Das Geheimnis der blutigen Lilie

Giuliano Carnimeo's "Perché quelle strane gocce di sangue sul corpo di Jennifer?" aka. "The Case Of The Bloody Iris" of 1972 is a great, tantalizing and stylish Giallo that no lover of Italian Horror can afford to miss. A Giallo with Edwige Fenech and George Hilton in the lead should be recommendation enough for a fan of Italian Horror, and this particular film has so much more to offer. I would go even further and say that "The Case Of The Bloody Iris" is a great textbook example for a Giallo: Sleaze and nudity, stylishly violent murders, atmosphere, a jazzy soundtrack and a great cast - this stylish flick has everything that my fellow Giallo-lovers should desire in a film. Nevertheless, I do not agree that this is a giallo-highlight (as some people say). It is a great film, no doubt, but as avid Italian Horror fan (Giallo is one of my favorite genres), I would not name it as one of the highlights of this great sub-genre. That being said, "The Case Of The Bloody Iris" is definitely a great and immensely stylish Giallo that every Horror fan should see.

Seductive beauty queens are being slaughtered one by one in the same house by a masked killer, and the police do not have the slightest clue who the killer could be. When the sexy model Jennifer (Edwige Fenech) moves into a victim's former apartment - and the killer starts stalking her as well...

As mandatory for a good Giallo, the suspense is maintained throughout the movie and the killer's identity and motivations are not revealed until the very end. In a good Giallo almost anybody could be the killer, and "The Case Of The Bloody Iris" sure is no exception here, as almost everybody is suspicious. The characters are very interesting and so is the cast. Sexy Edwige Fenech is always reason enough to see a film, and this is one of the movies that made her a Giallo-queen. George Hilton is also great in the lead, as an architect. Apart from Fenech and Hilton, the cast contains many other familiar faces for fans of Italian genre cinema, such as Giampiero Albertini, who plays the stamp-collecting police commissioner who is investigating the murders. The sexy Carla Brait, who should also be known to genre-fans for her role in Sergio Martino's Giallo-masterpiece "Torso" (1973), is seductive as always as a black stripper. The film is highly atmospheric and excellently photographed in intense colors, and the jazzy soundtrack contributes a lot to the film's style and typical early 70s feeling. All things considered "The Case Of The Bloody Iris" is a great Giallo, that any Horror buff should see. Especially my fellow fans of Italian Horror can not allow themselves to miss this! Highly Recommended!

The Case of the Bloody Iris is one of the most entertaining giallo's of them all.

I do realize that it's far from perfect. It's got wooden performances, childish dialogue, illogical moments (more than a few), plot holes etc..., but it's entertaining as hell. These pure giallo's are guilty pleasures to be sure, featuring a number of knockout damsels in distress, gory murders, black gloved killers, a murder mystery with endless red herrings, law officials without an IQ and almost universally badly dubbed actors.

Here we have it all in abundance and it all works. The women here are quite simply stunning, the murder scenes inventive and well done, the appropriate amount of sleaze, impressive visuals and nice location scenery, a terrific musical score (catchy as hell), decent acting and a fair amount of shocks and suspense. It's also quite funny at times, I've never before or after seen a detective obsessing with stamps.

Highly recommended if you're a fan of giallo films.

Stylish, alluring, and agreeable, "The Case of the Bloody Iris" is a straightforward giallo less notable for its dexterous offings and more for leading lady Edwige Fenech, the inarguable queen of the genre. While never reaching the orgasmic heights of other masterpieces of the era (most helmed by Dario Argento and Mario Bava, of course), "The Case of the Bloody Iris" is still a splendidly fun (albeit gory) murder mystery that embraces its ridiculousness and makes up for convoluted time with sophisticated design and worthy blood-soaked set pieces. It's an admirable time waster, a slasher dressed to the nines in pre-De Palma swank.

As in all gialli, a gloved killer wrapped in sharp black is mercilessly butchering physically beautiful young women for kicks, this time in a luxurious high rise apartment. Days after two women are murdered in a twenty-four hour period, models Jennifer (Edwige Fenech) and Marilyn (Paola Quattrini) move into one of the victims' apartment, hardly worried about the room's sordid past. "Life goes on," Marilyn scoffs, as if wishing to jinx herself into murder mystery oblivion. But it doesn't take long for the pair to realize that such things can hardly be laughed off, especially when considering the building itself seems to contain a number of shady characters easily able to commit such heinous acts. Suspects include a stereotyped lesbian neighbor, a misogynistic old woman that lives with her disturbingly deformed son, and even Jennifer's love interest (George Hilton), an architect with a crippling phobia of blood. And it doesn't help that Jennifer's maniacal ex-husband (Ben Carra) enjoys spending his days stalking his former wife instead of making a living.

