I like my screwball comedies sprinkled with sexual innuendo, and this wasn’t really doing it for me. There’s too much shouting and tiresome slapstick antics (I had a migraine while watching it last week). Sorry, not sorry!
I still love you, Jean Arthur! Please don’t hate me, cgavin… 🥲
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Exotica is quite possibly the most empathetic film about transactional/therapeutic relationships and trauma.
With every re-watch, I appreciate Atom Egoyan’s psychoanalytic storytelling structure and the deliberately slow reveal akin to a striptease. His nuanced depiction of desperate, codependent people processing painful emotions through repetition compulsion or rituals in the hopes of reconciling with their past and finally *living* in the present is heart-rending and relatable.
I feel for these individuals craving intimate connections, but they’re unable to cope with the tragedies inflicted upon their lives, even if a shared sense of loss and longing is what intertwines them.
It goes without saying, why isn’t this every psychology major’s favorite film?!
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The Adjuster is one of the most uncomfortable films I’ve sat through, and I say this as a compliment… It’s so cryptic and so Canadian (harrowing and horny). I’m certainly into it!
Also, ~perverted Pisces~ Elias Koteas can sweet-talk anyone with that soft-spoken voice of his! *Swoon*
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~Pisces icons~ John Cale and Lou Reed eulogize Andy Warhol in an intimate performance of their album, “Songs for Drella.”
The interactions between the two men on stage (they hadn't played together for nearly 20 years) and Ed Lachman’s melancholic blue lighting during “Slip Away (A Warning)” and “A Dream” melted my heart!
Coincidentally, I watched this on Reed’s birthday, even though I have a big crush on Cale. Can you believe they were born exactly a week apart?! That explains A LOT.
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I have *faith* that my soulmate (wherever he is) LOVES this beguiling, brilliant film as much as I do!!!
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House of Tolerance is sublime filmmaking by Bertrand Bonello — it truly feels like you’re peering into the lives of the ladies in a Henri de Toulouse-Latrec painting.
Although I wish I could articulate my thoughts about the film more thoroughly (I have a lot of them!), there are several moments embedded in my mind forever: sad swaying to the song “Nights in White Satin,” wilted white rose petals slowly falling to the floor, and ‘The Woman Who Laughs’ crying thick white tears of cum.
P.S. I’m not sure how many ~gut punch endings~ I can endure after this one…
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Miss Osbourne is a 19th-century chamber drama/gothic horror/Euro-sleaze retelling of Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic story featuring Walerian Borowczyk’s signature flair for capturing ~beauty and brutality~ through a soft-focus camera lens.
While Freudian psychology and Transcendental medicine permeate the film’s disorienting, dreamlike atmosphere as Bernard Parmegiani’s score drones on, what I enjoyed most was its inclusion of Marina Pierro as Dr. Henry Jekyll’s fiancé, Fanny Osbourne.
In a climactic scene, she subverts all Victorian-era societal expectations by relinquishing herself to the same dark impulses as her lover. Wearing a dirty bodice that exposes her breasts, she licks a bloody dagger with a glint in her red-colored eyes, signifying that her *transformation* is complete! It’s a very transfixing “Good for her…” moment. After all, what woman doesn’t find succumbing to her innermost desires tempting?
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I *live* for melodramatic morality tales that criticize Catholicism and contain a lavish early 20th-century costume/set design with lush European landscapes!
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Keetje Tippel *walked* so Nomi Malone could *strut across the stage in stilettos*
Pair this 19th-century period piece with Showgirls for a ‘resilient blonde woman who rises to the top’ double feature.
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Happy Valentine’s Day to Paul Verhoeven 💝
He’s the only ~perverted Dutchman~ who made me weep after watching a turbulent, tender, and tragic love story unfold while still unabashedly showing plenty of blood, cum, feces, sweat, tears, and vomit on-screen!
