{"id":2996,"date":"2011-06-06T11:43:09","date_gmt":"2011-06-06T15:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=2996"},"modified":"2011-06-06T11:43:09","modified_gmt":"2011-06-06T15:43:09","slug":"dvd-autopsy-macchie-solari-1975","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=2996","title":{"rendered":"DVD: Autopsy \/ Macchie solari (1975)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Return to: <\/strong>Home <\/a>\/\u00a0Blu-ray, DVD, Film Reviews<\/a> \/ <\/em>A<\/a><\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/a>Film: Good\/ DVD Transfer: Good\/ DVD Extras: Standard<\/p>\n

Label: Anchor Bay\/ Region: 1 (NTSC) \/\u00a0Released: March 21, 2000<\/p>\n

Genre: Giallo \/ Mystery \/ Thriller<\/p>\n

Synopsis: A sudden flurry of suicides and murders possibly influenced by sun spots begin to affect the emotional state of a city coroner.<\/p>\n

Special Features: International \u201cThe Victim\u201d and U.S. theatrical trailers<\/p>\n

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Review:<\/p>\n

Not unlike a Larry Cohen shocker (think God Told Me To<\/strong>), Armando Crispino\u2019s Autopsy<\/strong> begins with a strange, lurid hook: solar flares are causing ordinary people to commit mass murder and off themselves in bewilderingly violent fashion, and the secret life of city coroner Simona Sana\u2019s father may hide some clues to this peculiar pattern of violence that\u2019s now endangering the pretty gamine.<\/p>\n

Actually, no<\/em>.<\/p>\n

SPOILER ALERT<\/p>\n

Crispino, along with hack writer Lucio Battistrada, junk their novel premise + Simona\u2019s weird delusions of seeing splayed cadavers advancing towards her in the autopsy room for a standard giallo, where people are being killed because of an inheritance connected to the flooding of Venice which destroyed valuable city records.<\/p>\n

END OF SPOILER<\/p>\n

The strange thing about Autopsy<\/strong> is had Crispino stuck with the mystery tale alone, the film would\u2019ve had a better chance of succeeding, but it\u2019s also saddled with an unintentionally schizophrenic leading heroine who always manages to recover from horrid trauma as though she\u2019d just taken a magical aspirin.<\/p>\n

Whatever aspirations Farmer had of eking our a serious acting career in Italy kind of went south when she began to slide into banal genre entries in which women were put onscreen to be pretty, scared, naked, scared, curious, scared, and occasionally content.<\/p>\n

Crispino\u2019s film bears one of the most misogynistic attitudes among gialli because every male character\u2019s a sleazy pig, and wants to get between Simona\u2019s legs: her colleague, for example, gropes and attempts to rape Simona in the autopsy room, and when the event is brought to the attention of her boyfriend (played by a mechanical by Ray Lovelock), his response is to exclaim it\u2019s a lack of recognizing her beauty. He then tears off her top, and boffs her hard, after which she\u2019s fine, and forgotten all about being treated like a piece of meat.<\/p>\n

Gialli aren\u2019t female-friendly – women tend to die horribly \u2013 but there\u2019s so much sexual rage among the male characters, one can\u2019t help wondering if Crispino actually liked women. There\u2019s such a foul attitude in Autopsy<\/strong>, and it\u2019s a major undercurrent which may be why the solar flare premise was junked in favour of a familiar heroine struggling to make sense of a mounting mystery \u2013 more opportunities to stage encounters between Simona and crotch-hungry hands,<\/p>\n

Crispino also intercuts the same stock documentary footage of solar flares to maintain a sense of thematic cohesion, but there\u2019s none, and he has the attention span of a gnat, smash- and jump-cutting shots and connective scenes in a manner that might infer Godard or the brilliant Franco Arcalli (Death Laid an Egg<\/strong>), but is really just the poorly imitative work of a rank hack.<\/p>\n

Ennio Morricone slummed his way through the score, sticking to his formulaic contrast of a lullaby main theme and chaotic weirdness; it works (particularly the bizarre vocal effects), but it\u2019s a smart score that fails to elevate the film\u2019s banality.<\/p>\n

The plus side of Crispino\u2019s nonsense lies in the spastic nature of scenes: actors blurt reactions, spout quotably awful dialogue, and the terrible editing ensures a fast pace regardless of whether it turns a tragic moment into bathos. The gore is minor; the cinematography is hasty, making otherwise stylish Italian architecture look plain ugly; and Barry Primus plays the role of ex-race car driver \/ newbie priest (!) with hysterical gravitas.<\/p>\n

The film\u2019s best moments tend to involve Farmer freaking out (either from an awakening cadavers or her sleazy apartment concierge), plus a ridiculous scene where Simona\u2019s father Gianni (an embarrassed Massimo Serato) lies in a hospital bed with a busted back, and hooked up to some flashing light gizmo, attempts to spell the name of a needed clue in lieu of his busted voicebox. It\u2019s a scene that presages the blinky-blinky headband mind-meld in Exorcist II: The Heretic<\/strong> (1977), and it\u2019s top fragrant film fromage.<\/p>\n

Anchor Bay\u2019s DVD (reissued in 2007 by Blue Underground) includes a trailer sporting the alternate title \u201cThe Victim,\u201d and reveals every money shot \u2013 include the finale \u2013 so avoid viewing prior to the film.<\/p>\n

Mimsy Farmer\u2019s other giallo entries include Four Flies on Grey Velvet<\/strong> (1971), The Perfume of the Lady in Black<\/strong> (1974), and The Black Cat<\/strong> (1981).<\/p>\n

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\u00a9 2011 Mark R. Hasan<\/p>\n

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Related links:<\/em><\/p>\n

DVD \/ Film: \u00a0Exorcist II: The Heretic<\/a><\/strong> (1977) —\u00a0Perfume of the Lady in Black, The<\/a><\/strong> (1974)<\/p>\n

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Related external links (MAIN SITE):<\/em><\/p>\n

DVD \/ Film: Death Laid an Egg<\/a> <\/strong>(1968)<\/p>\n

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External References<\/em>:<\/p>\n

IMDB <\/a>— Soundtrack Album<\/a> — Composer Filmography<\/a><\/p>\n

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Buy from:<\/em><\/p>\n

Amazon.com<\/strong> \u2013\u00a0Autopsy (1975)<\/a><\/p>\n

Amazon.ca<\/strong> –\u00a0Autopsy<\/a><\/p>\n

Amazon.co.uk <\/strong> –\u00a0Autopsy [1974] (NTSC) [DVD] [1975] [Region 1] [US Import]<\/a><\/p>\n

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Return to<\/strong>:\u00a0Home <\/a>\/\u00a0Blu-ray, DVD, Film Reviews<\/a> <\/em><\/em><\/em>\/\u00a0A<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Return to: Home \/\u00a0Blu-ray, DVD, Film Reviews \/ A . Film: Good\/ DVD Transfer: Good\/ DVD Extras: Standard Label: Anchor Bay\/ Region: 1 (NTSC) \/\u00a0Released: March 21, 2000 Genre: Giallo \/ Mystery \/ Thriller Synopsis: A sudden flurry of suicides and murders possibly influenced by sun spots begin to affect the emotional state of a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[18],"tags":[518,131,517,519],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-Mk","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2996"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2996"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2996\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3008,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2996\/revisions\/3008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2996"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2996"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2996"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}