...hanno cambiato faccia

(1971) They Have Changed Their Face/ ...hanno cambiato faccia (In Italian with English subtitles) DRAMA HORROR

Co-written and directed by Corrado Farina that has regular office factory worker, Alberto Valle (Giuliano Disperati) ordered by his superior to meet the president of the corporation, Giovanni Nosferautu (Adolfo Celi) of "Auto Avio Motors" comp. And during his drive he then notices he is running low on gas and tries to communicate with the villagers with the only person who reached out to him is a female wearing a thick coat with no bra and topless, Laura (Francesca Modigliani) coincidentally heading toward the same direction. And by the time he reaches the villa, and tries to ring himself in, there is no one there to greet him by the fence's gate. And when a door is finally discovered, he then decides to walk the rest of the way with Laura deciding not to to walk with him. He would then hands her the keys, she tells him she will wait for him. As he is walking toward the villa, two cars are driving alongside with him. And when Alberto tries to make conversation with them, they act unresponsive as if they are dead. He is then greeted by Giovanni Nosferatu's secretary, Corrina (Geraldine Hooper) and she tells him he will not be able to see him until dinner which is weirdly served at 10 PM. It is during then Alberto does some snooping around that does not really does anything. It just resorts to more weird stuff happening.

The name Nosferatu was mentioned on purpose and although I did not see the ending the way that it happened, the entire set up was routine and boring. To which if anyone were to watch many vampire movies the approach is still the same for I would have liked it more had it been shortened to 45 minutes both the impact and message of capitalism would still be the same.

Italian jazz, Italian car factories and an invitation to meet the boss. That juxtaposition of the naked woman in the fur coat and the lifeless village. All surface style in the villa, executive toys clacking away. Great first appearance (complete with choir!) of Celli. The offer is made; there's a room full of ickle babies and a troupe of white fiats. It's a fascinating little flick. The allegory may be a bit heavy handed, but there's a real style here.

This Italian horror film is one that is most certainly coming at us from a decidedly different angle. Its director Corrado Farina was also responsible for the more well-known Baba Yaga but for my money They Have Changed Their Face is the better film. It's an adaption of Bram Stoker's novel Dracula but with some serious differences. In it the Dracula substitute is a powerful businessman called Giovanni Nosferatu. Like the book, he also lives in a remote mountainous region of Eastern Europe and the storyline also follows a hapless businessman who has been sent to see him. But aside from a similar basic story structure this film takes the material into very unusual places. Atypically for an Italian horror film this is a somewhat satirical movie. It's an allegory on capitalism, where the modern vampires have moved with the times and now prey on the public differently. Instead of sucking their blood, they suck the life from them with soul-destroying commercials and generally prey on the population with ruthless capitalism.

All this is well and good but what takes it up a level is the overall strangeness of the presentation. The vampire's house is a crumbling old building but inside it is very chic and modern. His henchmen drive around in white minis while sporting jump suits and helmets. While inside the house the hero is exposed to commercials; cumulating in an excellent later scene where a selection of newly developed adverts are shown to Mr Nosferatu in his board room. It's all very disconcerting and, to be honest, it's very hard predicting where this one is going to go. This is very inventive genre film-making that's for sure. The soundtrack by Amedeo Tommasi is great as well, with a variety of tones and themes. It helps set the atmosphere, which is one of real mystery. There is also a good cast too. Adolfo Celi is well suited to the role of Giovanni Nosferatu. But perhaps most interesting of all is Geraldine Hooper who was most famous for her turn as a male homosexual in Dario Argento's Deep Red. Frankly, it was only due to this film that I was even aware that she was not a bloke!

This is one of the most original Italian genre pictures from the 70's. It's one that certainly needs to be seen by a far wider audience.

Just like Baba Yaga, Corrado Farina's only other film made for cinema, They Have Changed Their Face is a quasi-horror film which is really a commentary on something else altogether, and although unlike that film there's no animation or boxing matches with Jesus, there's enough weirdness to carry the threadbare plot.

Alberto works for an automobile company and is delighted to find that the CEO of the company wants to speak to him. He travels to the top of the building where he discovers that the actual true owner of the company is a Mr Nosferatu (Adolfo Celi), who wishes to have Alberto visit his remote villa in the mountains. Alberto hasn't read Bram Stoker's Dracula and thinks there's nothing creepy about that at all.

Things do start getting creepy when the guy and the petrol station runs off when he asks for directions to the villa, and no one will speak to him in the village except a travelling hippy chick who is swanning around the place looking for a lift to somewhere more interesting. Alberto obliges, probably because he's a nice guy and probably not because this chick is walking around with her boobs hanging out.