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Teresa (Geraldine Chaplin) and Pedro (Per Oscarsson) are a bourgeois couple living in a brutalist home recently adorned with baroque antiques from Teresa’s childhood. The presence of her deceased family’s furnishings ignites a sense of delirium in Teresa as she regresses into her younger self, revives past religious trauma, and re-enacts repressed memories. Pedro is initially reluctant to indulge his wife’s behavior but relents, and soon, they both engage in cruel games and deranged role-playing scenarios with no discernible rules, distorting fantasy from reality.
I couldn’t take my eyes off of Chaplin, whether she was imitating Sleeping Beauty in the cellar (“A kiss like that won’t wake me up.”), smiling in ecstasy while crayfish crawled all over her writhing body, shredding/stuffing her slinky black dress in the garbage disposal, singing a strange song about Saint Catherine from her Catholic school days, or scolding her husband for eating raw meat off the floor like a fucking dog — she made this kinky, kooky psychodrama such an entertaining watch!
Honestly, Honeycomb’s story about a self-destructive marriage scratched a very specific itch in my brain… It belongs in the ~relationship goals~ film canon.
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Ladies, if he’s serving you crème de menthe cocktails, making you wear false eyelashes, and suggesting you bleach your hair… RUN!!!
In all seriousness, Carlos Saura’s Peppermint Frappé is a fascinating critique of fetishization, objectification, and obsession.
Watching a Francoist conservative man (who’s repressed and repulsive) cutting out pictures of women from fashion magazines and contorting their faces/bodies to his liking for his ~creepy little collage~ during the opening credits was quite telling. And then he *Vertigo’s* his brunette colleague after meeting his childhood friend’s blonde wife — that’s the type of shit that sends a shiver down my spine!
Cheers to José Luis López Vásquez for perfecting the ‘pathetic pervert’ stare; unsettling is an understatement.
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Curtis Harrington’s Night Tide feels like an eerie, ethereal 1960s SoCal fairy tale and looks like a summertime noir with its atmospheric black-and-white cinematography shrouded in shadows, moonlight, and mist!
While the story seemed a little lacking; baby-faced Dennis Hopper as a starry-eyed sailor falling for a dark-haired beauty harboring a deep secret — I still appreciated the film’s mermaid myth as an allegory for female turmoil and trauma, its sense of seaside longing and loneliness, the realistic Tarot card reading, and beatnik jazz club/carnival setting.
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Pandora and the Flying Dutchman is the mythological, Mediterranean coastal melodrama of my ~Cancerian~ dreams!!!
Albert Lewin’s film about predestined, doomed romance looks like a Surrealist painting come to life — courtesy of Man Ray’s contributions to its set design and Jack Cardiff’s sumptuous Technicolor cinematography.
Cardiff is a magician with a camera; his muted color palette and lighting elevate the film’s mystical mood. I was mesmerized as soon as I saw the (early) shot of the dead soulmates’ clasped hands lying ashore among fishermen's netting and a diary.
James Mason is otherworldly and wistful as the 17th-century mythical man endlessly sailing the lonely seas, awaiting a star-crossed lover who’ll free him from his curse. The Flying Dutchman even paints like Giorgio de Chirico and recites English poetry under the moonlight! Naturally, he attracts the attention of Ava Gardner’s Pandora, a real-life goddess *glowing* in every scene! Her performance is the heart and soul of this story. She’s a self-destructive femme fatale who favors ‘sensation to sentiment’ and later transforms into a selfless woman willing to sacrifice her life to experience a love that transcends time.
I don’t believe this fantastical film is for everybody, but if you’re prone to (romantic) yearning, Pandora and the Flying Dutchman will wash over you like an all-consuming love affair…
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Made in England is Martin Scorsese’s two-hour love letter for The Archers 🏹
It warmed my heart to hear him passionately speak about Powell and Pressburger’s oeuvre by sharing profound analyses/anecdotes over archival footage and selected scenes from the pair’s films. His musings on A Matter of Life and Death had me misty-eyed!
I highly recommend watching this documentary if you’re in the mood for a ‘Scorsese yap session’ about CINEMA.
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Gone to Earth is Powell and Pressburger’s gothic romance/pagan folk tale/Technicolor tragedy in which a radiant Jennifer Jones spends most of the film running around barefoot across the resplendent Shropshire landscape with her pet fox!
