the proceedings.

So that just leaves ...the murders. And just as he manages to make all the sex scenes ugly, unpleasant and graphic, Landi cuts no corners with the violence either. So prepare yourself for some very grim scenes of violence. Although the scenes are not dwelled on in loving detail like they are in a Lucio Fulci gore flick, they all seem to have a very nasty flavour to them. Scissor stabbings to the crotch and a human torch are two that spring to mind. Oh wait, did I say the gore is not dwelled on? Sorry I forgot the film's gore "highlight' in which victim has their leg sawed off while tied to the kitchen table. I have seen a lot of graphic gore but I found this intensely unpleasant. I think it's because it's just all sort of...thrown at you. No artistry to speak of, just events.

This film has absolutely no class whatsoever. And if you get a kick out of sleaze, it's almost possible to appreciate it on that level alone, but anyone with any taste in good cinema is likely to be left shaking their head in disbelief. Very hard to find - at time of writing there is no DVD or VHS release in print, so you're stuck with finding bootlegs if you want to track this down, and even then I believe it was originally released in Italian only – so make sure you get a subtitled copy if you must seek this out! A bleak, bizarre and depressing piece of grime, it's very hard to be positive about this movie. Even calling it a giallo is an insult to that genre, as the "whodunnit" value is very weak. Its just 90 minutes of bad simulated sex and some equally badly simulated murders, but if the phrase "in your face" was ever deserved, it is here.

Perversion in Venice.

[Fella_shibby · 4/10 · 30 December 2020]

I saw the 99 mins version of this movie for the first time recently as i got enticed into it aft reading some glowing reviews on imdb by Coventry n Harrison. The film is boring, the lead detective kept on munching hard boiled eggs, the pervert kept on his perversion while the abused girlfriend simply kept quiet, the other characters r not developed well n the killer's background story is nada. Unnecessary footage is given to weird sex scenes n less to the killer or the kills. In one scene, the killer leaves the scissor inside the private parts of a woman but the cop insists that the scissor was found at the killer's place which even the killer is not able to recollect whether he had left it at the murder site or na. The masturbation scene will give Natalie Portman's scene from Black Swan a tough competition. We have Mariangela Giordano who goes full nude n performs wild sex, the masturbatory nun from Malabimba n the pervert's mother from Burial Ground.

The film has few gory scenes but that gets overshadowed due to the unnecessary sex scenes. There is a scene where a guy gets shot by a gun n he does lots of overacting by doing writhing movements.

Sleazy but ultimately rubbish.

[Moshing Hoods · 10 September 2001]

This is sleazy. I've seen the English subtitled Luminous print of this film, and it is safe to report that as a giallo it fails miserably on every level. Not only is there a weak plot and zero suspense, but there is also laughably no attempt to conceal the identity of the killer who is in fact revealed in the first ten minutes or so of the film. Clearly Landi was aware of his shortcomings as a giallo director and so therefore decided to make up for it with lashings of jaw-droppingly misogynistic sexual violence, which he again showed a passion for in his later film "Patrick Lives Again".

A couple of scenes really stick out for absolute, grimy nastiness. Firstly, the vaginal stabbing of the prostitute. This scene has more parallels to old hardcore porn loops than it does the giallo genre, with poorly lit and explicit prolonged close-ups, shot on grainy stock. Secondly, the scene where Mariangela Giordano gets her leg sawed up. Even though the effects are poor, the absolute sadism and overall atmosphere makes you feel pretty sordid for watching it. It kinda reminded me of the similar (but more nasty) scene in The Last House On Dead End Street...

But is this enough to make this film good? NO. This is a failure as a giallo, and is only worth anything because of the outrageous violence.

Mean spirited and misogynistic giallo sickie

[Bogey Man · 1/10 · 16 February 2003]

Mario Landi's giallo attempt Giallo a Venezia (Italy, 1979) is incredibly exploitive and hyper sleazy film that tries to be more (but turns out to be less) than any of the previous films of the yellow (=giallo) genre. It concentrates on sadism, gore and almost hardcore level scenes of sex and masturbation. We cannot talk about a noteworthy film for the fans of Italian genre cinema from the sixties to the eighties, but we can talk about one of the lowest exploitation films ever made!

Flavia (Leonora Fani) and Fabio (Gianni Dei) are lovers, or "lovers" more precisely as we learn very soon that thair relationship is a little twisted. Fabio likes to make love while somebody's watching them and when that is not anymore enough (which is very soon once the film has started), he starts to whip his girl and also force her to whore herself while he himself is watching from a safe distance. This continues in various places and I don't think the reason for Fabio's acts is never really explained which is not a surprise either. Due to the film's circle-like structure and some surprising plot turns at the beginning and the end, I can't tell more about what happens, but without spoiling anything: a double murder takes place, a policeman (Jeff Blynn) starts to investigate and soon more murders take place and they all are as gratuitously graphic and disturbingly sick as could expect. Imagine a hard core porn film where all the porn is gore and violence and you have an idea what kind of a film Giallo a Venezia will be.