She gives him the usual 'living free/non-conformist' jive these hippies like to bore people with, and then starts putting the moves on him, but Alberto is determined to see his boss. Laura (the hippy) elects to wait in the car for him while he makes his way up to one of the stranger villas to appear in Italian cinema. For starters, he's escorted to this house by two silent men driving tiny white cars. He's then ushered into the building by a very pale, tall woman who is Mr Nosferatu's secretary. She informs Alberto that Mr Nosferatu doesn't entertain visitors until the evening but in the meantime Alberto is free to relax and have a drink. Alberto (and the audience) quickly find out that the real purpose of the plot is for director Farina to make some sort of comment on the symbiotic relationship between consumer and the big corporations who offer us every product we desire. This is done subtly when Alberto's arse makes contact with a couch and an advert about the couch starts blaring from speaks on the wall. This also happens when he uses a certain shower gel and of course a 'Mr Nosferatu' brand johnny to shag Nosferatu's secretary.

It becomes clear soon enough that Farina is in piss-take mode as he makes fun of the Dracula story (Nosferatu does have a crypt, for instance, but also likes to shoot targets that yell when he hits one). Alberto is the Jonathan Harker character who tries to escape as things get stranger, but is lured back by the secretary, and of course the promotion of a high-level promotion.

The best bit for me was when Nosferatu has a board meeting to discuss the mass-marketing of LSD and is shown three different adverts. One makes fun off Jean Luc-Godard's socio-political style, and best of all there's a Fellini pastiche where a clown plays a trombone in the middle of a field while his mother and father look on. It's nearly, but not quite, as fun as Baba Yaga, this one.

I don't know if I haven't to even mention the quality of Adolfo Celi's acting. He seems to pull any character without any effort whatsoever, so even a vampiric corporate fat cat comes across naturally and charming.

And that hippy in the car? Farina saves the best joke for last...

After re-watching this obscure Italian gem, I'm even more convinced that Corrado Farina is a true neglected maestro of Italian horror cinema. Granted, he's only made four films, two of them being horror (the other one is the delirious fumetti adaptation "Baba Yaga"), but they really shows a unique style that is hardly seen elsewhere in the genre. In fact, even more so than "Baba Yaga", "Hanno Cambiato Faccia" is something of a black sheep of 70's Italian horror. The most obvious difference is the look of the film. While most of it's kind are photographed with Bavaesque colors, this one is almost completely pale and "lifeless", with all the exterior scenes filmed in nearly deserted, fog-shrouded landscapes and with stark white, minimalist interiors. Corrado's script is also very well written and intelligent. Something of a loose adaptation of Bram Stoker's "Dracula", set in 1970's Italy, we follow a young man who goes to visit his boss - Giovanni Nosferatu, the head of a huge corporation, at his secluded country villa, in order to get a promotion. As soon as he gets there, however, he soon realizes there's something not quite right with Mr. Nosferatu, and he eventually comes to the conclusion that the man is a vampire. Not unlike Hans Geissendorfer's eccentric masterpiece "Jonathan", this is an obvious allegory to capitalism, with corporate tycoons presented as vampires who feed on the expenses of their consumers, and the title means that these foul beings are still living in our modern society, only under a different image. The metaphor is presented very subtly, and doesn't come across as being pretentious. The film's finale, though some can see as being anti-climatic, actually enhances this, and leaves a haunting, lingering impression, rather than a shocking one, on the viewer. One of the film's greatest assets is the contrast between classic Gothic imagery with high-tech, ultra-modern settings. Nosferatu's villa is, on the outside, old and crumbling, surrounded by a foreboding forest and an ancient cemetery. There's also a nearby village with the creepy innkeeper-ish character who warns the protagonist of his destination before he gets there. Hell, there's even a cobwebbed crypt for the vampire to sleep in. Another brilliant aspect is the choice cast. Adolfo Celli is just effortlessly creepy as the undead businessman, and Giuliano Esperanti makes for a likable protagonist in his Jonathan Harker-type role. Argento fans will be surprised to see the androgynous Geraldine Hooper, best known as Gabriele Lavia's homosexual lover in "Deep Red", as Celli's mysterious and seductive secretary, a "Bride of Dracula", if you will. As a whole, I think I slightly prefer "Baba Yaga" over this, but only by a hair, as "They Have Changed Faces" is obviously the better written, better acted of the two. Speaking of which, even if you didn't like "Baba Yaga", I urge you to see this film - it's a highly original, intelligent slice of Italian Horror, and another one that deserves more praise and recognition. 9/10