Maniac Killer

Wou. Another horror film from great director Andrea Bianchi. It is not much gored. But it has nice locations, perverted rich bastards, the atmosphere of another dimension. Sometimes I was thinking about some Chechz old films. The film is rather slow, but not boring. As usual the actors show rather unusual perverted personalities, science fiction detective man, local freak and many more details, reminding of Russian writer Yuri Mamleyev. The far out underworld with rather moody afternoon picture and hypnotic score. I would recommend that film to someone who really likes psychedelic awesome vision on cinema. Andrey Grachev. If you like Andrea Bianchi, please, write to me. I am gathering all possible info about him.

www.myspace.com/neizvest

My recent '80s Italian kick led me to a weird place - the Italian-French co-production Maniac Killer (1987). This is a bizarre one as there are two separate plots going on here. One has a cult led by Gondrand (Robert Ginty) that tortures impure women and then he kidnaps the wife of Count Silvano (Bo Svenson, who should never play someone named Silvano). The second plot has professor Roger Osborne (Chuck Connors) performing experiments in life extension at his isolated mansion. The only common thing connecting these two are some cop characters that visit both. Andrea Bianchi is often credited as the director (under the pseudonym Frank Drew White), but this feels more like a Jess Franco film (and it was produced by his main outfit, Eurocine). It definitely has that Joseph Lai or Godfrey Ho feeling of two separate films being edited together. Oh, there is also no maniac killer so no one is killed by a maniac killer.

Maniac Killer - 1987 (This Film Rates a D ) After getting slapped in the face by a jerk of a man, Rosalee walks home in the dark alone and is stalked by an unknown assailant. She is drugged and carried away. Rosalee wakes up chained to a wall then stripped and tortured. The next day word gets around town and rumors start. A man is thought to be "experimenting on animals and women until they die". Meanwhile there is a town "half wit" named Matthew. He collects a cat/rabbit/bird in a canvas bag and is fascinated with fireworks. Matthew is snatching these creatures for Professor Roger Osborne who is a molecular biologist. This guy never takes off his lab coat. Anyways, he needs the animals for "new fresh blood". The professor teaches Matthew how to speak. There are also interludes of Occultist torture scenes that break up the monotonous and painful storyline. These feel very disjointed. The group of occultists torture women into confessing they are possessed by Satan and to "purify their souls". There are no real connections with either story except the local police investigations which intertwine both. By the time it ends you won't care about any of it. The acting is pretty terrible, but it is a French film. This is highlighted by the shootout scene at the 45-minute mark or the knockout scene at the 1 hour 6-minute mark. The poor doorman gets knocked out twice. No real gore but has some teaser moments that just do not pan out. So many gunshot to the stomach death moments. On the positive side there are a few boob shots. Do not waste your time here.

Maniac Killer is a typically surreal Eurociné production. There's no gore, in case you're hoping director Bianchi would repeat his blood feast from Burial Ground. There is an extremely unconvincing shootout, everyone seems to get shot in the the stomach(most convenient place to strap on a squib?) Robert Ginty (the Exterminator) crushes a glass in his hand - of course he's evil. There's a shaky hand-held shot of the Eiffel tower. There's also a village idiot reminiscent of Bob in City of the living dead. Maniac Killer is as low on any action as Gianni Martucci's the Red Monks. Nothing happens. Still, there is certain weirdness to the film.

I must first say that I was kind of disappointed by the lack of gore in this movie by Andrea Bianchi (director of Burial Ground). Having seen the gorefest that is Burial Ground, I was expecting something along those lines, but it's not. Nevertheless, this movie was entertaining with its bad acting and its plot that barely make sense.

It's the story of a weird cult that kidnaps prostitutes in a small French village, and tortures "inquisition style" in order to purify their souls. But, soon the local pimp and others will seek revenge. It also includes a scientist from California that uses the village idiot to capture small animals to experiment on them.

Entertaining, if you want to laugh at a bad movie.