Naturally the film is awful on every noteworthy level. The cinematography is nothing special albeit the setting is beautiful and elegant and can be seen also in a much better and real giallo film Nero Veneziano (1977) by Ugo Liberatore. The acting is not TOO bad which naturally makes it easier to sit through the 91 minutes of sleaze on display. The soundtrack is rather amusing as it could fit perfectly in your average 70's porn flick, too, and that makes my above statement even more valid I think! So all the things and elements that made the giallo classics of Argento (Profondo Rosso, Tenebrae), Bava (Blood and Black Lace), Dallammano (What Have They Done to Solange) and Fulci (Don't Torture a Duckling, Sette note in nero, which are both his masterpieces) among many others so great are totally lacking in Landi's film but what can be found in it is the thing that wasn't the most important in those mentioned films: gore and sex.

The murders are not after all so plentiful but they are so calculated and just plain sick that the film ranks easily among the most nastiest films ever made. The three scenes in the film stand out and include a burning death (a scene that is equally sick with the early 80's US serial killer romp Don't Go in the House by Douglas), a repellent genital mutilation (like in Fulci's NY Ripper but even more explicit but no less gratuitous) and a leg sawing that reminds me of the infamous Japanese Guinea Pig sickies, especially part 2 directed by famous manga artist Hideshi Hino. Still Giallo a Venezia is never as depressing, haunting and mentally disturbing than the strongest of the mentioned Japanese underground cinema genre like Guinea Pigs. The effects are pretty good as can be expected by Italian production like this and the camera captures every detail in close up that makes the film's exploitation status so obvious and its lack of real merits so easy to see. Naturally the gore is so strong that if you (understandably) felt bad while watching Fulci's New York Ripper or other films with such misogynistic elements, then don't even try to (first) track down and watch Giallo a Venezia.

The other reason this film was made is naturally the sex and sleaze which is also more graphic than in the other giallos. The film includes many scenes of sex, masturbation and female nudity and they all are as long and detailed as the gore scenes. This film is so filled and covered with blood, smut and degradation it could easily be a film by the late Joe D'Amato, too, as his 1979 film Beyond the Darkness, alongside Landi's film, stand out in the list of all time nasties. Giallo a Venezia is the kind of film that can give the whole genre a bad name in its lack of ambition and interest to deliver nothing else than gore and sex.

The structure of the film however could be an effective one in a thriller like this and that is perhaps the only positive thing I can find in this film. Otherwise this film has nothing to make it interesting or worthwhile on any other level than exploitation. The film is a very rare little sickie and available only in various illegal forms and as far as I know, there are no legal English versions available. The Brazilian VHS should be the longest version but alongside the Italian tape it is very rare and hard to find. But after all, depending on what you're waiting from your films and giallos, that is not necessarily so bad thing. Many thanks to my dear friend and IMDb supporter Bart for offering me a chance to see this!

1/10

or 10/10 (if I'd wear a raincoat, both literally and symbolically in my taste in movies.)

Weak, disappointing giallo with overrated sleaze and gore

[Groverdox · 3/10 · 7 October 2020]

"Giallo a Venezia" is known as the sleaziest, most violent giallo out there. That means it is believed to feature content even in excess of "New York Ripper", so that is a pretty tall claim.

Having just watched it for the second or third time, I don't know if it deserves this reputation. It only really has a couple of notable violent moments, and the sleaze is limited to interminable softcore-like scenes that seem to take up the majority of the movie.

But about those violent scenes. They are, indeed, pretty nasty, including a scene where a prostitute is murdered by having her vagina repeatedly stabbed with a pair of scissors, and another scene where a naked woman's leg is sliced off, the knife cutting through as easily as if the flesh was three day old ham.

However, if you're looking for extreme violence, there's not enough of it here to satisfy you, and nor are the endless sex scenes very interesting.

Gialli were generally dazzlingly plot-driven, with lots of twists and turns that were often hard to predict. This one barely has any plot. It concerns a tedious investigation of the central murder carried out by a man who eats hard boiled eggs in every scene, and flashbacks to the murdered couple, detailing how the ugly, gay-Phil-Spector looking husband forced his wife into weird sex.

I didn't even realise that these were flashbacks at first. The movie sets them up so badly you can't tell.

In fact, the whole movie is badly structured. It's an unpleasant mess.

È esattamente quello che pensi che sia!

[BandSAboutMovies · 3/10 · 20 February 2020]

Let's get it straight: giallo can class it up at times, but at its heart, it's a scummy and brutal genre. No movie - save perhaps Play Motel or The New York Ripper - is as brazenly profane or messed up as this film. That's saying something, because this is the kind of genre where the heroine can be totally fine with a man making love to her on broken glass (The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh) or absolutely fine with the hero making a joke about having tradesman's entrance sex with her as a reward (Strip Nude for Your Killer, which predates Kingsman: The Secret Service by oh, three decades or so).

In case you were wondering, this is all brought to you by Mario Landi, who made a sequel to the Australian movie Patrick with Patrick Still Lives, except his movie has extensive sex scenes. Because Italian exploitation, that's why.

PS: Is it sad - or awesome - that I know that Patrick Still Lives was shot in the same house as Burial Ground?

Oh Leonora Fani. I watch your movies and feel bad for you, like you need protection from the maniacs making your films. Between this movie, Hotel Fear and The House By the Edge of the Lake, one starts to worry for your psyche. Here, she plays one part of a doomed couple - along with Gianni Dei, who played Patrick in the aforementioned Patrick Still Lives - who are killed by a maniac who likes to use scissors on very tender parts of his victim's anatomy.

