Il boia scarlatto

Mickey Hargitay(aka Mister Jayne Mansfield) pulls all the stops in his demented ham-and-cheese portrayal of a man possessed by "The Crimson Executioner"...a sadistic monster of barbaric times. Gasp as you witness him cruelly torturing a crew of photographers and models who have decided that his dank stone castle is a perfect spot for a photo shoot. While flexing and posing his oiled-up, muscular body in the horrified presence of these helplessly bound captives, he randomly hurls crack-up dialog about how irritated he is by these scrawny plebeians, and how perfectly ripped his awesome body is. What possible retort could an unfortunate victim deliver once slapped with such self-aggrandizing harangue? How about "OH! You are an EGOTIST!"?

HA! ...yes...it's *THAT* good...

BLOODY PIT OF HORRROR labors for Gothic horror atmosphere (mostly by virtue of stone castle sets immersed in garish color-filtered mood lighting), though the upshot is a slumgullion of juvenile comic book shocks tinged with cheap psychedelia and homoerotic S&M weirdness.

A high-camp Eurokitsch favorite...recommended. 6.5/10

This is definitely a MUST PURCHASE DVD for any die-hard euro-horror fan! This ridiculous and extremely entertaining 1965 Italian horror-romp stars Mickey Hargitay (Jayne Mansfield's husband) as "The Crimson Executioner". He struts around bare-chested wearing red tights and admiring his muscular body in the mirror as he rubs it all over with oil. When a film crew comes to his castle, he starts torturing and killing them off one by one, overacting all the way! Mickey is a true ham and jumps around the screen like a lunatic throughout. One great highlight is a room with a giant spiderweb and a hungry spider. And then, of course, there's the torture chamber. There's a rotating torture device that Mickey ties bikini-clad women up to and as it turns a sharp blade rips and tears at their skimpy brassieres and lightly scrapes their flesh! And with Mickey running around half-naked throughout in his red tights, were they also going for a gay audience? It's all quite tame by today's standards, but at the time, this must have been quite a sensation! It's a great sleaze-trash classic NOT TO BE MISSED! The DVD presents the film in it's U.S. 73-minute abbreviated version. 9 minutes were trimmed out of the complete version ("A Tale of Torture") by it's American distributor. The deleted scenes are included as a supplement (including the alternate title sequence), but it's too bad they didn't restore the footage back into the film. Something Weird offers the complete 83 minute version "A Tale of Torture" on VHS under the "Bloody Pit" title so you would have thought this would be the same print. BUT it's not... maybe because the print used here looks a lot better than the "Torture" print and it's fully letter boxed whereas the "Torture" print was only marginally letter boxed. Also, the movie has never looked better than this transfer...the colors are vibrant and sharp and the detail is quite good (although there is some minor artifact). So, having the deleted scenes as a supplement only was probably a good decision.

When a group of photographers and models sneak into an apparently abandoned castle to do a photo-shoot, they are immediately asked to leave by the castle's inhabitant, Travis Anderson (Mickey Hargitay). But when he recognises his ex-fiancé Edith (Luisa Baratto) amongst the group, he changes his mind and gives them the freedom of the castle. Lurking in the castle's dungeons, where the group have set up, is the preserved body of an executed serial-killer named The Crimson Executioner, and when his coffin is disturbed, his spirit is released and enters the body of Travis. Soon enough, bodies are dropping like flies while the 'hero' Rick (Walter Brandi), desperately attempts to save them.

Former Mr. Universe Mickey Hargitay made a moderately successful career for himself after appearing in the excellently madcap Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957) with his wife Jayne Mansfield. He was mainly employed in B-grade Italian horror movies such as the twisted Delirium (1972), and he is just about the only good thing is Bloody Pit of Horror, also known as The Red Hangman, A Tale of Torture, and most hilariously, Some Virgins for the Hangman. Although his role is completely ridiculous, he has a hulking presence that brings a likability to Travis, even when he is wide-eyed, tightening the hold of a rack. Plus I couldn't imagine anyone else being able to pull off those red, spandex pants.

The sets have a bright, technicholour warmth about them, reminiscent of some of the classic Hammer horrors and Roger Corman's Poe adaptations, that give the film a nicely Gothic, if slightly camp, feel. But ultimately it is as effective as wrapping a ribbon around a turd, failing to cover up the sheer atrocity of its direction. It is so over- the-top and silly that the film ends up feeling like a cartoon, containing torture scenes that include a woman stuck in a giant web with a spider so badly constructed, I don't know if it was meant to be real or not. That said, I still found this quite fun, but I don't feel good about it.

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Surely nobody goes into this laughable cheese-fest expecting to see a quality horror film. Even by Italian standards - Bava and Argento excepted - this is utter nonsense. The horror part is well, what horror part? The plot is utterly predictable, no surprises there. The dialog is just as predictable. As for the scenery we are treated to some spectacular vistas (they caught my wife's fancy long enough to pause in passing and in her determination to avoid taking part in my passion for horrible films) and the castle where the action takes place is really cool! So what else is there to recommend this? It's all about perfect bodies, a good number of them, enough to keep members of both sexes entertained. Mickey Hargitay who plays our villain has, as he so proudly informs the audience often enough, THE perfect body. He puts the rest of us puny males to shame with the utter certainty that no matter how hard we try we'll never reach that level of physical beauty. On the other side of the gender barrier the women are equally gorgeous. They are all curvaceous, luscious, mouth-watering eye candy to awaken the man-beast in every male out there. Bear in mind there is no real nudity. The closest we get to risqué scenes is just the hint of the top part of nipples. Otherwise it's all designed to tantalize the male spectator with the prospect of revealing the hidden parts without doing so. How delicious! Well, perhaps not for recently pubescent and inexperienced teens. For them it might be too frustrating.

One final point. The hero is the exact opposite of our gorgeous villain. A Joe Pesci look-alike, he's not exactly my idea of a hero and he in fact gets beat up pretty regularly until he finally prevails with strategic karate chops. Makes you wonder why he doesn't use them before he gets punched out within an inch of his life, but I digress. The heroine is clearly above his league in the looks department but also not as sexy or exotic as any one of the other four women. So I'm not sure but maybe the producers were trying to insert a moral about looks and death but who knows? Any way you look at it this movie will keep you chuckling and salivating neither of which is a bad thing.

It's really hard to score THE CRIMSON EXECUTIONER. On one hand, it's a horribly made little film that is embarrassingly bad. On the other, it's so terribly funny because it is so bad! The film begins with some really obnoxious people breaking into an old castle to take some publicity pictures. However, it turns out the place is NOT unoccupied and the crazy owner tells them to get lost. Oddly, however just moments later he asks them to stay. So, they do and over the course of an evening, the crew members and models are killed off one at a time by the crazy homeowner--who thinks he's the reincarnation of a sicko named the Crimson Executioner. Actually, the guy's outfit makes him look a lot like Diabolik from another Mario Bava film, but that's neither here nor there.

The film is filled with lots of sadistic torture and is reminiscent of the German film, THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM (talk about a great title). However, unlike the German film, this one is much sillier and the horrible punishments really don't look all that realistic--just cheesy. But, because it is made so poorly (with horrible dialog and action throughout), it is worth seeing to have a few laughs. Otherwise, if you do skip it, your brain might appreciate it!