She’s initially reluctant to confront the chasm between carnality and spirituality but eventually surrenders to David Farrar and his enticing violet eyes, similar to the nuns’ conflict in Black Narcissus. Unsurprisingly, it doesn’t end well.
Even though this isn’t my favorite pastoral Powell and Pressburger production (Um, where’s the Criterion restoration?), I enjoyed the ~steamy~ scenes between Jones and Farrar, those sprawling shots of Shropshire at dawn/dusk, all of the adorable animals, and how it made me want to listen to Kate Bush afterward!
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God Bless Powell and Pressburger for presenting *pious women pining* in Technicolor!!!
Yes, I’ll be purchasing red eyeliner ASAP to emulate Kathleen Byron’s demented look of desire…
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“I see through my tears, but no one comes to wipe them away.” 🩶
Carl Theodor Dreyer has crushed my soul ~anew~ (complimentary)
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It’s no surprise La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc is considered miraculous filmmaking by Carl Theodor Dreyer. He captures Renée Falconetti, who plays the famous French saint, expressing a thousand emotions on her face with the most memorable close-ups. I was entranced by her screen presence the entire time!
Let’s hope those eyes will live through another century on celluloid... 👁️🎞️
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Elizabeth Sankey’s intimate, insightful, and inspired cinematic essay contemplates the connections between women’s perinatal/postnatal mental health issues (depression, anxiety, and psychosis) and the portrayal (persecution) of witches throughout history.
The interviewees’ poignant stories moved me to tears as they shared their struggles, diagnoses, experiences in psychiatric treatment facilities, feelings of shame, and fears of stigmatization surrounding pregnancy, childbirth, and motherhood.
Additionally, Sankey included crucial conversations about gender and ethnic disparities in medical care, considering it’s such a highly prevalent and preventable problem in today’s society as the maternal mortality rate, sadly, continues to soar.
I also loved how footage of my favorite witches in pop culture weaved together with testimonials *spanning several centuries* of women who confessed to the crime of witchcraft to illuminate Sankey’s thought-provoking thesis.
Witches was an incredibly heartfelt ‘first watch’ of the new year! It made me want to hug all of the ✨mothers✨ in my life.
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I’m not sure how I’ll cope if my Christmas wish for more wintry gothic horror films doesn’t come true in the new year.
I appreciated Lily-Rose Depp’s physically committed performance and Robert Eggers’ attention to historical detail — everything from the 19th-century European costume/set design to its depiction of Romani folklore, occultism, and ‘modern’ medicine. The cinematography, color grading, candlelight, and cute cats also caught my eye!
Although, is it just me, or is anyone else slightly amused that there’s a Nosferatu-inspired perfume on sale? I’ll admit, I shamelessly doused myself in Marissa Zappas’ Tragedy Oil for the ~special~ occasion. After all, “Providence for the tragic girls” is its promise — a perfect scent to wear while watching this hauntingly horny vampiric fairy tale.
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Werner Herzog’s Nosferatu the Vampyre is a spellbinding slow burn steeped in sadness and sensuality.
As always, Isabelle Adjani’s magnetism is unmatched. Her face was made for horror films!
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If you’re in the mood for a chilling, mean-spirited Christmastime exploitation film, look no further than Aldo Lado’s Late Night Trains, also known as Night Train Murders.
I can’t confidently say I’d watch it again, though. 😳
P.S. Men who play the harmonica are heinous!!!
Self-destructive sons of miserable men accept their familial fate by becoming detached fathers to disappointed daughters.
Nobody does Daddy Issues™️ like Paul Schrader!
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Hardcore starts as a Midwestern Calvinist Christmas story and slowly unravels into a ~father’s worst nightmare~ when moralistic George C. Scott descends upon the red-light districts in California, searching for his runaway daughter, intent on saving her ‘innocent’ soul from the sex industry while trying to make sense of this ‘corrupt world’ on the West Coast. Spoiler — it’s hopeless!
