The Kiss or The Kiss of Death was directed by Mario Lanfranchi (Death Sentence), who also wrote the script with Pupi Avati. It's based on Il bacio di una morta by Carolina Invernizio, which was already adapted by Guido Brignone in 1949 and Carlo Infascelli just a year earlier in 1973.
Countess Elena Rambaldi (Eleonora Giorgi) has a half-brother named Alfonso (Brian Deacon) who has been exiled by their father, Count Rambaldi. When Alfonso comes home and embraces his sister, it upsets the elder Rambaldi so much that he dies from a heart attack. Elena inherits his fortune and soon falls in love with Guido (Maurizio Bonuglia) and goes to Venice for their honeymoon, which does not last long as he's soon enraptured by a dancer named Nara (Martine Beswick). She convinces him that his wife and her brother are lovers. He responds by allowing his new lover to poison Elena, who is brought back to life by a kiss from her brother while lying in her coffin. Guido sees that he was wrong and leaves Nara, who accuses him of killing his wife.
In Robert Curti's book Italian Gothic Horror Movies 1970-79, he states that this movie was based on an Italian feuilleton or serial novel, which was the literary ancestor of the Italian Gothic, creating a mixture of melodrama, horror and romance.
Avati added occult elements to the story, like the sapphic witch Madame Lixen (Valentina Cortese) who conducts Satanic masses and has a volcanic scene with Beswick. There are also horror elements here, like when Guido searches for his wife's ghost throughout the streets of Venice and Nara dances for him with a bra that has demonic hands cupping his breasts.
It's not really horror, not really romance, but actually pretty good.
Countess Elena Rambaldi (Eleonora Giorgi) has a half-brother named Alfonso (Brian Deacon) who has been exiled by their father, Count Rambaldi. When Alfonso comes home and embraces his sister, it upsets the elder Rambaldi so much that he dies from a heart attack. Elena inherits his fortune and soon falls in love with Guido (Maurizio Bonuglia) and goes to Venice for their honeymoon, which does not last long as he's soon enraptured by a dancer named Nara (Martine Beswick). She convinces him that his wife and her brother are lovers. He responds by allowing his new lover to poison Elena, who is brought back to life by a kiss from her brother while lying in her coffin. Guido sees that he was wrong and leaves Nara, who accuses him of killing his wife.
In Robert Curti's book Italian Gothic Horror Movies 1970-79, he states that this movie was based on an Italian feuilleton or serial novel, which was the literary ancestor of the Italian Gothic, creating a mixture of melodrama, horror and romance.
Avati added occult elements to the story, like the sapphic witch Madame Lixen (Valentina Cortese) who conducts Satanic masses and has a volcanic scene with Beswick. There are also horror elements here, like when Guido searches for his wife's ghost throughout the streets of Venice and Nara dances for him with a bra that has demonic hands cupping his breasts.
It's not really horror, not really romance, but actually pretty good.
