Tulpa - Demonio del deseo

It might be a strange to criticise this modern day giallo film for looking a little cheap; in their heyday in the early 70s, such genre films were never hugely budgeted.

This does have the look of an Indie film though, which is absolutely no problem in itself, but it robs the production of the stylish values usually attributed to the gialli.

The acting is fine, although Italian actors speaking English when it is not their first language damages it a bit. It also makes it difficult to care about the characters, which is unfortunate as many of them spend quite a few scenes in jeopardy.

I don't mean to be too damning here though. Any half-respectable reinvention of the gialli style is a good thing as far as I'm concerned, and there are some nicely filmed set pieces and some weird and fascinating red herrings - and a fair bit of sex too. My score is 6 out of 10.

I saw it at Sitges this year and i was impressed by the quality of this crazy and bloody Italian flick. Zampaglione clearly knows his stuff and with this new film he shows all his love for the genre. . Tulpa visually looks fantastic,and it's a well performed addition to Italian cinema, most importantly it does what it intends to do, it remains faithful to the Giallo mentality, and breathes life back into a dead area of the horror/thriller genres.

Zampaglione even goes as far to bring back the traditional Giallo killer, a dark shadowy figure, with face covered, black hat, and those leather gloves . There are also some incredible and elaborated murders you will never forget. Giallo fans will love this one.

Claudia Gerini plays Lisa Boeri,a successful business woman who is also a member of an exclusive club in which people are having sex with multiple partners in order to reach a higher level of consciousness.But people with whom Lisa had sexual encounters begin to die viciously murdered by a killer dressed in black.It's up for Lisa to track the killer down.Federico Zampaglione's "Tulpa - Perdizioni Mortali" is a pretty vicious and bloody Italian neo-giallo scripted by Dardano Sacchetti.The film has some obvious references to Dario Argento's "Tenebre" or "Inferno" and Sergio Martino's early 70's gialli.The killings are stylish and brutal and there is plenty of sex and nudity.Unfortunately there are some dull scenes and the dialogue is horrible at times.7 hungry rats out of 10.

Some great cinematography early on, the score is consistently nice and the creative/gory deaths are enjoyable to watch. Sadly, that's about it.

The acting in 'Tulpa - Demon of Desire' isn't the best, though I don't actually blame the cast - rather the filmmakers, who chose to shoot the majority of the film in English, despite having a mostly - if not entirely - Italian cast. The language choice makes it feel clunky and cheap.

I liked watching Claudia Gerini in the lead role, she does a solid enough job. There aren't any others I'd pick out, though. There are a few that play a big part, one in particular with the twist at the end - which is poorly executed. I do, meanwhile, give the film credit for how it mixes the sexual stuff into the story.

A bigger budget and cleverer writing could've made this great, instead it's a disappointment in my opinion.

The biggest problem with movies like this and Eyes Wide Shut, that revolve around a sooper-seekret sex club is that sex clubs don't generally operate in secret. They tend to be right out in the open. Just for kicks, I googled "swingers clubs rome italy" and got dozens of results.

That said, I enjoyed this movie. It really felt like it could have been made in 1972. Not that it's a period piece or anything, but the style, the pacing, the music, and the whole general vibe of the film felt very retro.