A few of my favorite (unintentionally) humorous highlights of the film include: Season Hubley’s Quaaludes t-shirt; Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young playing on the radio at a sex shop; *blink-and-you’ll-miss-it* Mickey Mouse bedsheets in a brothel; and that infamous porn producer disguise!
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So, this is what you get when you put two of the most stunning women in a Giallo together — Barbara Bouchet and Rosalba Neri sleuthing/seducing in Venice, all while wearing swoon-worthy outfits with smoky eye makeup, sipping on spiked drinks, and sleazing it up in slow-motion!
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In Fernando Di Leo’s Giallo, an agoraphobe, homicidal housewife, nymphomaniac, and suicidal socialite receive psychiatric care at a rural Italian estate embellished with medieval weaponry and Joan Miró’s artwork — all while a mouth-breathing ~creeper in a cloak~ massacres patients and staff.
Although the cinematography and editing stood out to me, there’s not much to ponder in terms of plot. Instead, Slaughter Hotel feels like a clumsy collection of interspersed scenes — some more titillating than others: supervised croquet/chess games; Klaus Kinski and his hideous haircut wandering the halls aligned with suits of armor; Margaret Lee casually smoking cigarettes in a crushed velvet dress; Rosalba Neri seducing the gardener in a greenhouse; an erotic (unethical) full body massage/bubble bath; writhing women tangled in their bedsheets (teetering on the edge of softcore porn); and multiple deaths by an axe, iron maiden, scythe, etc.
I must say, this film wasn’t nearly as awful as I anticipated! Then again, I probably have terrible taste… 😉
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I don’t care how ridiculous this remake is with its jaundiced killer, fucked up family dynamics, excessive eyeball gore, and cannibalistic Christmas cookies.
Every December, I come back for a couple of my favorite mid-2000s bitchy brunettes (Mary Elizabeth Winstead! Michelle Trachtenberg!), lurid LED holiday lighting, surprisingly decent camerawork (Split diopter shots! Dutch angles!), Motorola Razr product placement, a blood-splattered glass of eggnog, one hilariously dated Dick Cheney joke, and the dumbest dialogue imaginable: “I’d like to bury the hatchet with my sister… Right in her head.”
Yes, Black Christmas is very tacky, but watching it alongside the original film is a tradition I always look forward to this time of year!
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Christmas came early for me this year…
I finally got to see my all-time favorite slasher film on the big screen!!! 🎄☎️🔪
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Who else *fights the urge* to dye their hair darker after watching an Edwige Fenech film?!
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The Big Heat is one of the most vicious, volatile noirs of the 1950s… Of course, I loved it!!!
Sorry to Glenn Ford and Lee Marvin, but Gloria Grahame stole the show as the ‘mink coat girl’ carrying a gun and a coffee pot for *revenge*
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Similarly to Barbara Stanwyck in Clash by Night, I’m a free-spirited woman who occasionally struggles with self-loathing and moved back to her hometown of Monterey, California, after spending some time living on the East Coast. I know the oppressive weight of those crashing waves captured by Nicholas Musuraca’s camera very well.
Fritz Lang’s film is based on Clifford Odets’ stage play — a domestic drama in which Stanwyck is torn between two men, played by Paul Douglas and Robert Ryan. Does she settle for the sincere fisherman who’ll provide a safe, simple life? Or does she run away with the fiery, ~fucked up~ film projectionist who stimulates her body and soul?
Overall, Clash by Night is quite cynical, and I’m still conflicted about the conclusion. While I appreciated seeing my hometown on-screen, the film’s claustrophobic atmosphere made me more aware of my fear of choosing complacency in life and love.
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I’m confident that The Case of the Bloody Iris was Brian De Palma’s favorite Giallo, considering its similarities to his film, Dressed to Kill.
You know you’re in for a great time when the English dubbing is shitty, Bruno Nicolai’s score is banging, Edwige Fenech makes *wearing a tie* look chic and not like she’s a Cheesecake Factory server, dim-witted cops are comic relief, a couple has sex on a shag carpet (Hello, it’s the 1970s!!!), eccentric/elusive high-rise apartment neighbors may or may not be murderers, the victims’ blood is so ~obviously~ red paint… I could go on.