Reviewing all of this is a cop with wild hair played by Jeff Blynn, who shows up in Stallone's Cliffhanger. He's so hard boiled that he eats hard boiled eggs throughout most of the film's running time.

Amazingly, Scorpion Releasing restored and re-released this film after they found the legendary uncensored version of this movie hiding in the attic of a Portuguese dental clinic. All copies have been sold out for a while, but man. Movies are weird sometimes.

This isn't the kind of film that I'd recommend to anyone, however. It has little to no redeeming value, as even its soundtrack is recycled from Interrabang and Burial Ground. For all of the vitriol thrown at The New York Ripper, that movie is positively restrained when compared to this. What do you expect from a movie that outright tells you that it's a giallo right from its title? There's nothing subtle at all here.

Man, I feel like Evelyn Quince from Tales of Ribaldry. "Our once baudy tale is turning into a tawdry tale of pornography! I don't like it!"

But seriously, this is pretty much the scummiest movie I've ever featured on this site and I regularly ingest Joe D'Amoto movies. Watch it at your own peril.

A chug in Venice

[Bezenby · 7/10 · 5 December 2018]

10:26 AM - Nov 22, 2018 #783 543) Giallo In Venezia (1979, Italy, Giallo, Director: Mario Landi)

Notable actors: Leonora Fani! Mariangela Giordani!

If Maurizio Merli and Richard Harrison got it on and had a child, that child would be actor Jeff Blynn. Blessed with Merli's bushy, fair hair and moustache, he also has the glare of real life ninja Harrison.

Jeff is a cop in Venice and he's got some case to solve: the murder of a married couple, one drowned, one stabbed in the crotch. More confusingly, the drowned woman has been removed from the water and left beside her husband. There was a witness to this, an old man who spies on everyone, but he's not talking for reasons that don't make any sense and aren't really explained at all.

Jeff goes to a friend of the couple, played by Mariangela Giordani, and there things start getting stranger. She's nervous as hell (I would be too seeing as Jeff insists on sitting right next to her and munching on boiled eggs all the time!) and seems to be avoiding Jeff's questions, until she caves in and the film descends into sleaze for what felt like about six hours.

Y'see, husband Fabio and wife Flavia (played by Leonora Fani, who is well named judging by how often the camera lingers on her crotch) are a couple of pervs, especially Fabio. Fabio likes to mix things up a bit in the sex department, as we'll see over and over and over again as Jeff conducts his investigation. This includes:

1) Getting strangers to spy on him while getting it on with Flavia. 2) Spying on strangers getting it on with Flavia. 3) Letting strangers cop a feel of Flavia in the cinema while knocking one out. 4) Having orgies with hookers and Mariangela Giordani. 5) Reading porn magazines, sniffing coke, whipping Flavia and then having sex with her for about ten seconds before blowing his wad. 6) Bumming Flavia while she was trying to put a washing on.

In a film that's just over an hour and half long, all this perversion doesn't leave a lot of time for Giallo-style antics, and maybe this is why director Landi just goes ahead and reveals the killer about half an hour in. That said, this is a giallo, not a slasher film, and things are that straightforward. They're not that great either mind you and the mystery is rather weak.

The violence and sex, however, is amped up to the max, well beyond what you'd expect. One character is tied to a table and has her leg graphically cut off while she watches on, while another is repeatedly stabbed in the fanny over and over again. You've got to kind of wonder what Landi was aiming for. The whole film is a wall to wall sleazefest that does live up to its reputation. And for the ladies, you get to see a guy having a chug in close up. It's as ridiculous as it sounds.

Overexploitation...

[markovd111 · 4/10 · 9 March 2024]

If there are exploitation movies, "Giallo in Venice" or "Giallo a Venezia" is an overexploitation movie. It seems that there are various versions of this movie circulating around, but I think I watched completely uncensored one. Where to start? A police detective that looks like a hippy singer from down the block leads an investigation concerning the murdered married couple. His only notable difference from other similar characters in this genre is that he walks around playing with or eating boiled eggs, which is only interesting because how stupid it is. Otherwise, he's the same old Italian detective spouting seemingly intelligent sentences. His sidekick, Maestrin, looks like he's a distant cousin of Benito Mussolini. The case they are working on is never particularly interesting, because killer is shown to us and the approaching plot twist can be predicted by anyone with a functioning brain. More than 40 minutes of the movie are wasted in showing sexual acts, almost all of them simulated, except from one scene where a man simply pulls out his penis and starts masturbating, because somebody thought we need to see that. The movie feels sleazy and perverse. There are legit exploitation movies that have shown nudity with far more taste and reason than this movie. For example "Cold Blooded Beast" is an horror/erotica movie that's not anything special, but it's at least better than this movie. I mean, what more do I need to tell you about this movie after I tell you there's an version featuring real sex scenes released only in Brazil (according to Wikipedia)? In the end, "Giallo a Venezia" fails to be both a good giallo and a good exploitation movie. It was probably shocking when it was released, but nowadays it's only shocking how dull and pointless it is. It's technically decently made, but even that's is nothing to write a home about. The movie is simply a boring relic of the past when boundaries of what could be shown on the film were being moved and Mario Landi probably thought he could make a quick buck by making a movie that is as sleazy as a movie can be. 4/10! Avoid it, there's nothing worth seeing here...

Adorable trash...

