Death Walks at Midnight

Giallo fans have a real treat from Mondo Macabro with the release of Luciano Ercoli's 1972 Death Walks at Midnight on DVD. Starring Susan Scott, Death Walks, more so than the more famous examples of this genre by the likes of Dario Argento, is as close as we come to a 'typical' giallo, the norm of the hundreds of examples of these thrillers produced in Italy in the late '60s and the first half of the 70s. This film is not exceptional (neither exceptionally good nor bad), but has all the requisite sleaze one expects of Italian gialli.

Valentina (Susan Scott), a Milanese fashion model, does an experiment with a new drug, HDS, for her friend, Joe (Simon Andreu), a tabloid reporter. While under the hallucinogen, Valentina witnesses the murder of a young woman by a man armed with a spiked glove. The killer thinks she might be an eyewitness, and draws her out to try and kill her. Her other boyfriend, Stefano (Peter Martell), doesn't believe her, as the victim Valentina says she saw was murdered six months earlier. As luck would have it, her apartment and that of the victim face each other and in a plot which more than resembles Hitchcock's Rear Window a game of cat-and-mouse begins.

Death Walks at Midnight is very much a typical giallo - all the accoutrements of the genre are there: black gloved killer, beautiful women murdered with nasty weapons, naked fashion models, 'hip' drug culture, and glamorous locations (here it is Milan). The movie itself is sufficiently convoluted, with enough red herrings and false frights to utterly baffle the watcher. Missing are the over-the-top set pieces one comes to expect from directors like Bava or Argento, but it is important to recognize that the cinematographic flamboyance of those auteurs are the exceptions, not the norm. Death Walks at Midnight is a nice example of the norm, what the vast majority of these 1970s gialli are like.

This was Ercoli's third giallo with his wife Scott and screenwriter Ernesto Gastaldi. Gastaldi himself is something of a gialli legend, having not only written the three Ercoli gialli - Forbidden Photos of a Lady Above Suspicion (1970) and Death Walks on High Heels (1971) - but also most of the classic gialli by Sergio Martino too - The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh (1971), The Case of the Scorpion's Tail (1971), All the Colours of the Dark (1972), Eyes of the Black Cat (1972), and my personal favourite of all gialli Torso (1973). Gastaldi also wrote The Case of the Bloody Iris (1972), so he's someone who is well acquainted with the flows and eddies of the genre. I mention Gastaldi's filmography here because Ercoli is not much of visual director; certainly less than Mario Bava or Argento, and even less of a filmmaker than Martino. The story is what propels Death Walks at Midnight. Seeing the film within the context of Gastaldi's other films seems to make more sense - and if you're familiar with his other giallo films, are familiar with how his stories are plotted, then you have a good sense of what to expect from Death Walks. There is more plot here than gore, although the spiked glove (derivative of Bava's Blood and Black Lace to be sure), is pretty visceral.

The film is dubbed into English, poorly; although considering the Italian film industry's practice of not using direct sound recording, effectively making all Italian films dubbed, having a subtitled giallo seems to defeat the purpose. One needs to question the pretentiousness of releasing giallo films in Italian language versions - I still prefer the dubbed version of Profondo Rosso (1975). Despite whether or not a subtitled copy was actually available, Mondo Macabro was right to use this dubbed print. And the bad dubbing of Death Walks just adds to the sleazy fun of the picture. Mondo Macabro have beautifully restored the film to an anamorphic widescreen format and the colours look almost as fresh as if filmed today.

But what makes Mondo Macabro's DVD release of Death Walks at Midnight a truly significant release, is the inclusion of a half-hour documentary on the giallo genre. Although this is not much more than an extended interview with Italian sleaze expert Adrian Luther Smith, punctuated by with clips from Death Walks, it is the kind of DVD extra that is actually interesting and worth watching.

Mondo Macabro's release of Death Walks at Midnight is a DVD worth having. The film itself is a good solid example of the norm of the giallo genre, not a brilliant film, but twisty and turny enough to keep you interested. And written by one of the most prolific screenwriters in the genre. Although dubbed into English, the print is clean and looks fresh. The short documentary on the genre is an extra worth watching too (not something I say about many 'extras').

Review by Mikel J. Koven

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