In order to fully enjoy "The Case of the Bloody Iris", one must disregard the horrendous dubbing, the severely stiff performances, and the regularly asinine script — because this is a film about style and Edwige Fenech, not much else. (Those expecting the normal amount of generous giallo gore will be sorely disappointed.) The first murder is exquisitely shot — with hardly a word of dialogue to spare, it follows a comely blonde from a telephone booth to her apartment building's elevator, where she winds up slashed to death after the passengers depart one by one. Clearly inspiration for Angie Dickinson's gruesome offing in "Dressed to Kill" (which is miles better), the scene sets the tone of the film: absurd but competently suspenseful. Because much of the film is absurd — Jennifer's religious cult back-story is unneeded and contains a gratuitous orgy scene (hardly graphic) more laughable than tantalizing, and her bad habit of wandering away from safety in a time of danger is maddening — but, for the most part, "The Case of the Bloody Iris" classes it up while later '70s peers of the "Black Christmas" mindset didn't. It cares more about how it appears than how it builds intellectually, so thank God it looks like the chic second cousin of "Blowup" or some other mod infused character study.

Best of all is Edwige Fenech: never have I seen her in one of her famous gialli (those were directed by Sergio Martino, and I'm still in the process of trying to find a copy to view), and this film gives an idea as to why she is an underground legend. With her cat eyes, voluptuous figure, and jet black hair, it's impossible not to stare at her, mouth agape and all. One can hardly call her a fine actress, but Fenech has presence, a characteristic hardly found in other giallo women like Barbara Bouchet or Ida Galli. The camera clings to her composure almost passively; she can turn a poorly executed scene into a work of art by merely acting as its center. Maybe her films with Martino are better, but "The Case of the Bloody Iris" is a giallo minor but palatable.

After the murder of a call girl in a building, the dweller Mizar Harrington (Carla Brait), who is a fighter and stripper in a nightclub, is drowned in her bathtub by the killer. The administrator and architect Andrea Antinori (George Hilton) offers the apartment to the models Jennifer Lansbury (Edwige Fenech) and Marilyn Ricci (Paola Quattrini) for a reasonable price and they move to the flat. Jennifer is the ex-wife of the hippie Adam (Ben Carrá), who forced her to practice group sex and now harasses her all the time. Soon Andrea hits on Jennifer and she becomes his girlfriend. When Adam is found dead in Jennifer's apartment, Andrea becomes the prime suspect of Commissioner Enci (Giampiero Albertini), who assigns his Assistant Commissioner Renzi (Franco Agostini) to follow him everywhere. However, Jennifer believes Andrea is innocent and suspects that one of her neighbors might be the killer.

"Perché quelle strane gocce di sangue sul corpo di Jennifer?", a.k.a. "The Case of the Bloody Iris", is a Italian thriller silly and predictable. The goofy Marilyn Ricci is an annoying and unfunny character; Commissioner Enci is ridiculous and dull; the dialogs are very poor; and the music score is irritating and dated. It is not difficult to know who the killer is. But may be entertaining for fans of "giallo" genre. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "As Lágrimas de Jennifer" ("The Tears of Jennifer")

There is a mysterious gloved and masked killer stalking and murdering beautiful young Italian women. Sound familiar? But of course, this is a Giallo from the early 70's!

The Case of the Bloody Iris is part of Anchor Bay's four dvd set The Giallo Collection. Three of the movies can be purchased separately, but The Case of the Bloody Iris can only be purchased as part of the set.

The Case of the Bloody Iris starts out with a pretty young blonde woman being murdered in an elevator in an urban apartment building . The killer is wearing rubber gloves and stabs her with a knife that looks like a scalpel. A day later in the same apartment building, another woman is drowned in her bathtub by a killer wearing the same rubber gloves. This murder is pretty brutal to watch as far as movie murders go.

There is an architect by the name of Andrea (George Hilton), who dated the second murdered woman and starts seeing another woman, Jennifer (ably portrayed by the beautiful Edwige Fenech) who recently left a small religious group lead by a crazed guy who keeps harassing her and trying to get her back to the group. Through a flashback scene we discover that they were into group sex and and he seems to be, and is, seriously deranged. There is also a woman living with her father in an apartment in the building and she hits on every woman she encounters, which in this film are beautiful models and dancers.

A couple more murders into the film and Andrea is suspected by the police of performing the murders, especially after a woman is murdered on the street and witnesses see only him covered in blood and running away from the scene. The police have been following him using a detective who serves as a minor bit of comic relief (fortunately he doesn't try to be too funny). Jennifer also starts suspecting Andrea of committing the murders and after they arrange a secret meeting trying to elude the police, he seems more guilty then ever.

This is a well made movie with a decent script and is well acted by the entire cast. I recommend it for anyone who like a well made Giallo and also as a decent who dunnit.

This movie is released in a beautiful 2.35:1 widescreen display. The sound quality, while dated, sounded great out of my speakers. Extra features on the disk include an alternate stabbing scene and theatrical trailer. The alternate stabbing scene is just an abbreviated version of one of the stabbings late in the movie. Personally I liked the longer version in the film better. The Giallo Collection goes for around $40-50 which means each movie is around $10-13 each. This is a great price for movies that may have never seen the light of day in U.S. except for the Anchor Bay's decision to bring well made Italian Giallo's to the American market.