Thanks to my friend cgavin for his funny commentary and for recommending I watch this stylish and (somewhat) sleazy Giallo!
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There’s a shot of Robert Ryan ~menacingly~ walking down the stairs while he’s reflected in Christmas tree ornaments that will live rent-free in my head this holiday season!
Ryan never disappoints when playing a disturbed man, and he’s the reason I'd recommend this taut thriller.
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I’m seriously in awe of how Robert Ryan’s dark eyes exude a man with a *tortured soul* while he simultaneously walks around with his “No fucks to give…” 🦂Scorpio swagger🦂
He could do no wrong!!!
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I was in the mood to watch something ‘stupid’ to combat the Sunday Scaries, so I settled on The Big Lebowski, another Coen Brothers film I haven’t seen since I was a teenager.
John Goodman’s outbursts, the Busby Berkeley-inspired dream sequence, and the trio of German nihilists who like lingonberry pancakes are what make me laugh the most!
Also, I’d kill to go bowling with Steve Buscemi!!!
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Nic Cage’s messy hair, mustache, and Hawaiian shirt were the ~distractions~ I needed most after an emotionally draining week.
I haven’t seen Raising Arizona since I was a teenager, but it’s just as ridiculous and romantic as I remember! I love that it’s essentially a 90-minute Coen Brothers episode of Looney Tunes!
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The *cure* for my anxiety is watching The Cure circa 1986 in 35mm.
Robert Smith skipping/spinning around on stage got me giggling like a schoolgirl, kicking my feet, and twirling my hair for real!!!
Performing “One Hundred Years” immediately followed by “A Forest” and “Sinking” was ~certainly~ a choice… 🥵
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Watching this 3-hour show celebrating The Cure’s recently released album, “Songs Of A Lost World,” made me feel even more grateful I got to see them perform last spring at the legendary Hollywood Bowl.
They still sound amazing after all these years!!!
And now I’m off to listen to “Endsong” on repeat.
P.S. During the set, if you don't crack the ~cheesiest~ smile while Robert Smith sings “Close to Me,” you have no soul!!!
I’ve spent the entire day processing Anora, attempting to articulate every emotion I experienced in the cinema — the (eventual) comedown as soon as I got home late last night. I’m honestly surprised by how much it moved me!
But all I can really say is that I couldn’t have picked a more perfect film to watch while celebrating the first year of my sobriety.
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How could I not spend Halloween with the eternally badass beauty Zoë Lund in one of my favorite films ever?!
The ~moment~ I love most is when she’s wearing a nun's habit and *blessing* each bullet with a kiss as she loads her .45 — Lund’s face reflected in a mirror expresses what so many of us wish we could say: “Fuck ‘em all.” 💋💋💋
I imagine vengeance tastes sweeter than the Twizzlers I’ve been eating all night…
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Late 1970s scuzzy New York, Abel Ferrara rockin’ denim on denim, a bemusing buffalo painting, punks that can only play the Peter Gunn bass line, women with crimped hair and heavily applied blush *shit-talking* in the sleazy club bathroom, a phallic power tool, lots of fake blood, and McDonald's leftovers — I desperately wanted to like The Driller Killer, but it was just ~okay~
I still love that naughty Cancerian Catholic boy, Ferrara, though! 🫶🏼
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Two sisters living in their grandfather’s German castle are the *manifestation* of a centuries-old curse between two rival sisters known as the Red Queen and the Black Queen. Sadly, one sister dies — both in the legend and ‘real life’ and subsequently returns from the grave to exact revenge and claim seven souls.
The Red Queen Kills Seven Times is probably one of my favorite Gialli I’ve seen thus far!!! I’m all about Gothic fairy tales and melodramatic murder mysteries, so I had a lot of fun!
Like always, the twists and turns caught me by surprise, which is why I enjoy this genre as much as I do. You’d think by now I'd be less oblivious, but no, I’m easily distracted by the clothes and makeup.