[Oggz · 6/10 · 28 July 2009]

...if for no other reason (of which really and truly there aren't any to speak of unless the trinity of coke, sex and murder is what gets you going) - then for Berto Pisano's stellar, lush, textbook pornographic musical score, all in routinely dizzying major 7 chords, swirling strings and the bop-bop melody firmly rooted in the 60's, already horribly dated by the time this was filmed (late 70's) but very charming and very pleasant nonetheless - for those into that sort of thing - it's a standout winner. What makes this additionally twisted is that the soundtrack is often strangely out of sync with what we see on screen (people are having copious amount of often kinky sex but are also being whipped, stabbed and mutilated to some rather blissful musical sounds, adding to the perverse appeal). The film is certainly a very decadent Eurotrash oddity worth checking out, provided you watch with your ears. And with your brain on leave.

Dumb

[dopefishie · 3/10 · 27 January 2023]

Poorly written. Bad cinematography. Feels more like a parody of a giallo than an actual giallo. It's hard to overstate how poor the direction is here. Giallo is infamous for its style... this has none. And the only mystery is why the characters are so dumb.

I will say that I enjoyed the well-dressed, egg eating detective - Inspector Angelo De Pol - played by Jeff Blynn. He is perhaps the dumbest character of all, but he is also so chill and likeable. The actors really did the best they could here with the bad writing they were given.

At the end of the day, this is a stunningly bad movie. But it is decidedly not so bad that it is good. Skip this one.

Truly disgusting and misogynistic giallo. **Spoilers**

[HumanoidOfFlesh · 8/10 · 20 March 2001]

"Giallo a Venezia" is,without a doubt,one of the sleaziest movies ever produced in Italy.Along with "The New York Ripper"(1982,Lucio Fulci)and "The Killer Is Still Among Us"(1985,Camillo Teti)this is possibly the nastiest giallo ever made.The film begins with a double murder on the Venetian docks:architect Fabio(Gianni Dei)is stabbed with a pair of scissors,while his wife Flavia(Leonora Fani)is drowned.The fact that Flavia was pulled back from the water by the killer after being drowned,intrigues inspector DePaul(Jeff Blynn)and his assistant Maestrin.As they begin investigating friends of the couple,such as Marizia(Mariangela Giordano from "Burial Ground" and "Malabimba"),they soon discover that Fabio was in fact a sex crazed cocaine addict,who could only achieve sexual gratification by violence and sick voyeurism put upon his wife.During the investigation Marizia begins to receive threatening phone calls from ex-lover and soon after that a series of brutal murders is set in motion.Director Mario Landi("Patrick Still Lives")fails to create any suspense or mystery.What Landi looses in mystery he more than makes up for with some of the most brutal violence and sex ever put on the screen.The violence in "Giallo a Venezia" is truly shocking.A prostitute is stabbed repeatedly in the crotch in one of the most sickeningly audacious murder sequences ever filmed.Another gory highlights include Giordano being tied naked to her kitchen table and having her leg cut off with a handsaw by the killer and Marizia's lover being doused in gasoline and set alight.The long sex scenes are pretty explicit and it's quite obvious that Landi's intentions were only to show as much sex and blood as he could.To sum up,if you like sleaze and extreme gore then you should check this one out.Recommended!

Incredibly Sadistic and Sleazy Giallo

[Witchfinder-General-666 · 6/10 · 23 May 2010]

Quelle surprise! Before watching the relatively unknown "Giallo a Venezia" (1979) I certainly didn't expect it to be one of the nastiest, sleaziest, most sadistic and misogynistic films of the Giallo-genre (which generally doesn't scant with sleaze and violence). Director Mario Landi's supremely sleazy flick is certainly no Giallo-highlight, but still highly recommended to all the fans of genuine 70s nastiness.

The film already starts like a punch in the gut, when a guy is repeatedly stabbed in the groin. The corpses of the guy and his wife are found shortly thereafter, he obviously died of the groin-stabbing, she was drowned and then dragged out of the water. When investigating the case, Inspector DePaul (Jeff Blynn) finds out that the murdered couple had a somewhat unusual sex life: The husband was a deranged pervert, who would constantly force his poor young wife (Leonora Fani) to participate in demented and exhibitionist sex-activities. As the couple's acquaintances are interrogated, more people are getting killed...

Half of the film consists of pretty deranged sex-scenes, the rest is full of truly nasty killings. For Giallo-standards, there are not very many murders, but those that take place are brutal as hell: A guy gets (repeatedly) stabbed in the groin, a woman gets (repeatedly) stabbed in the vagina, a guy gets burned alive, and a naked woman (played by Mariangela Giordano, who also had her nipple bitten off in Andrea Bianchi's ultra-gory Zombie flick "Burial Ground") has her leg sawed off while still alive. The music is sub-standard for a Giallo, and even though set in beautiful Venice, the film (unlike most Gialli) features little cinematographic elegance. The budget was pretty low, as it seems, and most of the money probably went into the brutal gore effects, and into paying the actresses to undergo all the sleaze going on on camera. Since none of the characters are likable, there is little suspense for Giallo-standards. The Inspector, who sports John Lennon glasses, is a total ass who cracks jokes about murder victims (Assistant: "The female victim was wearing no underwear." - Inspector: "Too bad for her. Hahaha."). Overall, "Giallo a Venezia" is a sadistic and trashy pile of sleaze with several brutal murders and a rather un-compelling plot; however, it is still highly recommendable to all my fellow Exploitation fans out there, exactly for being such a sadistic and trashy pile of sleaze. While you will never hear me say that it is a good movie, it will doubtlessly entertain those who are demented enough to find this kinda stuff entertaining - such as yours truly. My copy is in rather bad quality, which, strangely enough, fits the movie. If you are a fan of the sleazy and nasty kind of Italian Horror, give it a shot.

