Cast overview, first billed only: | |||
Fabio Testi | ... | Enrico Rosseni | |
Karin Baal | ... | Herta Rosseni | |
Cristina Galbó | ... | Elizabeth Seccles (as Christine Galbo) | |
Joachim Fuchsberger | ... | Inspector Barth | |
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Günther Stoll | ... | Professor Bascombe |
Claudia Butenuth | ... | Brenda Pilchard | |
Camille Keaton | ... | Solange Beauregard | |
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Maria Monti | ... | Mrs. Erickson |
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Giancarlo Badessi | ... | Mr. Erickson |
Pilar Castel | ... | Janet Bryant | |
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Giovanna Di Bernardo | ... | Helen Edmonds |
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Vittorio Fanfoni | ... | Enrico's Landlord |
Marco Mariani | ... | Father Webber | |
Antonio Casale | ... | Mr. Newton (as Antony Vernon) | |
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Emilia Wolkowicz | ... | Ruth Holden (as Emilia Wolkowich) |
In London, the Italian gym teacher Enrico 'Henry' Rosseni is having a love affair with his eighteen year-old student Elizabeth, who is the niece of the owner of the Catholic school where he works and she studies. His estranged wife, Herta is the Music and German teacher. One day when Enrico and Elizabeth are in a boat in a grove, she sees a man hunting down a woman. Enrico believes she's making it up, but the next morning, he learns a teenager was murdered in the river bank in the grove. Inspector Barth goes to the school since the victim Hilda studied there and soon, Enrico is the prime suspect, though Elizabeth could give an him an alibi. When a second student's murdered, and then so is Elizabeth, Enrico decides to investigate, and teams up with Herta to find the of the mysterious Solange, but what might have happened to Solange?
An innocent teacher is suspected of a really sick series of murders (after this film, the verb "to solange" should have been added to the dictionary) and must clear himself, ala Hitchcock. Supposedly based on one of Edgar Wallace's books (there _is_ a hidden room), they still must have taken an awful lot of creative license. Joe D'Amato uses the 2.35 frame as only a style-uber-content DP can, though Dallamano deserves a lot of credit for making the story so engrossing. Morricone's score is truly haunting (available on CD with his score for Lenzi's "Spasmo"), adding a note of sadness to the gruesome proceedings. As with the best horror, there's nothing explicit in the murder scenes, wisely leaving the details of the truly hideous murders to the viewers' imaginations. ("Giallo in Venice" also featured a murderer solanging a victim but ruined it by showing the whole thing.) This one's definitely worth checking out, though widescreen is a must.