Hands down, this Giallo had the best dressed cast of them all! Not to mention, every woman had a perfect smoky eye — whether she was scheming, sleeping, getting shot, or stabbed… These ~trivial details~ delight me and are why I’ll keep returning to this film in the future!
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🍂Gialli Girl Autumn🍂 continues, and I’m so glad I decided to watch The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave!
It’s a Gothic-infused Giallo, which I didn’t mind, considering how much I love ornately decorated castles, decrepit crypts scattered with dead flowers, a paranoid protagonist with unusual psychosexual urges, a nighttime séance, and supernatural sightings.
There are also burlesque babes with red hair, a medieval torture chamber, an ‘Adam and Eve frolicking and fucking in the Garden’ dream sequence, funky early 1970s fashion, and more!!!
If you prefer backstabbing in favor of bloodshed (obviously, killings still occur), this Giallo might be for you!
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I’m an easy girl to please — give me split diopter shots and my #1 childhood crush, Josh Hartnett, and I’ll have a pretty good time!
Yes, Trap was corny, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t cracking up!!!
Kid Cudi’s cameo (his hilarious interaction with Hartnett) was the cherry on top of this shit sundae. I’m so down for seconds. 🤌🏼
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No matter how many times I watch The Sixth Sense, that ~car conversation~ between Haley Joel Osment and Toni Collette never fails to make me cry!
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Ugh, I gave Lucio Fulci the benefit of the doubt and unknowingly watched the filthiest fucking Giallo. ☹️
Fingers crossed I don’t dream of Donald Duck’s degenerate-sounding voice tonight… Yuck!!!
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I don’t know if I can continue riding the Lucio Fulci train if the eye-gouging is going to get gnarlier than this. 🫣
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This was my introduction to Lucio Fulci, and I can finally confirm he’s one freaky ass Italian!!! I think I’m into it, though??? For what it’s worth, that insane ending had me *screaming* at the TV!
Even though it’s not as gory as I imagine Fulci’s later films are, Don’t Torture a Duckling is still a macabre and mean-spirited story surrounding dead children, small-town superstitions, sexual repression, and Catholic guilt in southern Italy.
I’m definitely taking a deep dive into Tomás Milián’s 1970s-era filmography after watching this — you know, for um, ~research purposes~
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Damn, what a confident directorial debut — this is the definitive Giallo for a reason!
I always appreciate Dario Argento’s films because of how their twisty endings get me every single time! The Bird with the Crystal Plumage was no different, and its reveal had me cackling!!!
Dare I say one of the genre’s best dressed killers? Their outfit in that last scene was to die for...
]]>House of Psychotic Women: An Autobiographical Topography of Female Neurosis in Horror and Exploitation Films by Kier-La Janisse
***This is by no means a complete list of all of the films referenced in the book***
Here are some of the films I want to prioritize watching!
I probably won’t get through all of these, but if you see something worthwhile, don’t be shy — please let me know!
- Dracula's Daughter
- The Curse of the Cat People
- The Snake Pit
- The Innocents
- What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?
- The Depths
- The Demon
- Strait-Jacket
- Seance on a Wet Afternoon
- Repulsion
...plus 77 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>***This is a work in progress***
I’m ranking the best dressed girls of Gialli based on how cute and covetable their outfits are!
I’ve seen quite a few Gialli in the past, but I’m only including the films I’ve logged on Letterboxd for this list.
Recommendations are always welcome!
~Italian productions only~
- The Red Queen Kills Seven Times
- Amuck!
- Torso
- The Bird with the Crystal Plumage
- Don't Torture a Duckling
- Slaughter Hotel
- All the Colors of the Dark
- The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave
- The Case of the Bloody Iris
- Paranoia
...plus 9 more. View the full list on Letterboxd.
]]>Here are some Poliziotteschi films directed by Umberto Lenzi that I want to prioritize watching!
Please don’t judge, I’m only doing this for Tomás Milián, Maurizio Merli, and Claudio Cassinelli… 😉
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