Opiniones de usuarios

Pomeriggio caldo is the kind of film that tries to simmer with sultry intensity but ends up lukewarm and unfocused. Set in a sweltering southern Italian town, the film attempts to build atmosphere through long silences, sun-drenched backdrops, and lingering shots of dusty interiors, but the result feels more like a series of loosely connected moments than a cohesive cinematic experience. Joe D'Amato, known for walking the line between erotica and exploitation, seems here more interested in aesthetic than substance. While the hazy heat is palpable in nearly every frame, there's no real tension to match it. Instead, we get the visual impression of a mood that never fully arrives.

The cinematography has flashes of beauty. Some scenes have an almost painterly quality, especially those shot during the golden hours of dusk, where shadows spill across old stone walls and empty beds. But this same visual style becomes repetitive fast. Wide, static shots of empty rooms and listless characters might have worked had they been used sparingly, but here they dominate the film. The effect is numbing rather than hypnotic.

The cast is mostly composed of underused or misdirected actors. Afef Jnifen, in a rare screen role, brings an intriguing presence, but she's saddled with a character too thinly written to leave much impression. Her performance suggests more complexity than the film ever allows her to explore. The rest of the cast ranges from serviceable to disinterested, with few moments of genuine emotion. Many scenes rely on prolonged stares or wandering movements that fail to convey the internal lives of the characters. Instead of building tension, these choices often come off as stalling tactics to pad the runtime.

Despite its brief runtime, the film drags, weighed down by a repetitive visual rhythm and a script that mistakes mood for meaning. The eroticism, which D'Amato clearly leans on, feels more like an afterthought than a narrative driver. The film seems to want to say something about longing, displacement, or isolation, but never follows through. It floats in a sort of narrative limbo, content to suggest rather than develop.

Bizarre Voodoo Ritual (1987)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Also known as POMERIGGIO CALDO, HOT AFTERNOON and 11 DAYS 11 NIGHTS 3, this D'Amato low-budget flick doesn't have too much going for it except for some real badness that makes it mildly entertaining. A reporter (Allen Cort) takes his kinky girlfriend (Valentine Derny) to New Orleans where they're going to do a story with a woman (Carey Sally) whose husband was killed in some sort of voodoo ritual. Soon the girlfriend takes off with another man leaving our reporter depressed and just standing outside their window watching them have sex. This is yet another D'Amato softcore effort and it's got some really horrid dialogue and awful performances but these are two reason to actually watch the film. I must admit that I found all three leads to be very bad with their performances and not for a second did I buy any of them in their roles. Cort gets to scream some of the lamest dialogue in film history (If you want to f*** him for now that's fine. When you're done, remember where I am) but his delivery is just as funny. Not for a second did I believe him to be a reporter and I'd have a hard time believing he could actually spell his name. Derny certainly fits her sexual part but her acting still leaves a lot to be desired. The movie actually does do a pretty good job at balancing the "story" with all the nudity and sex. D'Amato uses the New Orleans settings to his advantage and the music score isn't too bad at all. The sex scenes themselves are pretty bad as you'll be feeling more laughs than any type of erotic nature. Fans of the director will probably want to check this out even though the subject of sex and voodoo had been used by him in his early 80s period with films like EROTIC NIGHTS OF THE LIVING DEAD and the horrible PORNO HOLOCAUST.