Blood and Black Lace (1965)

Please don't spend money on this.

It is a performances centric movie

good back-story, and good acting

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

Tightly-woven and visually impressive giallo. Has a refined and classic feel with very assured direction by Mario Bava. Definitely not the film to pick if you're looking for something to truly scare you. It has a few tense moments but overall the tone is somewhat light and the film breezes by relatively inoffensively. It remains engaging and entertaining nearly throughout though and feels well-crafted and sturdy. The visuals are definitely its biggest strength - fantastic lighting, interesting cinematography, and some downright beautiful sets and lush shot compositions. Definitely a high quality film but lacks the punch to really take it to the next level for me, on a first viewing anyway.Light 4/5

Originally titled 'Six Women for the Killer', this Mario Bava film is often cited as the movie that pioneered the giallo horror subgenre with a plot that places more emphasis on gruesome murders than catching a killer. Full of creepy tracking shots and with eerie sound effects frequently favoured over background music, the film certainly succeeds in depicting a handful of memorable murders and stalking sequences. There is a particularly effective part where one victim to-be is chased around an antique dealer's place where every nook and cranny is lit up in varying neon shades of blue, pink and purple. The opening murder is effective too. The plot, characters and acting here leaves a lot to be desired though with the story coming to a near stand-still in between the murders. Thomas Reiner makes for one of the dullest police detectives of all time, though to be fair, the cast are hardly saddled with the sort of dialogue that could have made their characters come alive. Of course, many will be quick to point out that narratives are always a secondary consideration in gialli, but when one considers what Dario Argento was able of achieve in years to come with films like 'Suspiria' and 'Tenebrae' that managed to wrestle good performances and a decent plot into the giallo formula, it is hard not to mentally compare and contrast. Certainly, if viewed with minimal expectations, there is a lot to like about 'Blood and Black Lace'; it is simply hard not to expect something more revolutionary from a film that kick-started an iconic movie trend.

Cameron Mitchell heads a haute couture fashion salon where the models are being murdered by a psychotic killer in a black hat, black coat and stocking mask; seems the first victim left behind a diary, which the maniac desperately wants. A police detective is immediately on the case and has a host of suspects, including Mitchell and several dressers and designers. French-Italian co-production directed and co-written by Mario Bava (who also assisted in the cinematography) has a sterling reputation among Giallo buffs and slasher fans, but the robotic English dubbing coupled with the blinking neon lights and melodramatic music by Carlo Rustichelli gives the picture a thick coating of kitsch. Bava, at this point, knows a great deal more about staging a sequence for the camera than he does about building suspense or intrigue in the scenario; thus, the film is visually imaginative and yet strangely fatiguing. ** from ****

This is another thoroughly underwhelming horror entry from Mario Bava, injudiciously praised because of it coming so early in the giallo canon. If it had been released ten years later, you never would have heard of it.The movie is set in (and indeed, never leaves) a fashion house where, of course, the models are the victims of a masked killer. There is no reason for the killer to wear a mask; if anything this would make the job more difficult. They would be spotted so much more easily by anyone who happened on the scene. The mask is, of course, only worn to surprise the audience when we find out who the killer really is.Not that it really works as a surprise.The movie has no characters who make any kind of impression, and certainly no one we care about. Its many shots of mannequins invite unfavourable comparisons between these dummies and the women that sometimes stand in front of the camera. The mid sixties release date means that the movie isn't particularly violent and there is no nudity or sex. There is a mention of - shock, horror - drug abuse that is accompanied by some raucous strains on the soundtrack as if the mere word "cocaine" should be enough to send us into palpitations.Nothing else in the movie will have that effect on you. There's no tension, or surprise, or shocks whatsoever. When the killer is revealed, it's not even much of a surprise.