The Worst Giallo I Have Ever Seen

[thalassafischer · 2/10 · 15 March 2023]

I have a memory of my ex who also enjoyed these types of films (and perhaps to a far more obsessive degree) gleefully rambling around the house one week saying Giallo a Venezia, as though he was trying to tempt me to watch it. Or maybe he was mad at me and seeking revenge, because good lord is this movie ever freaking terrible.

First of all, it's not really a giallo, it's more like the wave of 70s cop films in Italy, the closest thing I can manage in my own immediate reference is The Suspicious Death of a Minor which also has an underwhelming Hawaii 5-0 aftertaste. Except that it's a porn. Not a good porn mind you, but if you're not one those people who watch giallos primarily for the sexploitation, please skip this one all together. I expected Ron Jeremy to make a cameo on set at any moment.

A word of warning about this hard to see slasher

[5thcord · 29 September 1999]

This is an extremely rare, hard to find movie which to be quite honest is no bad thing. The version I viewed was in its native Italian tongue and is, as far as i'm aware, the only way anyone's likely to see it. The film begins with the dockside discovery of a murdered man and woman which starts an investigation undertaken by a cop (Jeff Blynn) whose favourite past-time is eating hard boiled eggs! (well Kojak had his lollipops I guess). A series of seemingly unrelated murders start to occur, two of which are very nasty, so nasty in fact that I couldn't possibly describe them on such a family friendly site such as this. An already cheap and cheerful film is cheapened further by endless scenes of a couple participating in various sex games, all backed by a Berto Pisano score which wouldn't seem out of place in one of your dad's "stag" flicks. Needless to say these sub- plots seem to tie up in the end (well...at least I think they do). The term "giallo", is the Italian word for yellow and these thrillers (BIRD WITH THE CRYSTAL PLUMAGE, BLOOD AND BLACK LACE and WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO SOLANGE? being amongst other examples of this fascinating and addictive genre) have their origins in the mystery books published years ago in Italy, which were distinguishable by their yellow covers. When all's been said and done, I cant really recommend this sleazy, sordid affair (not that it's readily available anyway!), unless your idea of a nice night in is a showing of Lucio Fulci's equally misogynistic (but more fun) THE NEW YORK RIPPER. Happy hunting.....

Possibly the Most Disgusting Film Ever Shown

[jfrentzen-942-204211 · 3/10 · 9 February 2024]

With its garishly-lit, low budget TV look and tacky brutality, GIALLO A VENEZIA is one of the more compellingly sleazy giallos I have seen. One Italian movie reviewer called it the most disgusting movie ever shown.

A man dreams of being murdered. He wakes up. Next, we see him lying on a pier in Venice; this time he really is dead. Nearby, the body of a woman in his dream. The messy murder scene and subsequent credit sequence is scored with brassy lounge music.

Inspector DePaul (Jeff Blynn) can't figure out why someone first drowned the woman and then dragged her up to the pier. It's just the first of several incongruities that baffle the cops throughout the film. DePaul offers a clue to the viewer when he says to his lughead assistant, "Keep your mind on sex, it's the key to everything." There is a lot of sex in GIALLO A VENEZIA. Mostly, it figures strongly in the frequent flashbacks of Fabio (Gianni Dey) and Flavia (Leonora Fani), the two people found dead at the beginning.

Fabio, an architect, likes to watch his wife having sex with strangers. Also, he enjoys pouring over erotic Asian drawings as a prelude to whipping, sodomizing, or attacking Flavia. These Fabio-Flavia scenes are so sloppily inserted into the narrative, one might suspect they were leftover from some other movie. However, when we settle back into the film's police procedural, Landi builds on the expectations raised by these flashbacks. The chief target of the filmmakers' improprieties, Flavia's friend Mariza (Maria Angela Giordano), is also the target of an ex-lover who happens to be a very sick serial killer.

Mariza's death scene -- in which the ex ties her to a kitchen table and saws off her leg -- is way over the top. Landi sets up this murder with, first, a lengthy bump-'n-grind between Giordano and her current lover, which contains hardcore scenes. Next, when the lover exits Mariza's apartment, the killer intercepts him, shoots him several times, douses him with gasoline and sets his still-quivering shape on fire. Then he goes to work on Mariza. This sequence, one of the most disagreeable ever committed to celluloid, earns Landi and screenwriter Aldo Serio a 10-on-the-upchuck-meter award.

Beyond the obvious gore-mongering, this and other sequences are meant to attack the target audience where it lives. As GIALLO A VENEZIA was shown mostly in Italian theaters and was not released on video in other languages, it is solidly aimed at a traditional, macho Italian male audience. Landi and company are very sly, playing on the audience's expectations of explicit sex and gory violence. When the sex and blood becomes pornographic, the film makes a strong statement.

The key to the movie is an early scene between DePaul and a dull psychologist, in which the latter remarks that if the killer's personality profile was examined closely, it would fit that of the majority of Italian men.

