Autopsia

It gets really, really warm in Rome during the month of August, and a lot of Romans head for the hillside towns like Tivoli to cool down a bit, so it's no surprise that those who elect to stay suffer the consequences. A spate of suicides is plaguing the city, as we see a few Romans graphically taking themselves out at the start of the film, including one old guy who puts a plastic bag over his head and jumps in the Tiber. That's no cry for help!

All this business is taking its toll on coroner Mimsy Farmer, who, while doing an autopsy on the old fella, has to also put up with the advances of a weirdo assistant: "Brains leave me cold, but I've got something warm for ya!" To make matters worse Mimsy starts hallucinating that the corpses around her are getting up and bumping uglies with each other. Mimsy needs a break, but of course Ray Lovelock comes along, does an impression of a corpse, and scares the crap out of her. This leads to a romance for some reason.

The plot for this one is rather tangled, but let's try and simplify it. Mimsy lives below an apartment owned by her good-looking, rich father and meets his new fiancé, a nice red-headed girl who is found dead on Ostia beach the next day of a gunshot wound. It's apparently suicide, but then Mimsy is doing a research paper on staged suicide and thinks foul play was involved. So does the dead girl's brother, a race car driver who has since become a priest (yep), so if the girl didn't kill herself, who did, and why?

There are many suspects to choose from, including the dog-owning landlord who is always looking up Mimsy's skirt, the weirdo assistant who, in one of those bad-taste moments of Italian cinema is also a necrophile, Ray Lovelock and his bizarre porn-slideshow seduction techniques (that work!) and Mimsy's father, who is up to something or other. It all comes together in the end but like Armando Crispino's earlier giallo The Etruscan Kills Again your head will be buzzing trying to keep up with all that's going on.

Although the Roman locations, Morricone soundtrack and cinematography lend this one a lot of style, there's still plenty of sleaze to bring the tone down a bit. Both Mimsy and Ray get nude at various stages, as do many other actors (in corpse form, mainly), and one character seems to be holding some sort of art exhibition about dead bodies. It's also a very strange film as well, with a sub plot about the suicides being blamed on sun spots and a bizarrely detailed scene involving one of the characters being horribly crippled after falling off a roof.

'Autopsy' is a very strange and confusing giallo that has to be seen to be believed! Newcomers to the genre best steer clear, but buffs will find this one totally fascinating. Mimsy Farmer (Fulci's 'The Black Cat') stars as an uptight doctor who between wrestling with freaky hallucinations of horny corpses(!) investigates a series of suicides supposedly caused by sunspots(!). A mysterious car racer turned priest (!) (Barry Primus of Scorsese's 'Boxcar Bertha') gets involved in the mystery, though she is unsure whether he is an ally or a suspect. Also in the cast is Ray Lovelock ('The Living Dead In Manchester Morgue') as Farmer's moody and cynical boyfriend. The brief plot synopsis doesn't give you any idea of just how convoluted and nutty this one is. Many will probably find it too flamboyant to stick with until the end, but personally I found it impossible to resist. Easily the most bizarre giallo I've ever seen!

Armando Crispino's `Autopsy' is an authentic Giallo…but slightly more complex and diverse than your ordinary experiences in this field of horror. The constant mix of mystery, suicides and twisted characters makes this film one of the most ambitious Italian flicks of the early 70's. Closely living up to Dario Argento's films when it comes to originality and suspense, but a lot more modest when it comes to violent images. Autopsy contains a downright brilliant opening and the first 5 minutes (showing a series of repulsive suicides in the city of Rome) already were enough for me to consider this film a success. The story loses much of its initial grip, of course, but there still is a lot of imaginativeness to discover throughout the whole film. Compared to many other Gialli, Autopsy features a believable, solid plot and it sticks to it without the overuse of unnecessary plot-twists. The score (by Ennio Morricone) gives you cold shivers and the main characters are creatively presented. How about a depressed pathologist who has visions about the living dead copulating? Or a racecar-driver turned priest and out for vengeance? Autopsy is a lot more suspenseful than it is gory, even though the DVD-cover leads you to believe otherwise. Tension-highlights include a compelling sequence inside the `Death Museum' and an atmospheric experiment upon an entirely paralyzed victim. Add a bit of stylish nudity to all this and you've got yourself an undiscovered and ignored cult-gem. It may not satisfy horror-rookies on a quest to see tons of blood, but it'll sure please the more experienced horror fans. If you're searching for a top-macabre and unsettling horror film, this is the one.

A rather confusing giallo and I think in part this is because of rather lazy direction and a poor performance from Mimsy Farmer who seems to get the wrong look most times and leave us in doubt as to what she is thinking or feeling. One essential in giallo is some sort of empathy for the lead, even if that eventually turns out to be misplaced! Here I don't feel many are very concerned for what happens to Mimsy. And plenty does, that's for certain. Is there another movie where the lead actress gets so much abuse and groping, not to mention attempted rape and up skirt shots!? Of course the Morricone score is first rate and for all the confusion this is a very varied and very different giallo that maintains the interest throughout.

Armando Crispino's "Macchie Solari" aka. "Autopsy" of 1975 is an underrated and quite unusual Giallo that lovers of Italian horror can not afford to miss. Great suspense, bizarre elements and very interesting, often troubled characters come along with a menacing atmosphere and a great, very eerie score by none other than Ennio Morricone. The film already starts out excellently, with several nasty suicides. Rome has been struck by a heat wave, which leads to increased suicidal tendencies among the population. Being constantly surrounded by disfigured corpses is becoming too much for young pathologist Simona (Mimsy Farmer), who is writing a thesis about suicide and murder. Simona, whose job is giving her nightmares and terrible visions, doesn't believe that all of these violent deaths were suicides...

"Autopsy" features many frightening and often bizarre sequences, a quite complex plot and elaborate characters. The storyline is sometimes quite complex to follow, especially since the scene changes often seem quite abrupt, but this only makes the film less predictable, and everything makes perfect sense as a whole. The performances are entirely very good. Mimsy Farmer is excellent in the lead, and portrays her character's fears and nightmares in a very believable manner. Another great performance is delivered by Barry Primus, who plays a quite unusual catholic priest. The cast furthermore includes Ray Lovelock, a regular to Italian genre cinema, and Ernesto Colli, who should be known to Italian Horror buffs for his role in Sergio Martino's 1973 giallo masterpiece "Torso" (aka. "I Corpi presentano tracce di violenzia carnale"). It should be said that "Autopsy" is not the gore-fest the DVD cover might make you think. Even though there are some very violent sequences and many repulsive images, the violence is quite tame compared to many other Gialli of the mid 70s. The movie's main intention is suspense and it definitely succeeds in being suspenseful. "Autopsy" is a stylish, atmospheric and very suspenseful Giallo, that no lover of Italian Horror should allow himself to miss. Highly Recommended!