Unusual Giallo picture in accordance to the detective's perspective

[jordondave-28085 · 5/10 · 20 March 2023]

(1979) Gore in Venice/ Giallo in Venice/Giallo a Venezia (In Italian with English subtitles) THRILLER/

A young couple is discovered murdered by the waterfront where the blonde young man was stabbed to death while the brown-haired young lady was drowned. In charge of the case is Detective Insp. Angelo De Pol (Jeff Blynn) who has a craving with hard boiled eggs. We find out later when the detective visits a lady named, Marzia (Mariangela Giordano) that the two people who were murdered are a married couple of architect, Fabio (Gianni Dei) and his wife Flavia (Leonora Fani). However, when Marzia leaves her home residence, she is then followed by the police toward her meeting of an ex-con, Marco Dezan (Maurizio Streccioni ) while Angelo's assistant, Maestin (Eolo Capritti) are going through her drawers without a warrant, discovering some embarrassing make out pictures.

Not really a giallo

[mvario · 6/10 · 2 October 2005]

I just watched Giallo A Venezia First off, it's not a giallo, it's a crime story. It opens with 2 bodies and a bunch of cops and goes from there with the investigation, and it's quite a while before anyone is actually killed. And when it does happen it's not a mystery, as we see the killers face. The story has some twists and turns to it though.

A good part of the film is flash-backs of the the 2 victims doing kinky sex things. Yeah, there's a decent amount of sex in this, probably on par with a typical Jess Franco film, some of it was okay, some a little boring. There's also some pretty gruesome gore stuff late in the film. Otherwise the plot is fairly simple, on par with say a typical 70's cop show.

To recap, I wouldn't say this was all that good... a lot of sex (some simulated, some female masturbation, some kinky stuff), a couple of decent gore killings, and not a giallo.

If you want a giallo with a lot of sex the best I've seen so far would be Slaughter Hotel, or maybe Washing Machine (though that one is kind of a borderline giallo).

A grisly Italian film that holds a mirror up to your darkest fantasies

[HuntinPeck80 · 6/10 · 11 October 2023]

I can't guarantee you'll make it all the way through Giallo a Venezia; not because it's a haunted movie like Ringu and watching is dangerous for the spectator, but rather because it is so nasty you'll learn your lesson maybe halfway through, and that'll be enough. After all, there's no law that says you have to watch the entirety of a movie, or a season of a TV show, or even finish a book, right?

And not seeing the whole doesn't necessarily mean you don't profit from the experience, correct? Remember the first episode of Black Mirror, the one with the pig? I realised it was a test, that the showrunners were saying to me, are you really going to sit there and actually watch an act of bestiality? Are you such a slave? So I turned it off. Turning it off before the end was the correct response to it. In the case of this giallo picture, one may learn quite enough before the credits roll, and in any case, the movie alerts you to the married couple's fate from early on. So why wait?

Personally, I don't think this film exists purely to satisfy a scopophilic desire to watch acts of sexual exploitation and sadistic violence. Such things can be shown in a way that is entirely for titilation. Giallo a Venezia allows you to watch the sex games of a couple accelerate towards calamity, and it allows you see acts of murder be performed so as to generate greater levels of fear and suffering. The sexual violence becomes uglier and uglier, and the murderous activities of the killer more horrendous. And the question arises, why am I watching these things when they are horrible? And the impulse to put a cap on the experience, as indeed on one's dark dreams of wish fulfilment need to be capped voluntarily.

What I am saying is that it is too easy to write-off a movie like this as sick an exploitative and thus of no value. It does have a value. It shows that violent acts are repulsive, more than they are arousing. That a human instinct towards competition, upping the ante, can spin out of control, and that its better when we impose our own limits, rather than have them imposed upon us.

Or maybe I'm wrong and its just a shabby little shocker.

Leonora Fani sure is a portrait of youthful beauty, destined for corruption, for such is life's doing. Alas for us.

Essential mean spirited sleaze gem

[Bloodwank · 8/10 · 20 February 2011]

Giallo A Venezia opens with a swiftly edited stabbing, then a lady floundering in water. Credits roll and we discover that these two luckless chumps were a married couple, Fabio and Flavia, and its now up to egg eating, bad joke cracking detective De Paul to sort out the mess, a process which involves much delving into the sordid details of their relationship. Meanwhile, things are about to get nastier... Despite the title, this one only just about qualifies as a giallo. It has a mystery, some killings and a whole lot of perversion, but when stacked against the notables of the genre Giallo A Venezia is a terrible example, with little in the way of style (one rather nifty moment aside) and even less in the way of interesting detective work or problem solving. It doesn't matter too much though, the title just about captures the nature of the plot and the film never really tries to compete in the giallo field. The main thing on its mind is sleaze and sleaze is what it serves up in delicious helpings, comparable perhaps to a three course meal. See, our unfortunate Fabio and Flavia had rather an unconventional relationship, he a dominant deviant and she a submissive, if often unwilling partner to his lusts. A lot of the film is spent on their sex lives, delivered as seedy soft-core with a dollop of sadism we get voyeurism, rape and humiliation as the more traditional female masturbation and conventional coupling. Gianni Dei and Leonora Fani are excellent as Fabio and Flavia respectively, he commands just the right air of haughty perversion that knows no sympathy beyond its own satisfaction, and she a tragic figure of the sort who just can't make herself get out. It helps that Leonora Fani has a splendid body and the sort of bush that makes you want to go exploring, gives her degradation an even meaner feel. There's more sexy shenanigans as well, lest you be afraid that this is a two hander, we get Mariengela Giordano nude in the films best loved sequence, and at least one more partly nekkid gal so its all good. The score works wonders for the soft-core side as well, natty porno lounge from Berto Pisano that bursts into indecently rousing loudness when good stuff goes down. For all this, the film doesn't completely forget its title, as the plot does steadily develop with one or two twists and turns and a few possible suspects/motives. It isn't too taxing though, and the mystery serves mostly as a means of joining together the sexual and the violent aspects of the film. As with any giallo worth its salt, there are a few gnarly murders in here, a couple of which have earned the film a deserved infamy. I won't go into details, but one would be better served by higher quality prints than the one mostly available (though it is still pretty sweet), and the other is an absolute ripper, real squirmishly entertaining classick. The finale is a corker as well, wrapping things up nicely just when the film is looking like it might have used up all its steam. There isn't really legitimately redeeming value here, no social themes nor insight into the interesting territory of a sexually twisted relationship, there isn't much style and the cinematography makes Venice look dull. I've never been but apparently its a nice place, not so in this film. This is pretty much aimed straight at the sleaze and nastiness brigade and no one else, seekers after truth and beauty should seek elsewhere and even average giallo lovers will likely be nonplussed. But if you like 'em mean, check this sucker out pronto as it plays a mean game and it plays it well.

Well if its violence and sleaze you have come for...

[Red-Barracuda · 6/10 · 8 November 2023]

I've been aware of this film since the 90's on account of its infamous reputation but its only just now that I have finally gotten around to watching it. It seems like if you are a connoisseur of all things giallo that you have to end up going up this particular cul-de-sac at some point. But be warned, this isn't one which is exactly aimed at those of you who are big fans of the pretty girls and ornate locations gialli (i.e. Me). This one isn't one of those, in fact it even manages to make Venice seem a bit sordid and grotty. It does have to be said though that its overall notorious rep is somewhat deserved. The focus here is exclusively on sex and violence, with little concern for such frivolities such as visual style or eloquence with the exception of Berto Pisano's lush score which sounds like it was taken from another movie...actually it appears it in fact was taken from another film (Interrabang). The sexual content is made up of a number of (very) prolonged soft-core sex scenes and one full-on porn moment where a guy starts whacking off in a cinema! This stuff's all really tedious and comes across like Jess Franco at his worst. As for the violence, unlike the sex there isn't that many scenes of it but the ones it has are very full-on and mean spirited - a scissors in the crotch attack, a man set on fire and a naked woman having her leg sawn (very slowly) off is the order of the day in this one. Its grubby stuff, which probably tops Lucio Fulci's New York Ripper in terms of repulsiveness.

The story, such as it is, starts with a dockside double murder, which itself, leads to a series of other killings. In true anti-giallo style the killer is revealed early on, so you do have to wonder what exactly is the point of the scenes involving the egg-eating detective trying to work out who is responsible. In fairness, there is a final twist in the tale, even if a significant part of it doesn't make a lick of sense. But, whatever the case, this one most definitely fails as a mystery. It's a product of its era though, with a few other gialli from the late 70's such as Sister of Ursula, functioning essentially as sexploitation flicks with giallo elements. Consequently, despite the infamous grimness, this one does drag a fair bit whenever the story reverts to shagging. But at the end of the day, it's those scenes of extreme violence which ultimately will forever define this one and ensure it retains a footnote in the history of the genre. Step in at your peril.

Depends what you're looking for...

[longlivethenewflesh · 6/10 · 3 April 2006]

First up, let me say that this movie simply fails as a giallo. While I can't claim to be an expert on the genre, I have long been an Argento fan and can honestly say that compared to Profondo Rosso or Tenebrae this is just bad. Mario Landi's film has the production values of your average Joe D'amato hack-job, with dialogue and acting to match. However, as an example of gratuitous Italian sleaze, it's pretty hard to top. This uneasy mix of kinky sex and hardcore violence is rightly proclaimed as one of the most offensive films of the Italian cycle - the closest comparison would be Fulci's The New York Ripper. So if you're looking for another stylish giallo masterpiece in the Argento vein, look elsewhere. But for lovers of Italian sleaze, this has much to offer, with Landi squeezing in as much sex as humanly possible and when the bloodletting arrives, true nastiness awaits.

Sickening, totally incompetent, an absolute insult to good taste... And yet I'm SO glad to have seen it!

[Coventry · 7/10 · 30 May 2006]

Honesty and openness are characteristics that you rarely ever come across in the horror genre. Doesn't it frequently happen that you purchase a title that loudly promotes itself as "the ultimate experience in pure terror" whereas, in reality, it's just another dull and totally unoriginal thriller that wasted both your time and your money? Well, at least Mario Landi's "Giallo A Venezia" is completely different! The brief description on the back of the VHS cover sincerely admits already that this film is a total failure when it comes to building up mystery or suspense, but takes pride in the fact that it is one of the nastiest, sleaziest and most brutal gore flicks ever produced in Italy. And let me assure you, this isn't a lie! Every single reviewer on this website agrees that this is a sick, sick, sick, SICK film and exclusively meant for horror freaks who're constantly searching for new heights in extreme film-making. The plot of "Giallo A Venezia" is hardly worth mentioning, as Landi doesn't even attempt to involve the viewers in the search for the demented serial killer on the loose in the streets of Venice. The mutilated corpses of a young couple are found near a river and pretty soon it becomes clear that they were fanatically into bizarre sexual fetishes and perverted games. A duo of unlikely police inspectors, one addicted to eating boiled eggs and the second looking like a homicidal maniac himself, investigate the case by questioning local prostitutes and their clients. Even though the killer isn't very good at keeping his identity secret, he still manages to commit several more very gruesome and misogynistic murders. As promised, there's absolutely no tension or atmosphere and even the 'surprise' ending is rather laughable. Although supposedly set in one of the most beautiful places in the world, every filming location and piece of scenery looks ugly and unappealing while there isn't the least bit of variety in camera-work or choreography. Mario Landi lacks all the qualities of a real director and allows his cast to do whatever they want, naturally resulting in atrocious performances. It really just is the graphic sickness that makes this movie memorable. The killer, wearing horribly over-sized sunglasses, repeatedly stabs a defenseless woman in the crotch with scissors and the camera proudly zooms in on how the blood floods down her legs (yikes!). Another poor sucker is shot multiple times and subsequently set on fire, yet he remains floundering until all his skin and flesh is burnt up. Mariangela Giordano stars as well and this woman urgently deserves a statue for being the Italian actress who suffered THE most on screen! In "Burial Ground", she had her nipple bitten off by a zombified teenager, in "Patrick Still Lives" (by the same director) she got vaginally impaled with a poker and, in this dubious classic, her leg is sadistically amputated with a rusty saw. Personally, I moved heaven and earth in order to finally obtain a copy of this notorious horror-shocker and, as disturbing as it may sound, I'm actually proud to add it to my collection, even though 99% of the film revolves on UN-sexy sex sequences and sickening gore. Consider yourself warned

Venice?!?! More like Venasty, if you ask me.

[BA_Harrison · 8/10 · 9 February 2014]

Considered by many giallo fans to be one of the least palatable examples of the genre, Giallo a Venezia's notorious reputation as a total sickie is well deserved, giving even Lucio Fulci's New York Ripper a run for its money in the misogynistic violence stakes.

Director Mario Landi turns what could easily have been a fairly mundane murder mystery into an exercise in pure depravity through the use of wall to wall sex and a few extremely harsh murders, making this unmissable stuff for those who love their Italian horror/thrillers to be as twisted as possible.

As Venetian copper Inspector DePaul (Jeff Blynn) investigates the deaths of exhibitionist architect Fabio (Gianni Dei) and his submissive wife Flavia (Leonora Fani), he slowly unravels their life of sexual experimentation and moral abandonment, allowing Landi to pile on the wanton debauchery and extreme brutality.

In a series of flashbacks that portray the events leading up to the young couple's deaths, viewers are treated to all manner of sexual shenanigans, and one or two really grisly scenes of carnage, including a hooker stabbed in the crotch with a big pair of scissors, a guy doused in petrol and burnt alive, and a woman having her leg cut off with a massive kitchen knife—all of which qualifies Giallo a Venezia for a sleaze-tastic rating of 8/10 from this particular reprobate.

Grisly and sleazy - but not all that good

[The_Void · 6/10 · 12 June 2006]

Anyone that knows anything about this film knows that it's grisly and sleazy - but to be honest, up until about the hour mark; I feared that I may be in the wrong film. Don't get me wrong, I love a good slice of disgusting sleaze; but not when the resulting film is boring. The first two thirds of the film focus mainly on sex and police procedure, with just a little blood thrown in for good measure. These sections of the film really drag, and don't give credence to the opening shot that sees a young man being repeatedly stabbed in the crotch. However, you've got to expect this sort of poor plot pacing from Eurotrash cinema, and to this film's credit - it gets a lot better as it goes on, as the death scenes get nastier and the plot gets more interesting. The first major plot point sees the police find the bodies of a young couple; he has been stabbed to death, and she has drowned and then had her body taken out of the water. We then follow police inspector De Pol, as he questions several people, some of which turn up dead themselves.

The two sides of the plot; those being the murders and the resulting investigation, don't bode well at all - and Giallo a Venezia feels very disjointed as neither one compliments the other, meaning that the film isn't very thrilling overall. By keeping the focus on the unpleasantness and sleaze, however, director Mario Landi makes sure that it's always obvious exactly what the point of the film is. Indeed, even the usually beautiful Venetian canals look sordid in this film, and while that helps the look and feel of the film; it doesn't do much for the aesthetics. Jeff Blynn is ineffective in the lead role, and looks like he accidentally stepped off the set of Starsky and Hutch. The violence is extremely misogynistic, and almost every woman in the film ends up being violated in some way. The scenes of gore are mostly good, and see such delights as a man being shot and set on fire and the butchery of a woman on a table, who promptly turns up inside a refrigerator! The conclusion to the film is the best element, and Mario Landi somehow managed to make this messy sleaze flick make sense. Overall, I can't say that Giallo a Venezia is one of the best Giallo's I've seen (not by a mile); but it has its positives elements and may delight fans of morbid sleaze.